So we had finally arrived in Northern Costa Rica after one hell of an offshore passage of 42ish days at sea. We had a great sail into the Golfo de Papaguyo with strong winds we were cruising at over 8 knots. We arrived in Playas del Coco at like 3am January 23rd. It was much drier than in December 2010 when we were here before on Karaka. There was even fires on the hillsides. We spent a few days chillin and exploring the nightlife in Coco. It got old fast. We planned a trip for my birthday weekend out to some islands with a bunch of friends and it was awesome! Simon got some last shots and interviews for the film and i did a kayak tour with two cool Italians who joined us deep into some mangroves nearby.

Upon return to Cocos, Simon left, Eric left, myself and Cesar wanted to go to Nicaragua and Steve and Keri joined aswell as Jenny and Danny. Keri, Jenny and Danny were supposed to join us for passage to Ecuador but plans changed for them as the SPOT beacon didnt always work and they thought we were heading directly to Ecuador. Anyhow, we all decided to go to Nicaragua for a week for an adventure away from the boat. We spent the first night in Liberia as it took a while to co-ordinate everyone to leave and went to a nice Peruvian restaurant. The next morning we were off to Nicaragua and Isla Ometepe. Upon arrival Cesar and i bought a meal that was equivalent to $2 and it filled us both! We were so excited to be in Nicaragua and how cheap it was. We took a taxi from the border to Rivas and then to San Jorge where we caught a ferry to Isla Ometepe. A great rustic wooden boat carrying a mix of random supplies, locals and backpackers. The ferry was something in and around 3 hours but we arrived with no clue as to where to stay but asking around led us to a bus which led us to Playa Santa Domingo and we stayed there for a few days. First night we met up with this local guide Jonas who said he’d take us to the top of one of the Volcanos for $7 each. Usually I’d just do something like this without a guide but it was nice. He woke us up crazy early at like 4 am and we started the adventure to Volcan Maras.


It was a great hike but muddy as hell and rainy, wet and cold but it was beautiful. It cleared up when we got to the Laguna near the top and had clear spectacular views on the way down.

We finished the hike at like 5:30pm after leaving at 5:30pm. It was a long day but fantastic! We hung around the next day and went into town, and chilled on the beach. We ate lots of Coconuts with Rum as there were trees absolutely full of them everywhere around the place we were staying. After 3 days on Ometepe we decided to take off to San Juan del Sur because Cesar had to go back to Costa Rica to catch his plane to Mexico.
Originally i was going to go with him to San Jose but it didnt make sense at this point in time so i stayed in San Juan del Sur another day and then made my way back with Jenny and Danny. I decided to go straight back to Playas del coco and spend a bunch of time helping Tom work on the boat. We replaced all the windows with new glass, sanded, painted, and grinded rust in the deck and a few other odds and ends. We did some spear fishing out at the islands from the kayaks, chilled out, lived cheap and ate well. It was a nice change to have so few people on the boat.