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We had skipped several island getaways in Central America because they required that we leave the car behind. We didn't want to risk leaving the half of our stuff that we couldn't carry in the car to be stolen. But Ometepe Island, we learned, was served by a car ferry. We weren't sure whether the roads on the island were drivable, but at least we could take the car with us.

Volcan Conception (1610m) from Ferry Pier

The previous paragraph makes it seem as though we knew in advance we would be able to take the ferry. In fact we didn't. We arrived at the ferry pier, shown here, in time for the early morning ferry but found it completely booked and had to come back four hours later for the early afternoon boat. That's when Gerry snapped this lovely picture of Volcan Concepcion, one of the two volcanoes that make up Ometepe.

The crossing turned out to be very pleasant. Our car was one of only five on board but still barely fit. There were two passenger cabins, one downstairs with a large-screen TV and the soda ice-box, the other upstairs had the bar and snack-bar. If all that sounds pretty modern and fancy, don't be fooled. The boat was old, battered, and very well-used. But standing up on the top deck outside of the cabin, who could care? The sky was blue, the sun was shining, and there was a nice cool breeze off the water as the volcano-topped Ometepe slowly (an hour and a half slowly) came closer and closer.

Bicycles for Rent, Altagracia

When we got off the ferry, we spent fifteen minutes driving around trying to find somewhere to stay in the village at which we disembarked. But nothing appealed to us and Gerry was anxious to explore. Checking the map, we had two choices: go around the island clockwise or anti-clockwise. We picked clockwise and headed off towards Altagracia. Only a hundred meters from the pier, the road switched from concrete to rutted dirt. It was awful! We couldn't go more than five miles an hour which meant it took us almost two hours to do the ten miles to our goal, Altagracias.

Altagracias, however, rewarded our efforts as it turned out to be a rather neat little place. There were three hotels in town, each of them acceptable, and one that had private parking and a little round concrete cabin all for us. Well, we had to do without hot water, of course, but given that it was pretty hot the whole time, that was no real hardship. We stayed three nights.

Walking group at Falls, Volcan Maderas

On our first day, we took a tour with a couple of other girls to this waterfall. The fifth guy is our guide. We needed him because we needed transportation to the trailhead as we weren't willing to beat up our own car any more than necessary and anyway, we didn't have a decent map and so wouldn't have known how to get there.

The walk was pretty hard. It was hot and quite steep for most of the way, but the guide was friendly and so we got to practice Spanish some. I should add that we both read Spanish quite fluently by now, but still needed lots of practice speaking and somebody patient to help us as we stammered out what little we could manage.

Gerry and Guide at Petroglyph Block

On the way back from the waterfall, we made a stop to take a short walk to see this petroglyph. Gerry and the others walked even further to check out a new hotel further into the forest, but I was too beat up even to walk an extra hundred feet to check out a howler monkey in a nearby group of trees. So Gerry got to see the noisy howler for once while I never did. Boo Hoo!

Horses on Taguizapa Beach

On our second day, we thought we might go swimming in the lake. We didn't want to spend the time to travel to the recommended beach and so instead just walked the couple of kilometers out of town to the nearest beach to Altagracias. The beach seemed deserted at first but on closer inspection we found quite a menagerie. These horses were grazing up behind the beach when we arrived, but there was a dog and a handful of chickens on the beach itself. When they were joined by a group of black piglets, I decided that prudence was the better part of valor. I would rather live to swim another day. The horses looked really romantic at the water's edge, but I certainly didn't want to share the water with the entire zoo.

Our hiking companions from the previous day had a real adventure. They went for a hike up one of the volcanoes, got up and back down but missed the last bus back to Altagracia and had to beg a space to sleep from a friendly farmer, only getting back to the hotel at 5 a.m. They were not happy campers!

Trying to Unload the Ferry

The ferry ride back to the mainland was memorable only because of the suffering of three other passengers. No, they weren't people, they were cows! Perhaps the beasts were being brought over for sale or for butchering, but in any case the journey quite terrified them. They were walked onto the ferry and immediately had problem getting a footing on the metal car deck. Because they couldn't stand up straight they struggled, that made them slip even more, the fear loosened their bowels, and you can imagine the rest. One spent the entire journey spreadeagled on the deck amidst her own excrement and complained loudly during the whole journey, poor thing. The cows handlers had no sympathy, especially at the end of the journey when they had to get the animals off the boat. They pushed, pulled, kicked, cursed, until finally all three were back on solid ground and upright again.