I have a healthy obsession with volcanoes, mountains and the great outdoors. Passionately curious of what the planet has to offer and of what human beings are capable of. It all happened a few years ago when i did the diagonal of fools on la reunion island and seeing the active volcano erupt during the run, it was magic. Afterwards being curious of what other volcano trail races existed, i stumbled upon a great report by Christian Griffith's on a trail race named Feugo y Agua. Translated fire and water from Spanish, it is a 100km wilderness run up two volcanoes on a remote volcanic island in lake Nicaragua, central america (the piece joining north and south america). When i saw this race a few years ago i knew i just had to do this race no matter what, by looking at this island on Google earth you will see what i mean, it is quite unique. So i drooled over the lakes and volcanoes and always had it in the back of my mind. The race was canceled last year because of financial reasons, but the date was set for February 2012.
Nicaragua is quite far from South Africa, so i added my own adventure to the mix to make it worth going. I always wanted to fly somewhere far and unknown and ride out of the airport solo with my mountain bike and explore, and this was the perfect opportunity for me to make it happen. Nicaragua lies on the pacific ring of fire and is bordered by Costa Rica on the south and Honduras on the north, it has undergone periods of political unrest, military intervention by the United States, dictatorship and earthquakes but has reached a period of stability and are described as the safest in the region. I did my research, and even though people tried to scare me with all sorts of stories, they didn't manage to scare me. I was gonna see for myself, armed with my mountain bike, running shoes, super potent bug repellent, antibiotics and hammock, i was well prepared and on my way. So packed with the bare essentials like any adventure racer would as hand luggage and only booking my bike as checked baggage on the airplane, i left for two weeks traveling on the 4th longest nonstop endurance flight in the world 17 hours directly to Atlanta with a slight detour near bermuda avoiding a storm (these airplanes are amazing), so touching US soil for the first time i connected to Managua Nicaragua with another 4hour flight. On the connecting plane to Nicaragua, a German guy saw me stand out in between the american missionaries with my South African passport, somehow he knew i was not a missionary and not from the US, and seemed keen to chat, we swapped seats and talked nonstop for 4 hours, what an awesome coincidence, this guy turned out to be an epic German cartographer that has mapped large parts of Nicaragua, central and south america and other parts of the world, a true adventurer. I showed him my topographic map on my tablet pc and he was impressed how well i was prepared and showed me the best way to get up some of the volcanoes in the arch. On one of this mapping expeditions he told me he traversed a large section of the volcanic arch on foot. His name is Klaus Wiesner and he gave me one of his own maps he made of Nicaragua for free, he said i needed it more, what a cool guy! Coming in over lake Managua for a landing at the capital with the same name he showed me momotombo volcano (they actually have a geothermal power plant there) and it's tiny offspring volcano inside the lake, momotombito. This was very cool, and he told me that the US marines used to do combat training there. We landed at the small but modern new airport in Managua that lies on 11 seismic faults, in 1972 an earthquake occurred here with a magnitude of 6.2 at a depth of about 5 kilometers beneath the centre of the city. The earthquake and after shocks caused widespread damage, among Managua's residents, 5,000 were killed, 20,000 were injured and over 250,000 were left homeless. Even though no recent earthquakes took place large parts of the city was never rebuild, and made the country even poorer. I booked into basecamp for my biking and running adventure, the best western hotel opposite the airport after crossing the pan american highway with Huge trucks like you see in trucker movies, hectic trucks, trucks you want to avoid getting your bike close to. But my plan was to take back roads and stay away from cars and experience the country from the top of my seatpost in style. Double story buildings in Nicaragua are rare, and because of the earthquake you can understand why. The settlements around the airport and next to the hotel looked similar to the townships we get here in south africa, very poor. So i mounted a small bike carrier on my seat post to carry the heaviest stuff and took the rest in a 40l backpack on my back, leaving my cardboard bike box at basecamp. I had my GPS and had semi planned were i wanted to go each night. It was quite a liberating feeling riding out there with my bike into the unknown on dirt roads in a strange country that only speaks Spanish, but i ended up having the time of my life experiencing tropical living in one of the poorest and richest countries in the region. Poor money-wise but rich in volcanoes,natural beauty, passion for poetry, art and friendly people. "It's a dangerous business, Frodo, going out of your door," he used to say. "You step into the Road, and if you don't keep your feet, there is no knowing where you might be swept off to." ~J.R.R. Tolkien My goal was to get to the island Ometepe in lake Nicaragua in time to do the 100km Feugo y Agua race and then cycle back, i ended up cycling more or less 30km every day, taking it easy before the race, exploring and having my own adventure. I cycled through very poor areas seeing very interesting landscapes, interesting people and funny dogs along the way. A couple of nights i stayed at a biological research centre inside the dormant apoyo volcano crater with clear blue lagoon inside hosting Cichlid Fish found here and in lake Malawi, i swam inside the lagoon most mornings, a very inspirational place with awesome people running it. It was a little though for me to get out of the crater with my loaded bike in the mornings but this place was so awesome that it didn't even cross my mind. I also cycled past the active volcano of masaya where i peeked inside the crater seeing the raw earth at work, one night i went with a group to explore it at night, we went into old lava pipes looking for vampire bats and found some, on our way out we had a peek into the main crater to see the glow but were quickly overwhelmed by the sulfur and quickly left the reserve. >From the port of granada on lake Nicaragua that hosts fresh water bull sharks, i took the weekly 2pm ferry witch was a 4 hour ferry ride to ometepe, the twin volcano island on lake nicaragua. My bike was loaded with the cargo and i spend most of the time in my ticket to the moon hamock outside on the upper deck of the ferry hanging and seeing on my gps were i was. We saw spectacular views of the island and the active volcano, la conception when we arrived at altagracia just before sunset. Waiting for us at the port were locals with stacks and stacks of banana's or plantain that would be exported off the island with the ferry continuing through the night to the south of the lake. I got off and i managed to get my bike after a while, and then there were nothing, no lights just a pitch dark 3km road i knew i had to take to get to the little town from the port according to my gps. Here after 100m i went over the handlebars with a heavy backpack on my back after trying to turn on my red back light and not looking, hitting a big rock my bike stopped and i bought land like we say when you fall off your bike, it was quite funny, but i won't mind buying real land there. Then out of nowhere locals on bikes came riding past and trying to stay in my light as they had none or very basic lights, i must have looked like a spaceship to them with my gps and all my lights. My gps helped me allot. All towns in Nicaragua are small, they basically have a central plain surrounded by a few settlements. Altagracia was even smaller, but i managed to find accommodation and eat something and get a nice nights rest in a very basic room with a bed and a fan, this day was full of adventure for me. The next morning i took some 16km of rough dirt roads directly to mayogalpa riding next to la conception volcano, a near perfect cone-shaped volcano, mayogalpa is where i was gonna stay for 4 days while doing the 100km fuego y agua ultra marathon, this is also where the race would start the next morning. I settled into a room that looked like a converted horse stable with a door, bed and fan. We departed in one of the chicken buses from the town of mayogalpa on the island of ometepe to the Feugo y Agua race briefing. Chicken buses are yellow america school buses found all over Nicaragua, locally decorated and converted to transport people,chickens and basically anything. After an awesome island style sunset and pre-race dinner we had the race briefing and a traditional island dance show by the local ometepe children. Twenty 100km runners lined up at the 4am start, and then, boom! Fireworks were shot into the air with sparks missing us by meters, giving us an extra jump in our step and off we were. Starting on the main road in mayogalpa the road turned into dirt trails with bush tunnels making use of sections of road, we were on our way to the malderas volcano on the other section of ometepe by means of the narrow strip of land joining the two volcanoes on the island, almost like a bridge. Even though it was early it was already hot and humid. We ran on trails and a piece of black sand beach on the island bridge section and missed the turnoff, allot of runners got lost here, but by using common sense and an detour through the forest, we eventually found the path after losing a bit of time. Running though the true wild banana forests was quite cool where after we reached the natural springs. From here we followed the road on the other side of the island bridge section next to a more white colored sand beach to the start of the volcano climb at porvennir 31km into the race. At this stage i think i was already dehydrated as i was drinking allot of water and sweating from the heat and not getting in enough salt. Luckily they had salt tablets at this aid station and i took a few with me. I followed a very rocky trail up to the start of the climb of the malderas volcano and started heading up into the cloud forest where i heard howler monkeys making freaky noises in the forest. The higher you go up on this volcano the more dense and humid it gets, the trail transforms from always wet mesh of roots in nutrient rich soil into mud pools in a jungle gym where you have to use all fours to pull yourself up the volcano on strong tree roots. Cloud forests are green, growing, glowing gardens of trees, ferns, orchids and mosses in an always cloudy or foggy atmosphere. Climbing through these forests reminded me of the film "Lord of the Rings". Movement was very slow and tiring here, but an awesome privilege to experience. I reached the rim and descended into the crater, at the bottom of the crater there is a lake composed of rainwater and a natural spring. It measures 300 by 250 meters, but with the fog one can see only about 50 feet across. This is 41km into the race, it was cold up here and I used the aid station to get some food down and refill my water. Going out of the crater the forest became so dense at places, that you would have to stop and figure out how you are going to get though this mesh of moss covered roots, eventually you would spot the gap where you could slide though. I have never seen strong dense roots with moss and forest like this in my life, it was very cool. Coming down though the mud it would drop steep at sections where you just had to hang on to roots and slide down. I reached the bottom for the volcano at the 50km mark after 10 hours, 2 hours before cutoff. I had blisters from wet feet, i was semi dehydrated and slow. Had a peanut butter and banana sandwich and hit the hot stretch of dirt road leading to the other side of the island and volcano la conception. At this stage 10 out of the 20 that had started the 100km had dropped out for various reasons. I was last and slow, but i make the cutoffs. It was probably my dehydration and blisters that made me so slow. As the sun set in an spectacular mushroom cloud over the volcano, i headed for flor the start of the la conception climb, here i went though local villages where my feet was starting to get very sore and i was getting very slow but i was determined to finish. The music the locals listen to here is exactly 15 years behind the rest of the world, so as i was making my way to flor i had to listen to remixes of the titanic soundtrack and other 1997 hits. I reached flor, the 80k mark in 17hours, and had 24hours to finish the race. Even though i was slow, i wanted to finish even though i made the cutoff with just an hour to spare. At this checkpoint the race organizer informed me that he can't stop me from going up la conception, but he wouldn't advise me to go at my current speed, as it is very steep and can be very dangerous. So this is where i ended up flipping a coin, a cordoba - nicaragua money with a triange on the one side. If it would fall on the triangle i would go up to volcano, if not it would stop here. It landed on the side without a triangle and this is where my race stopped. It was an awesome race, and i would love to do it again. So i did 80km in 17 hours and got a dnf, i enjoyed it and learned so much and are not killing myself about the dnf. It is definitely an experience of a lifetime i can recommend to any trail runner passionate about mountains and nature to put on their bucket list, a though one. After the race i stayed on the island for a couple of days exploring it on my mountain bike, whereafter i took the weekly midnight ferry to granada where my bike was stacked between lots of bananas. I did some off the beaten track exploring involving steep hike a bike sections, being chased by dogs, fired upon with fireworks, and escorted by friendly locals on the rim of the apoyo crater. I made my way back to the city of managua, and finished a very successful adventure. Jacques -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "DarkAndDirty" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. 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