Backpacking by myself with Life Before Work in Nicaragua and Costa Rica

Every year it is my goal to use my passport at least once or travel to three new cities in the U.S. This makes traveling even more fun than it already is. I have my staple cities that I love and go to every year like St. Petersburg, FL, Chicago, IL and to visit my parents in Naples, FL. One thing that is easy to find is people who love to travel. One thing that is hard to find is people that are willing to commit and pay the money to travel with. This is why last June I decided I was going to just go, even if it was by myself. This was an exciting feeling, I was putting myself out of my comfort zone and excited to go and meet new people. I knew someone that had done a Life Before Work (LBW) trip and I knew that Central America was where I was looking to go, specifically Costa Rica. I wanted to see beaches, waterfalls, jungle, and volcanoes.

Life Before Work made booking and traveling so easy. I booked a trip to Costa Rica and was in the checkout when it asked if I wanted to add Nicaragua for a week too. The cost was so affordable and I had the vacation days so I did it. I booked the trip and was leaving in 20 days. Wow! What started as just research for a trip turned into booking a backpacking trip to not one, but TWO countries leaving in less than three weeks. My adrenaline was pumping and I was so excited. I took the Central Teaser trip which can be found here. Those 20 days flew by and before I knew it I was boarding a plane to Managua which was scheduled to land at midnight and the tour started the next day so I connected in a Facebook group with two girls and booked a hotel by the airport. I called one of my best friends Sam and told him and he instantly booked the Costa Rica portion of the trip for his birthday so if all else fails I would have him with me in a week.

From Managua we met our tour guides Desmond and Jorge who picked us up in a van and we hit the road for San Juan del Sur, the cutest little beach town in Nicaragua. In San Juan del Sur we hiked to a statue of Jesus that overlooked the town and went on a Sunday Funday pool crawl, which included four different pools and drink tickets at each location. This trip was already off to a great start and I loved all the people in the group. They were so friendly and just like me, they loved to travel but often had trouble finding friends that would commit and pay for trips with them.

The third day we woke up in our beautiful hostel called The Pink Palace, which is the headquarters for NomadLife and a few of us walked to a café called Simon Says, where we probably spent $3 for all you can eat buffet, ordered a menu item and unlimited coffee and juice. We paid extra for smoothies which were so delicious and I highly recommend. Then we drove out of town about 45 minutes to take a surfing lesson. VERY IMPORTANT LESSON LEARNED IS THE STINGRAY SHUFFLE. We were reminded of this lesson in a painful way when a girl in our group was stung on the foot by a stingray and she was in the most intense pain I have ever seen. Being a vet student she instantly said “it was my fault, I stepped on him in his home.” We waited for an ambulance (which was really just a van) to come and get her to take her to a doctor in town. After that I was pretty much done surfing for the day and we had a fire on the beach, ate fish and veggies out of foil cooked over the fire and drove back into town.

Another thing I learned about stingrays is that their venom is heat loving, meaning if you put the affected area in cold water then the venom will move away and go further into the body. The trick here is to put the affected area in as hot of water that you can stand to suck the venom out as quickly as possible. Luckily, there were locals on the beach when this happened and they were able to help us.

The fourth day is one of my favorites because we had the opportunity to make a donation and volunteer at a local school where we played “elephant ball,” kind of like kickball and had a piñata as well as a dutch auction. If you are unfamiliar with a dutch auction it is when you get a bunch of random craft materials and have 10 minutes to create something to bring to the auction. It’s such a fun way to get the kids thinking and see all the different things groups will come up with when given the same materials. I encourage everyone to consider taking half a day on any trip and finding a place to volunteer. It such a cool way to see another culture. In the afternoon we went out on a Catamaran trip where we were taken to a private island to swim for a bit. On the way back we got to watch the sunset and a big, beautiful whale joined us for most of the ride back which made the whole experience even more memorable. Once back on land we changed and were ready to go out. The tour guides took us to a bar called the Loose Moose pub, where if you complete 5 shots in under 15 seconds you get a tank top. My girl Fanny and I both did it. I crushed it in 12 seconds and we both got tank tops.

Let me take a moment to tell you about Fanny! She will be coming up a lot in my travel stories. She is so fun and adventurous, studying to be a teacher in Quebec so needless to say she embodies everything an awesome Canadian would and tends to teach me French phrases when we are together. I am so lucky that I made a friend like Fanny on this trip because now I have a travel buddy for life!

Day five we packed up and left San Juan del Sur for Granada, one of the biggest cities if not the biggest in Nicaragua. We took a walking tour of the town, visited the cathedral, went to an active volcano in the evening where we could peer over and see lava in the bottom. I have truly never seen anything like this and was in awe that I could see all the way in to the center of the earth.

Day six was definitely my favorite day of the trip! We spent the whole day in an imploded volcano that is now a lake called Laguna de Apoyo! If there is one thing to know about me I love the water and even more so I love going to the lake! The water is so warm here because the sand is what used to be molten rock so it is black. This place included paddle boarding, kayaks, and tubes to float on or swim out to a dock in the middle. There was also a bar and café to order drinks and food from. I could spend all day doing water activities so this was my type of paradise!

And just like that our time in Nicaragua had come to a close. We packed up and hit the road for a LONG bus ride to Costa Rica with a final destination of Tamarindo. My friend Sam was joining us today (yay!). Once we got together we did a walking tour of Tamarindo getting tacos for dinner, of course and finishing the day with a little bit of rum. It was very sad to say good bye to some our tripmates in Nicaragua, but we picked up a few more in Costa Rica so it was exciting to get to know even more people.

The next day we took another surf lesson on the beach and I have to say there were no stingrays this time and by this point I was getting even better at standing up. We have arrived at day nine which included another Catamaran trip with food and drinks included. Another beautiful sunset and more tacos for dinner. Day ten was an activity packed day. We went zip lining over the Colorado River, which I did not know went all the way down to Costa Rica. This was my first time zip lining and my face in the photos says it all haha. After zip lining we went on a horseback ride, rafting with a guide down the river, had a steam in the sauna, took a mud bath, jumped in the river to rinse off and finished the day with a soak in Hot Springs. The next morning we packed up and hit the road to Santa Teresa.

In Santa Teresa we rented ATVs and rode from one side of Costa Rica to the other including a hike to a waterfall and cliff jumping. This was my first time cliff jumping too and as someone who loves the water I was so excited to try this. My nerves were definitely there as soon as my foot left the ground and then I was just pure adrenaline. What a thrill and a couple other people decided they would try it too so I went a total of three times.

The last day has arrived and I can’t believe that all of these people were strangers to me a week or even two weeks ago. You really do become a family and get to have the best conversations with people that love to travel and none of us have cell service. What a wonderful thing to be able to completely disconnect and meet a dozen new people. The last day we opted to pay for an infinite pool that overlooked Santa Teresa, where we had a few drinks and some tears were shed as reality set in that we were all getting ready to leave each other. The final dinner was so fun to reflect on the trip and hear how grateful everyone was to be a part of this experience along with me. I would definitely do another tour again and in fact a few of us girls are planning another trip for a little reunion which I am sure is going to be even more fun than the first time we traveled together.