We jumped on the local bus and proceeded to bounce around in our seats along with the locals, listening to the Latino American tunes that we have grown so accustomed to. We spent a night in probably the nicest accommodation that we have stayed in, but with no kitchen on-site and in our impoverished backpacker way, pulled out the gas stove and self catered.
For the second and third day we moved to a hippy farm in an underdeveloped area of the island. This was the 'real' Ometepe, complete with pigs, chickens, donkeys, dogs, you name it, all living free range and strolling from house to house. Some of our time was spent in a small bar/restaurant/home to a family, where we drank a few beers whilst observing the comings and goings along the dirt road. A particular highlight was watching a local on a bike being pulled by a rope attached to a horse! Between beers, Tom also turned the establishment into a hairdressers, after spotting one of the owners with some clippers.
Reclining in the sofa-hamoc in the living room after a hard day's work. Check out the reflection!
On one of the days we hired bikes to take in the views of the volcanoes and lake and go for a dip in the springs - water renowned for its purity and ability to soften the skin and hair. It was like jumping in a fresh pool of moisturiser!
Time in the hippy farm was interesting. It was located in a beautiful spot with fabulous views of both volcanoes, and surrounded by coffee and banana plantations. The finca/farm was owned by an Italian, passionate about his organic bread and pizza nights prepared in the wood fire oven. Amusingly, pizza night brought out the rather freakish community living foreign hippies, who when asked 'where they were from', replied with quizzical expressions and replied 'from planet earth' and proceeded to discuss the environment whilst puffing on their cigarettes!
Our accommodation was a shabby little cabaña, and in true Latin American style there were lots of gaps in the walls. An attempt to cover up the gaps with bug screens was fruitless as at night the bugs were out in force. Upon trying to kill one small spider with a broom stick this resulted in uncovering a massive tarantula. We spent the next 10 minutes freaking out trying to work out how to remove this 8 legged creature as he proceeded to stare at us from the sink while simultaneously wiggling his furry legs. Finally our Italian neighbour came to our aid scaring the fella to the next floor. When finally our pulses were returning to normal, we spotted another spider, this time it was a hybrid spider-scorpion and was aggressively clenching his pincers together. After spotting 3 potentially deadly spiders in a matter of minutes, this one had to go and he was immediately squashed. Trying to then sleep in a bug infested room was hard to say the least, each time I closed by eyes I had spider visions. With only 8 foot each of wedding veil material as make-shift mosquito nets, we didn't feel particularly protected from these biting insects. Hence we were incredibly relieved when morning broke so that we could pack our bags and head back to the mainland, away from crawly bitey things!
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