Volcán Concepción

The hotel that had arranged the guided hike to Volcán Maderas was not offering trips to Concepción during my time on Ometepe. The volcano had been grumbling a little bit, and had vomitó un poco the week before. (In Nicaragua, the word vomitar, meaning "to vomit," "to throw out," or "to disgorge," is sometimes congugated to describe an eruption. I think this is fantastic.) I got lucky, however, the guy working the front desk at the hotel introduced me to another woman trying to arrange a hike to Concepción at the same time. She had met a guide while walking on the beach earlier in the day, and we arranged to climb the volcano with him. Because of the recent volcanic activity, tourists were not allowed to climb past 1000 meters in elevation (Concepción is 1,610 meters, or 5280 feet). Our guide told us that he would not take us any higher than this, and that we should not ask him to.

The tour started at 5:00, when I met the two other hikers (one Columbian and one Swiss) and our guide to take public transportation to the start of the hike. The bus showed up at 5:30, and after a bumpy 15 minute ride we set off down a dirt road toward Concepción. We passed the mandatory pigs and chickens, rows and rows of banana and plantain trees, and several campesinos on horses or donkeys.

The road turned into a path and started to climb. After about a mile, we reached a small hut with a few benches outside, cobbled together of sticks and wood from the surrounding land. A 35-40 year old Nica man stopped his work and came to join us, and he and our guide began to tell us about their workers' movement and the new organization of guides and others in the tourist industry on Ometepe. They are standing up to the hotels, demanding better treatment and better pay, and they go to trainings once a month to learn how improve their interactions with tourists and better perform their work. Things are much better now, they said, since they have organized; but there is still a lot to be done. After some time we left and continued our climb, eating bananas given to us by our host.

We kept hiking - the trail getting steeper and rocky - and taking long, frequent breaks. At about 600 meters, I started to worry that if we kept taking long breaks like this, we would end up hiking down in the heat of the day - what we woke up at 4:30 am to avoid. At our next break, at 750 meters, I asked the time. It was only a quarter to eight.

After more climbing and more long breaks, we reached 1000 meters to find the lake below shrouded in fog. We walked a few meters further to find a place in the shade to wait, and relaxed on a flow of lava rocks from a past eruption. After an hour, there had been no change in the mist below, so we began our decent, stopping frequently as the clouds shifted and the views improved.

After the hike, I split with the group, the rest returning to the hotel while I made my way to Altagracia to meet my parents. I asked when the bus would come, but the guide told me that the bus wouldnt come for half an hour or more, and that it was less than a kilometer walk. I confirmed his directions, making sure I understood, turned down an offer by a 12-year old boy to take me there on his bike, and started to walk. I hadn´t walked more than 100 meters when the bus pulled over to pick me up. I sat down, and after about a half kilometer, the driver waved me up, pointed at my hotel (I hadn´t said anything more than "gracias" when he picked me up), and seemed a little suprised when I asked the fare.