LEON (NICARAGUA)
12 February - 14 February 2017
There
is nothing quite like the blind panic you feel when you’ve been woken up by the
town evacuation alarm and you make it out onto the desolate streets, heart racing,
barefoot, your mind processing information, and only to finding an public
square staring you straight in the face. That was one of the wake-up calls that we encountered in Leon.
Travelling through an active volcanic region I thought that my concealed and
restrained fears had come back to well and truly bite us in our ‘bravado’. For
a split second my head could only think, “Oh f***’. Then I saw a person.
Looking around, I saw more people. They were walking and acting normally,
unperturbed, in control. Absolutely no fear or anxiety visible. We watched the
scene for a little while longer whilst our beating hearts settled into a
comfortable canter. So, no evacuation scheduled for today? What the hell was
that then? Asking around at the hostel we were staying at we were told that the siren goes off twice a day. Once at
7am, so the children of the town know that it’s time to go to school, and
another at midday to signal lunch.
BLOODY
HELL – Leon, there’s just to go be a better way, for all and sunder.
Leon
as a town is not Granada. It’s grittier, dirtier, and Castilian architectural
roots. It’s said that Leon is ‘artier’ than Granada, and if that’s just in
relation to the murals that adorn its city walls, then ok, that’s correct. As a
city though, it didn’t have enough for me to get behind it. It felt desolate,
abandoned, a little wild west. You wouldn’t bat an eyelid and tumbleweeds
gliding down the road. In all honesty though, we weren’t in Leon for any real
cultural reason.
Some
years ago I wrote an entry into this blog (April
15, 2011) https://hdbc2.blogspot.com/2011/04/my-next-10-squared.html , in it I nominated Sandboarding Cerro Negro in Nicaragua as
No.5 on my list of ‘You want to do what
now!?!’. Well, sometimes even the fanciful comes true. Leon is the ‘base
camp’ utilised for attack the volcano with sand boards. Of course these days is
not the ‘far-out’, random, off-the beaten track activity that it was some 10
yrs ago. These days it’s sort of like a factory. There’s many tourist agencies
offering entry to the park, sand boards, equipment and guides – a lot of which
you don’t really need but in handy in any case. So we booked ourselves onto an
afternoon excursion and we were off to conquer the volcano!
Cerro Negro - near Leon - Nicaragua
Cerro Negro - Nicaragua
Cerro Negro - Nicaragua
The
reality of getting to the park, accessing the volcano and getting to the top is
a lot easier than the Youtube videos made it out be. In my mind Cerro Negro was
in a far flung corner of the earth, took days to climb and what you purchased in
hard earned elevation was the gratification you received in being able to sand
board down. Wasn’t that a mighty misconception! We were able to quite easily
take catch a van to the National Park, took a comfortable 5 min stroll from the
car park to the base of the volcano and managed to walk to the summit in 30
mins. That’s the truth of the matter. This was no epic feat by any stretch of
the imagination….but…to say that the volcano was dormant is itself a lie. This
thing is active, amongst the most active in Nicaragua. There are smoking vents
visible right up the climb and digging a centimetre or so below the surface
really warms your fingers up in a hurry.
Cerro Negro - Nicaragua
Cerro Negro - Nicaragua
Cerro Negro - Nicaragua
Battle axes ready! Cerro Negro - Nicaragua
Cerro Negro - Nicaragua
At
an elevation of 750 mtrs the walk up isn’t particularly strenuous but it does
provide you with some rather good views. The ability to sand board the volcano
is derived from the soil composition, tiny grains of black volcanic rock that
make the back side of the volcano more than useful substitute for sand which in
turn allows you to ‘carve it up’, in theory. I say in theory because on a
guided tour there’s a very homogenised & deliberate manner that they will
allow you to attack the slope. First, all guided sand-boarding is seated. Then
there’s an awful methodology of sand-board management you adhere to because
‘hey’ you’re not the professional. The issue with adhering to the method in the
madness is what it does to your descent
Descending
the black mountains should be ALL about speed. Daily records are posted by some
hostels with records holders commonly getting hitting 90+kph. This is what we
imagined to be doing.
Sitting
at the top of the volcano, on the precipice, there was a rush of adrenaline. All
we needed to do now was cast ourselves into the abyss, use our feet as brakes
and let the board fly!
WHAT
A DISAPPOINTMENT!!!!
The
guide we had advised us to stick our feet in front of the board. What this did
was immediately and miserably slow down the board and all momentum the moment
we hit a bump as our feet immediately dug into the soil. In hindsight, just
resting our feet on the board for the ride would have been the magic bullet but
in this ‘live’ version it inhibited the action so much that I felt like a
pensioner that had been let loose on a Sunday walk. It was pathetic. It was so
pathetic that when I reached the base of the volcano my disappointment was
readily visible and the guide, seeing that I was feeling a little bummed, attempted
to console me by saying;
‘I think you
reached around 30kph, maybe’.
‘Maybe huh? Maybe
it was 20kph, or maybe I reached the speed limit for piss weak brother!??’
The encapsulation of 'safe sex' - Cerro Negro - Nicaragua
Time to ride - Cerro Negro - Nicaragua
Inga actually did quite a good job
I in fact did a crap job!
It
took me a few minutes but I calmed myself down to realise that the achievement
was in the conquering of the volcano.
Inga
appeared to adapt to the ride better than I did and really picked up the pace
towards the bottom of the hill. Not 90kph but not anything close to the
speed….the paltry, miserable speed, that I allowed myself.
Anyway,
with the wrap up tour to Cerro Negro so too our stay in Leon wrapped up. A nice
town with some interesting elements but not really worth an extended visit.
