Sorry to keep pounding the topic. Anyone have any helpful info? I’m heading there in a month. A bit blindly. Thanks in advanced.
Just wondering, they claim 340 days of offshore winds…wouldn’t that cause some upwelling and subsequently colder water? Our water dropped nearly twenty degrees in a few days due to the seasonal winds. So maybe you get offshore wind but colder water than neighboring countries.
And, if you haven’t already checked, try the wavehunters website for the surf camp…Popoyo or something.
Thanks. I’ve check out Dagger’s place and Popoyo, but everything is expensive. Been to Costa a couple times and have been able to travel really cheap. Like $10 nights. I’m trying to find the same set up. Those camps are loot!
Ill be in northern costa rica the 14th through the 22nd. When will you be in nicaragua?
Somewhere around July 18-26th
Rick ( X 3):
I have been travelling to Nicaragua off and on for the last 5 years or so. It is changing very rapidly. When I first start going, there were absolutely no crowds. As in none. Every session was just me and the guys I went with. There was very little published info about the place at that time so we were able to enjoy the feeling of surfing spots that had not been surfed (even though they had, of course, been surfed - we were hardly the first surfers to show up). JJ Yemma’s camp at Popoyo wa basically just a slab with a thatched roof and a few ratty structures with wall mounted AC for his guests. Dale Dagger was sending out his dispatches trying to attract tourists. There was 1 restaurant and one place to get supplies like water, etc. We rented a house in Rancho Santana from Surf Express (a company out of Florida owned by Todd Holland’s mother). On the first trip, we had no running water or electricity at the house for about 4 days because the power grid and water system in that part of Nicaragua was spotty at best. We didn’t care, though, because we were surfing our brains out and pinching ourselves that we were getting such good waves with nobody else in sight.
Fast forward to the current - I just returned about month ago. The place has changed exponentially and much of that change has occurred during the last year or two.
To say that “they have killed the goose who laid the golden egg” is probably on overstatement but it is not far from accurate. Don’t get me wrong - the waves are still really good and overall the crowds are negligible compared to California or Florida.
That being said, it is a completely different show down there now. There are now several restaurants in the Salinas/Tola/Guasacate area. Rancho Santana has exploded with growth and there are now high digit houses going up left and right. Much of the coastal access is restricted because developers at Playa Iguana and Rancho Santana have sealed off the roads leading to the breaks. Tons of wave starved Floridians down there - paddle battling each other (and anyone else) for waves. To compound the problem, only a relatively small part of the coast experiences the offshores 340+ days a year. There are probably less than 10 breaks in that small strip of coast (as far as I am aware, anyway) and only a few are accessible by car unless you are staying in Rancho Santana or Playa Iguana - if you aren’t then you are very limited in your options unless you hire a panga. So, the coastal access problem combined with the larger crowds makes for a “different” experience than it used to be.
Overall I would say that the Nicaragua you will get today is more like lesser crowded Costa Rica with better waves - which is great but it isn’t the “zero crowd, perfect glass barrels all day” fantasy setup that it used to be.
It was bound to happen…
I don’t know that I will be going back anytime soon - think I will keep pushing south.
If you decide to go, send me a personal message and I will give you some more specific intel. The one bright spot is that they are still “discovering” waves down there and if you are willing to go exploring outside of the Tolas/Salinas area then you will have a really good chance of tapping into the Nicaragua of 5 years ago. I have heard stories of treasures in northern Nicaragua but I have not expored that area. From what I have been told, you don’t have the lake effect up there (i.e., offshores 340+ days) but you still get the reefs and points and you are in the same swell window.
Hope that helps.