We climbed Volcan Cerro Negro

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Ahhh, here i am writing this from my hammock in the tranquilo atmosphere of the hostel gardens. Taking a break from Nicaraguas HOT HOT HOT sun shine! It hasnt been this Hot for a while, its the kind of heat that makes you constantly thirsty, a wee bit lathargic and not very hungry, which is rare! (but will do me no harm)

So, we had a bit of a lazy, slow, day yesterday, still managing to fully wander this town called Leon though, but were both suffering from a lack of sleep and energy both of which were brought on by a rare proper night out, full of drinking local beer, not eating all day! eek, and much dancing in a tiny little cheesy club with our new found friends we had met along the way in Santa Ana and also a Finnish guy who joined our merry group that night. Fun times

We decided to stay another day and climb Cerro Negro, its one of the many Volcanos round here and the one which you can surf down yey! Ive never done sand or volcano surfing before, Age has in Namibia and loved it so we thought we´d give it a go, fingers crossed I wasn´t going to topple over and land head 1st into the rocky lava!

The scenery of the volcano and surrounding it were so incredible, I could have stayed for hours taking millions of photos. It was all black lava rock, with white and yellow streaks and patches where the sulphur had bubbled and risen out, then parts of it were tinged in a deep earthy red colour, maybe from the heat, amazing!
After about an hour and a half treck with our little crew of just 5 including our guide David, which made it even more fab as there was only us on this huge huge volcano, we reached the top and perched on the edge, just to sit back forg a moment and take it all in. From here, looking north you could see 3 other volcanos all in a straight line, Cerro Verde, the one we were on is part of 6 that are all in a row, some active and some not. The ones that aren´t are covered in the lushest green vegetation which almost seems to glow in contrast next to the black black hard edgy lava rock.


Time to head down the slipery slope eek! Off came our back packs and everything was revealed from inside them, a snazzy protective suit made from denim on the bottom half and a yellow nylon material to cover my top, it was quite snug, knee & elbow and wrist protector pads, goggles like we wore in science class and thick plastic gloves, I was ready to take on anything dressed like something out of a 70´s game show!
It was a 40% incline and I was a bit nervous, im quite a scardy cat I think, anyway Bill, one of the guys with us was the 1st to go down and he is 69! he did it really slowly though and then I was watching and hoping hoping that my ride would be much faster, but also that I wouldnt fall off, because as you know, if there is the slightest possibility of me getting either muddy or dirty from falling off or in something or tripping over and losing my balance then it WILL happen, here´s hoping that I have grown out of this unfortunate trait and I will desend safely but swiftly too.
I was the last to go, Age was flying down, looked to be in control, David was standing half way down, poised, ready with my camera for my action shot, here goes nothing!
I climb onto my board, lift my legs up and start the slide, and I go all of about 2ft and the lava ash & pebbles has been pushed up onto my board and ive ploughed through it and come to a complete stand still - bugger! Up I get, tip the board up and the ash off and try try again, this time I start to pick up speed and so lift my feet up which makes you go faster and im away, horrah!! down the side of the volcano. kind of in control, constantly lifting my feet up and down off the lava to try and control my speed but trying to have the courage to go faster and faster, untill Im riding one handed rodeo stylie, peering through my goggles, eating dirt and loving it!
There were a couple of shaly moments where a coupole of shaky moments where I could nearly have been tossed over into the gravel but I managed to swerve this and keep on the straight and narrow! amazing, lets do it again!

Stayed yet another day and relaxed at the beach, ate good fresh fish and snacked on amazing street made tacos, filled with chicken with a kind of cabbage coleslaw on the side. Eventually used the chickpeas we had been carrying in our bag for the last month and made, fo rthe 1st time ever, humus, it was a bit varried and make shift as we couldnt find tahini and lemons dont exist out here, so used olive oil and bought what we thought were limes, but were actually a cross between limes and sour sour SOUR oranges, but do you know what, it tasted pretty damn tasty.

This morning were heading either to a lake on a volcano a bit further south or an old colonial city called Granada.

Adios Amigos xxxxxxx

Saving time or saving money....

When travelling you tend to try and live and travel on as little money as possible, partly to do with personal budget but mainly just to see actually how far and how much you can achieve on very little money at all, its just a challenge. It also gives you a chance to travel the local exprience rather than an easy tourist one, this way you get imersed in lots of fun craziness and probably have lots of stories to tell at the end. This can get a bit ridiculous though and Im not a student so dont need to get by on the absolute cheapest options available, I have a bit of leaway and would rather treat myself to a slightly nicer room and great meals out sometimes (bare in mind this can be done for very little over here)

It was time to leave lovely Antigua and start making our way south. San Salvador was our 1st stop. As usuall we set off later than expected so were in a bit of a rush in order to catch the easy 1st class Tica bus from Guatemala City straight to San Salvador. These Tica buses are a bit more expensive, but genrally clean, efficient, straight forward, get you accross borders and where you need to be in a good amount of time and with minimal hasle, which is needed and very welcome some times. We had already decided not to get the shuttle bus from Antigua to Guete City as this was slightly more expensive than the chicken bus, a bit more boring and just a bit too easy. Age wanted to experience local chicken buses (I already have many times) and so you should when travelling around, these are old jazzed up American school buses, jammed packed with locals and a really fun if very cramped way to travel short distaces, but not recomended for longer journeys! The 1.5hr bus journey cost 8 Quetzal = 59p

Money saving 1:0 time saving

We missed our Tica bus . Bugger

A friendly guy that Age met on the bus has decided to help us get from A-B, crapy bus stop to crappy dirty down town bus station, his help is really appreciated, we bus across the city for 1 Queztal = 7p
So lets find our own way to cross the border into El Salvador and make our own way to the capital. This is cheaper, so great, but trickier eek! and now we actually have no choice anyway as were stuck in down town grimy Guatemala City at 2pm and we just have to find a bus to the border quick sticks in order to get there before sun sets. There is a million men hassleing us to get on their bus to the frontier, but we have to go on a treck with our really freakin haevy bags in the hot hot afternoon sun, for more local currency as we havent enough, 20min later, 40 Queztal = 2.95 in hand each, we board the 2nd class bus, sit at the back, our bags have to go in the isles, in betwwen our feet, on our laps, everything gets moved a million times so as to cram as many people onto the bus as humanly possible, and then, once every single seat is filled, and the bus is very hot, 6-8 plastic stools are placed in the isle so that yet more people can be squeezed on, so we are effectively 3 deep about 3 quarters of the way to the front of the bus, wow, no we are ready for our 4hour journey to the border. It is fine, not great, but fine. We arrive at the border at 18:45pm, the sun has set, it is dark and we are thirsty.

Money saving 2:0 time saving

Off we toddle, heavy bags on back accross the border, thank goodness its still open, but think that we may have to find a hotel nearby as the busses have stopped running and to get a taxi now would defeat the whole purpose! The border cost us 10 Q this wasnt an official price just the old man in the qiosk wanted money, enough for a beer as it was late, what can be done hey!
So, its past 7pm, weve made it to El Salvador, its great to be back inthis amazing country,but not sure ho much further we can get. Santa Ana, a City 1hr from SanSalvador is only 30min away but taxi is our only option - or is it...? We get chatting to the border police, Jorge and Jose, really friendly guys, who just happen to be holding huge weapons (goes with the teritory here). Bizarly they offer to leave their post and take us to a small town nearby 15min away, this is so so kind. We discuss for a minute either to take them up on their offer or grab a taxi all the way to Santa Ana, anyway, as were discussing this, Jorge is on his radio and discovers that his sargent, Paz is stranded between this little town and Santa Ana as his truck has broken down, so Jorge offers us a lift all the way to Santa Ana, result! Is this a bit to good to be true? a free police escort accross El Salvador safely to a hotel. In some countires I think some of the police cant be trusted, but these guys just seemed super friendly, wanted to practice their English and I think it was just a well come escape from guarding the border, so bags in toe, we jumped aboard the police truck, along with Jorge, Jose and 2 other armed guys and off we went into the night. This was so exciting, and quite surreal! We stopped mid way to meet the sargent who was broken down, and he joined us plus another police guy on route to Santa Ana.

Money saving 3:1 time saving - horah!

Now time was ticking on, it was coming up to 20:30pm and we had read that genrally hotels and hostels close at 20:00pm, oh well, little we can do now and we are in the safest hands possible, brilliant. So here we are, in the back of a police truck, surrounded by 6 heavliy armed El Salvadorian police, searching for a hostel that we had marked in our guide book. The streets are deserted, and quite eery, there is no sign of the hostel and we are bang inthe middle of a deserted market so were quite glad about that, but not sure where to go next. So, Jorge is driving around pointing out motels, we stop at 1 and the sarge jumps out to go inspect in for us and ask the price, its not great and its a bit more than we wanted to pay so we all decide to carry on looking, this is so so bizare, and Age and I are really aware of the situation now and decide to just take the next hotel they offer, its not like we can drive around much longer with these police, weve taken enough of their time and they are not here to be our tour guides. We come across a hotel, it looks a bit crappy but Sarge Paz hops out and agrees a small rate of $9 for the night, we just hope the room is clean. We say our goodbyes and get a couple of photos and wave the guys off into the night. The hotel owner has a face like a slapped bum, he is not pleased at being disturbed at 21:30pm by 6 armed police with 2 gringos in tow, but thank goodness we see the room and its ok, not a cockroach in sight and its fairly clean and airy, and once we go down stairs to pay, the owner has managed to crack a smile probably with relief that the police have gone, so all is well.

Money saving 4:1 time saving - a pretty good result all in all, with a total cost of 3.61 in English pounds and 10hrs in world time, we arrived not far from our chosen destination. Rather than it costing 15.41 pounds but only 7hrs.

Bloomin long day, sweaty, hard and tiring, but cheap as chips and a lot more interesting & exciting than taking a tourist bus. I think though, sometimes its good to do it this way and other times give ourselves a break, take the easy option and use the spare energy and time you save to explore your new destination.

Sorry for the bossyness but it has worked - yey!

Thank you Mum, Sophie and Kathy for your instant responses to my slightly bossy latest blog, I appreciate your comments and its just lovely to hear from you all and maybe easiest this way, but I also love emails too (sorry am being bossy again)

Well, Im sat here in my lovely room in Antigua which over looks 3 volcanos, and one must be active as Age and I saw black smoke eeking out of it only 30min ago, hope this is normal and safe...?

Im sipping on a lovely glass of red wine while writing this, and actually it is part medicinal, as I think I have a trapped nerve in my neck from sleeping funny about 4 nights ago, bit painful and gives me a slightly achey head constantly, so I may aswell add fuzziness to the mix with a little red wine. Age has rubbed something called Bengay into it, this seems to help but the name is a little off putting!

Anyway, you wil be glad to hear that we have FINALLY made a decision about what to do net and how to do it. We have booked our flight from San Jose (Costa Rica) to Bogota (Columbia) on the 30th Jan, between now and then the plan is to hop on a chicken bus tomorrow, head to Guatemala City with a yumi pack lunch in hand, the bakeries round here are Amazing, jam packed with freshly baked treats which will silver line any long bus journey. The journey will take us to San Salvador for which I will be Ages tour guide as it will be my 3rd time there too and I kind of no my way around. Then hop skip and a jump to Nicaragua where I hope we will find a tranquil beach to bask on and discover the Nicaraguan local tasty street food, then 1 more bus ride to Costa Rica. Idealy I´d love to work on a market produce organic farm for a week, ive discovered this great webiste with lots of participating farms on there, so, time permitting, and farms willing to accept a friendly, chubby but hard working english girl and chubby, chatty, kind of hard working Canadian, Italian, Sommersetian mix of a boy then we will be set and super happy to set our minds and bodies to something worthwhile for a week. I do feel I need a bit of purpose other than just seeing amazing places. A bit of hard graft and learning some new skills and with a chance to be submerged in a spanish speaking local environment would be fantsastic plus the added benefit of it being a great work out and a novel way to shift those Christmas pounds! But whether this happens in the next week or once we get to South America, it is just a really lovely idea and a great oppurtunity, I WILL make I happen.

Well, we are leaving after our wonderful complementary breakfast in the morning so I must put down my glass, switch off the hallmark channel so I can concentrate rather than watching yet another cheesy film and pack my back, yet again, for probably the 110th time on this trip, so all that leaves us to do this evening is go out for a fantasticaly tasty meal at a little restaurant we´ve spied not too far away where I have my eye on, what I hope will be, fingers crossed, mouth watering homemade pumpkin ravioli in a creamy herb sauce or shrimp & lobster rissotto ahhhh mmmmm .........


Buenos noches Amigos y Gracias por leer me blog xxx

One more thing, just while I remember

I am assured by freinds and family that you all read my stories from time to time, and I receive emails and some of them relate to things that I have posted on here but no one ever EVER writes in the coments section, not sure if this is tricky to do, but am sure you clever things out there could decipher it, if I could make a suggestion that maybe rather or as well as the emails, you pop a comment or 2 on there, so that when I log on to write my next tale or to post some lovely piccies, I can see / hear what you think directly and this would make me smile.

Gracias :)

Back in Antigua for the 3rd time on this trip, is that wrong!?

Yes, im sat here on my balcony of my hostel, full up from a fantastic breakfast, just as good aas I remembered, basking in the glorious sunshine and thus squinting whilst trying to do 2 things at once, update you guys and top up my tan, not that I need it as I got a bit caught out whilst visiting the ancient Mayan ruins of Tikal 2 days ago and burnt my little face and chest and ended up radiating a rather bright pink glow all through our long night bus journey to Antigua, probably centrally heating everyone sitting in a 4 seat radious of me, the lucky things, as it can usually get quite nippy on the busses what with the air con cranked up to the max!

I do love Antigua, its hard not to, and whilst Age and I decide whether to hot foot it down through El Salvador, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama all in the pidily time scale of 2wks before we fly to Columbia at the end of Jan or take a flight direct from Guatemala to Columbia and save ourselves the time and effort of this crazy whistle stop tour, I thought we may as well sit in a pretty town and decide whilst surrounded by views of stunning Volcanos, breathing in the wonderful fresh mountain air, rather than take a risk exploring Guatemala City, soaking up the polution while we make this decision. And, as Age and I are generally rather slow, and take and incredible amount of time to make even the smallest decision, this could take some time...

Ill pop some pictures of us in amongst the Mayan ruins on later so yu can see this incredible ancient city and also let you know if by some miracle we have come to decision and what our next stp will be.

Hasta luego amigos xxxxx

Yes more Caye Caulker Christmas shots

Christmas on Caye Caulker

Heres a little belated look at our Christmas on Caye Caulker. Our

cute apartment, tasty fishies we purchased from the local freindly fisherman & cooked on the bbq borrowed from our friendly neighbour whos boat we are also pictured on on Life on the Ocean wave. Sun bathing on Christmas day with the masses of other tourists who flocked to the island too - boo! and Caribbean Santa cooking tasty shrimps yum yum

Caye Caulker

Life on the Ocean wave ah ha!

A beautiful World under the Sea

Probably the best New Years Eve day EVER!

Hola Amigos,

Feliz Nuevo Año

I hope 2010 is going to be wonderful for all of us

I'm sat here multi tasking, writing this to let you know what I'm up to whilst cooking toast on the stove, kind of like camping, this is what its like in our little wooden cabin on stilts by the sea. Of course, it does have comforts like a double bed and a tv and adequate bathroom, but the kitchen is very basic, almost with a camping stove, and very little room or utensils to prepare food, but it does remind me of being in the caravan in Wales especially when its windy & rains at night and the whole places shakes a little and the sound reverberates around our little home.

Age and I had the most incredible New Years Eve Day, Ever! We set out on the ocean wave on a speed boat with 8 others including he captain for a days snorkeling with the promise of seeing, wait for it.... Sharks and Sting Rays, Turtles, wonderful coral and an array of multicoloured, multi sized fish, and that is Exactly what we saw.

I surprised myself as I never, EVER thought that id want to be actually in the water, actually right next to a shark, even with a metal cage around me, but somehow, along this trip of mine, I changed my mind. I learned to dive, I conquered the deep and also my fear of the dark world under the sea and at some point in amongst all of that, I thought, do you know what, if I'm lucky enough to see a shark and lots of other extraordinary creatures I should well come it.

I was SO SO Excited! Age said it was the most excited he had seen me the whole trip! I couldn't take the silly grin off my face and just couldn't wait to be in the water. Our 1st stop was an unplanned one, we stopped just by a small fishing boat that was cleaning its catch of the morning, a mixture of Conch & Red Snapper, and the guts etc were being thrown over board thus attracting tons of attention from Sting rays, Turtles, A Manta Ray, and a mixture of fish, all feasting on what was to them, a scrumptious breakfast. Oh my goodness, I had only seen these creatures before at Blackpool Sea Life Centre and Sea World in Florida, Never all together, right in front of me, within touching distance, and the fact that were now able to just jump into the water and swim with them was SO BRILLIANT!!

On went the snorkels and the fins, we slipped into the water, as quietly as possible but probably still with a bit of a splash, and glided nearer to the fisherman's boat to get as close to these wonderful creatures as we could. This had to be some of THE BEST 20min of my trip and maybe even of the last few years, I'm gushing, but I can´t quite describe to you how incredible & unbelievable this was. About 10-15 Stings Rays, 1 huge Spotted Eagle Ray, 2 beautiful Turtles and 10s and 10s of smaller fish, Snapper, Glass Eye Jacks, trumpet fish to name but a few completely surrounded us, they were swimming over and under us, nearly brushing against our skin, nearly bumping into us humans and gliding past each other, so graceful but hungry for guts. They wern´t scared or put off by all of us gawping at them and maybe trying to sneak a little touch of them (maybe that was just me and Age) It was really over whelming to be in amongst all of it, getting as close as I could to everything and taking so many pictures. We rented an under water camera and I'm so glad and lucky that I experienced this and that I could record it too and try & take lots of fantastic close up pictures so this memory will be really fresh forever. Ive never used an under water camera before, and I loved it! it was like, well it was I suppose it was, a whole new world to take photographs of and to explore. At some points I was about half of a foot from a turtles face looking into its eyes and even closer to the sting rays gliding all around us and on top of each other like pancakes. Bloomin fantastic!!

Back on the boat, beaming and elated, off to explore Coral Gardens and Shark and Ray Alley. The latter was the scary point, the boat next to ours was throwing meat or bloody fish into the water to attract the Nurse Sharks, we could see 3 of them circling and splashing around trying to feast on this easy free food. OH -MY- GOODNESS- was I actually going to get into the water next to this, writing this now, looking back its sending shivers down me and I'm nervous just recalling this moment, the moment of fear, sitting on the edge of the boat getting encouragement from the other snorkelers to jump in, but I have to say that I was the 3rd out of 10 to brave the water and jump on in, well done me. Well where we were, at this point, there was only 1 shark, about 5ft, because obviously the captain wouldn't anchor us right next to the feeding ones as no matter how placid these guys were, if you get in the middle of feeding time then I think its safe to say you may become the food! Still, easing our way in was good for the old heart, being 10ft away from a shark was fine for now, but something inside wanted more, more sharks,and wanted to be closer to them, what was wrong with me, what have I become!? We snorkeled for a while with the guide, who I might add, had a really long poky metal stick with him, probably just in case things turned nasty, so I stuck by his side like glue, just in case. Actually, he used the poky stick to show us Eal's and tap on things in the water, but I'm sticking to my story that it was a weapon and that he was just making use of it for other things scenes as he had it on him anyway.

A bit disappointing, we saw no more sharks on our swim through the coral, Age and I were thinking that it would literally be like swimming through an alley of sharks and Rays, but this wasn´t the case. It wasnt until we were back at the boats and 1 captain was feeding them, that we were able to get another close look. Eager to see as many as we could, we swam up close, at some points, on reflection, a little too close, especially when as I was trying to get a good picture of three of them thrashing around, one turned and looked straight at me, his beady eyes slyly eyeing me up, I could see his 2 fang like teeth poking out over his bottom jaw, eek, it was time to back away, slowly does it, back to safety. I managed to get a few pictures, but there were so many Glas Eyed Jack fish in the mix too that the pictures are a confusing mixture of these and the sharks, but still good anyway.

A brilliant, unique, refreshing, tiring day, home for a large Rum and Pineapple and out later for a bit of a dance to see the new year in, happy happy happy.

The sun is shining, which is refreshing as the last few days have been quite grey and stormy, not too bad though as it proved perfect weather for curling up on the sofa watching films and eating pop corn something which just has to be done over the Christmas holidays no matter where you are, without the guilt of not going to the beach because its raining.

So we are going Kayaking this morning! whoop, haven't done this since guides, a loooong looong time ago, and actually then it was just me in a canoe on a calm lake in the lake district, rather than 2 fat lumps (me and Age post lots of Christmas food) in a small plastic boat desperately trying to roe somewhere, against the strong tide I may add on a slightly choppy sea! Also there is the question of what to wear... its similar to being out on a boat, and with the water and the breeze its probably prime tanning weather, so the less straps the better but I also have to be prepared for falling in, as inevitably this will happen! wish us luck....