the basics
by Malecka
This small, fishermen village is located near the frontier between Nicaragua and Costa Rica, in the San Juan del Sur bay, which automatically tames the ocean a little bit and makes this town's beach a popular surfers' destination. At the far left end of the bay the town's dock is located... on the far right end of the bay, after a splendid beach, San Juan del Sur ends with a rock, a reef if you will, that has the shape of a profile of an Indian, called Cara de Indio (wish I had a good photo of the reef, it's fantastic). And yes, it's natural.
The bay is surrounded by hills which are not "cut" with highways and the blue sky is almost never polluted by airplanes.
I loved the nature... And the beach is awesome... the colours of the nature all around.. the sand and the sensation you get when you walk on the beach barefoot... the afternoon waves... and the food in the market place.
Pelican Eye
by Marie-France
This is probably not a "secret" anymore, but when I was there in November 2003, this new luxury resort up the hill at the back of the town was still under construction.
It wasn't in any guidebook. But I heard about it from some other travellers. Although the cabanas at the back were still being built, the restaurant and pool had just opened a couple of months prior. For the price of a few (very reasonably priced) drinks or lunch, you could enjoy the pool and the magnificent view over the town and bay for as long as you wanted! I spent many lazy afternoons here, and met several people, both tourists and locals.
This is the kind of place that usually only people spending a few hundred dollars a night get to enjoy in the Caribbean. And here I was, paying $15 for my room down the hill, 3 minutes walk away from this "resorty" place.
The staff was friendly and the food delicious (see my Restaurant tips).
Ha, la belle vie!
the beach, again
by Malecka
It's just a wonderful sensation to be walking barefoot on the sandy beach of this place. And, although I'm pretty sure things've inevitably changed, this village is still massive-tourism free and therefore a morning spent at the beach is a delight. When enjoying the sensation as if the whole beach belonged to you...
enough rambling.
a fishing trip with a lot of beer
by vicky_cannae
We hired a boat and went fishing with some other backpackers....it was a lot of fun, but had bad luck because we didn't caught anything!!!
But we bought a huuuge fish when we got back in the port and had a fantastic BBQ!!! Bring a lot of drinks on the boat
Turtles at La Flor
by Marie-France
La Flor Wildlife Refuge is one of the two Pacific turtle nesting beaches in Nicaragua.
You can book a tour from Casa de Oro in San Juan (or a few other hostels) to go see the turtles lay their eggs (or turtle babies hatching, depending on the season). The tours only go at night and are a little pricey (I paid about $13). It take about 1 hour by pick-up truck on a bad dirt road that crosses a few "rivers" !
Despite the difficulty getting there and the rather disorganised ranger station, I was surprised at just how amazed and touched I was at witnessing these large turtles slowly digging holes in the sand, laying all these eggs, and then painstakingly closing up the holes by pushing sand in with their flippers.
It's worth seeing at least once, and it's probably cheaper here than in neighbouring Costa Rica.
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Maria buying souvenirs
ali at hostal joxi's terrace
comedor del mercado
Maria at the beach
