At the moment, we are traveling quite fast through Central America. There are two reasons for this: On the one hand, we finally want to get to South America a little faster and, on the other hand, the attractions and sights here in Central America are slowly becoming repetitive. Accordingly, we are already reporting from the next country: Nicaragua! Although Nicaragua is not considered a country with easy entry, we cross the border better than expected. We make our first stop in the city of León.

City center of León

We immediately feel at home in Nicaragua. To us, the country seems a little tidier and more well-kept than many of its neighbors in the north of Central America. Although it seems to be much poorer than the countries we have visited so far. However, the people here are open minded and very friendly.
The city of León impresses us with a very colonialist cityscape. Due to Nicaragua’s lively past – it was once a republic together with Costa Rica – there is a mighty cathedral in León. It is considered to be the largest and oldest cathedral in the whole of Central America.
On our tour through León, we somehow feel reminded of Cuba. Not that we have ever been to Cuba, but in our minds, Cuba could be similar to Nicaragua, only much, much more touristy. The people are very friendly and interested, but at the same time like to go about their own daily routines without paying too much special attention to the tourists. However, large parts outside the cities live in very poor conditions, which should never be forgotten as the appearance of the cities can easily hide this.

Volcano boarding at Cerro Negro

As in many places in Central America, Nicaragua also has a number of volcanoes. Cerro Negro is close to León and offers an attraction that is probably unique in the world: we can go sledging down the volcano. It’s currently January and yes, why not. January would be a good time to go sledging. We book this activity for the next day and we are looked after all round. We are given a “protective suit” as well as goggles to protect us from the flying stones and a board that is used for sledging.
The ascent to Cerro Negro is short and easy, only about 45 minutes on foot to the crater rim. Once again, the view from the top of the volcano over the surrounding landscape is magnificent. And indeed: Cerro Negro consists of coarse to fine volcanic sand or fine scree. In any case, everything on one flank of the volcano is loose from top to bottom, making it suitable as our snow substitute in the summer temperatures. At the top of Cerro Negro it is extremely windy, so we are very glad of our goggles even before the actual sledging, as the fine volcanic rocks are blown everywhere.

However, the descent is short and extremely dusty. We can’t steer either, it’s just a straight line back to the base of the volcano on the pre-tracked track. Nevertheless, the whole experience is fun. So not only have we recently hiked up and down volcanoes, slept and eaten on volcanoes, no, we’ve also recently have sledged down a volcano! That’s one more interesting experience for us.