GAY & LESBIAN TRAVEL STORIES

Stranded on Volcano Island

While the relaxing bits, the sightseeing bits, and the shopping bits are fun, I always love the adventure bits of the annual group trips I take with friends. Every year I get together with five close pals and we travel to an unusual destination, stepping out of sight of Starbucks and our familiar NYC habitat long enough to discover fun and surprises. Great adventure moments from past years included boat-riding under the falls at Iguazu Falls in Argentina, shooting AK-47s and M-16s in Vietnam, and getting thrown around an Istanbul hamam by a 250-pound old Turkish dude in a towel. Some would consider this last item to be an exotic treat but I stand firmly by the adventure classification on this one.

This year's trip to Nicaragua was no exception; I'd been excitedly eying an excursion to Isla Ometepe, especially when zip-lining turned out to be more of a fun little ride than an adventure, and I really needed an adventure. In case you missed it that was the foreshadowing portion of this story.

After a couple days in Granada, the six of us were staying in an inexpensive house with a pool in southwestern Nicaragua, located up in the jungle hills overlooking the coastal village of San Juan Del Sur. Also with us on the property was a modest household staff, a family of howler monkeys, a large tree sloth, and several thousand species of insects ranging from mildly annoying to really freaking scary. It was late May on the cusp of the rainy season and weather ranged from stunningly gorgeous to really quite rainy. After a couple days of sitting around the pool between rainstorms and excursions to nearby secluded beaches we relished the idea of visiting nearby Isla Ometepe but my suggestion that we hike to the top of Volcán Maderas was understandably met with some skepticism.

Lake Nicaragua is the largest lake in Nicaragua, and the 21st largest lake by area in the world. Sticking out of the middle of the lake are twin volcanoes Concepción and Maderas, the bases of which form the large, lush Isla Ometepe. Ferries from the mainland drop travelers on the larger, active Volcán Concepción, whose steaming cone rises ominously over the island's 35,000 residents and their villages, abundant farms, and livestock. Concepción's smaller and more dormant neighbor Maderas rises about 4,600 feet about sea level and is crowned with a cloud forest and a crater lake.

Although everyone was interested in visiting this beautiful and unusual island's beaches and waterfalls, the prospect of a long and muddy hike up through a cloud forest on a volcano was met with less enthusiasm. This was maybe encouraged by the fact that every one of our guide books made reference to degrees of strenuousness, the perils of hiking through a sloping river of mud, and the idea that guides and ropes are required for the descent into the crater following the deaths of American and British tourists in a recent accident. However being adventurous, and possibly naive, my friend John and I decided to take on Maderas.

The next morning we six rode the ferry from nearby San Jorge to Ometepe, with the intention of most of the group returning that afternoon while John and I hiked through evening and returned the next morning. The ferry ride offers an hour-long glorious view of the twin jungle-covered volcanoes rising dramatically from the giant lake's surface. Jokes about King Kong were abundant.