A hiking we will go.....

Hello lovelies

There has been a distinct lack of blogging recently for which I do apologise for, this is due to various things;
A) Staying on a volcano island where internet just hasn´t reached yet
B) Travelling A LOT! including across 3 countries, many many hours of bumpy bus rides and a flight! ooh and a ride in a tuc tuc, poor bugger had to cycle with us 2 fat lumps in the front seat!
C) Illness, for the past 2 days I have been partially struck down with something, not sure what!? I did put my symptoms of which are headaches, slight fever, fatigue, sensitive skin & dizzyness into google but it didnt prove very helpful! Where is a doctor friend when you need one!?

Today, I have slept well and am feeling a bit more like my old self so thought it was about time to fill you all in on the adventures Age and I have been up to over the last week.

Well... from Leon in Nicaragua we headed to Granada, this was a bit of a tourist trap and hence lots of sketchy people, but as soon as we arrived, we did bump into our friends that we made in Guatemala, Gotz & Teresa from Germany, this was a bonus and they also recomended us to stay at their hostel, result, saved trecking around town on a hot day with 20 tonnes on our backs!
As with many hostels, the communal area was lovely, hammocks and plants everywhere and it even had a pool! (albeit the size of a paddling pool) this clinched the deal for me, but our room was the size of a shoe box, quite dark and dingy, but hay-ho it was only for 1 night, then we could get the hell out of there and head to Ometepe, 2 active volcano islands in the middle of a HUGE HUGE natural lake. It actually takes 14hrs by boat to get across the length of it! Luckily we didnt need to go the length of it, or else a sick bag may have been needed - urgh! I do not have sea legs!

The volanos, Concepxion and Maderas, were INCREDIBLE! And Concepxion was actually exploding (well, more like burping), we watched twice as huge grey clouds of ash were belched out of the top of this perfect cone volcano and lingered around the top then settled all over one side. Once on the boat we were hoping, fingers crossed it would do it again and again, purely for pictures sake! not quite engaging in how rare this must be and maybe how dangerous too, amd what it actually means!??? Well, after some asking around,it is a rare thing, it has only been burping out ash like this fo rthe last 2 months and since the last major eruption was in 1954, it was probably due another, eek! and the army on the island were practising evacuations, so all would run smoothely, well as smoothley as possible in the event of this happening.
Anyway, this was all very exciting for us, so off we continued on such a bumpy 2hr bus ride up a dirt track to Maderas, the smaller volcano of the 2, to our destination whcih was a Coffee Finca called Magdelana located on the side of Maderas. We arrived at 8pm, very shaken & stirred from the beyond bumpy chicken bus journey and were then forced to hike, with our very heavy back packs on, 20min, about 1.5km up the really steep side of this volcano, OH MY GOODNESS!! why were we being tested like this!
We arrived, safe, sound and sweaty and received a small cheer from the other guests who were eating what looked to be like really yumi home made food, think they all sympathized with us.

We stayed away from everyone in a lovely, but basic room somewhere in 1 of the gardens, it was so so quiet and peaceful. And the food was so so hearty & tasty, that this made it all worth while.
It wasn´t untill the next morning that we could appreciate the full beauty of where we were staying, the gardens were lush filled with greens, and pink plants, it was so calm and tranquil and again, the breakfast was lovely and would set us up for the hike that lay ahead of us. Oh but he hike was delayed slightly as we got locked in our room and I had to climb out of the window, thank goodness all houses here are built on 1 level! and run to the staff to help bust us out! ooh Cate & Ages days wouldnt be completé without these kind of hiccups!

Off we trotted up Volcan Maderas all by ourselves, we like to do this, have mini trecking adventures, on our own without a guide, rest asurred we only go where there is some sort of path, and there was one but it was very steep, quite rocky & slightly muddy at times. Mum this is all great training for our big climb. We trecked through thick forrest, hearing the occasional roar from a howler monkey or 2, ooh it was hard work, but we battled on. Ive attached apicture from nearly the top, where you can see the coast line of the island and Volcano Concepxion, it was really amazing. Such a stunning sight, especially when you have been walking for 3hrs but could only see the dense forrest which surrounds you. We tried to make it to the top as apparently there is a crater lake, but this turned out to only be 1ft of water and the rest mud, and the treck up there was very muddy as we saw from the state of the people passing us coming down. Time was ticking on and we didnt want to be stranded half way down a volcano in the dark so we started to head back. Then on the way down, right at the view point, there were 2 cheeky little howler monkeys sat up in the trees, they let us get about 10ft away from them, and they made little roaring sounds and Age and I watched them and tried to encourage more roaring sounds, and the little monkeys watched us probably thinking daft humans! but it was so so magical, just us and them all on a volcano together, just perfect.
All that was left to do was try and find some ancient Petroglyphs at the bottom of the treck and then settle down for some lovely tasty food & a large beer, I was trying to detox but we had done so so much walking, I really did deserve it.