Secret Nicaragua: 7 Experiences Few Travelers Get to Experience

Fifteen years in the business, and Nicaragua never ceases to surprise me. The country has an opportunity that few others have retained: 90 % of its territory remains unspoiled, accessible, and almost secret. International travelers tend to focus on three or four obvious destinations—Granada, Ometepe, San Juan del Sur, and sometimes Corn Island. Everything else is just the wilderness.

Here are seven experiences I recommend to my clients who want to go beyond the standard. None are inaccessible. None are elitist. But they require time, curiosity, and a certain willingness to be shifted.

1. Ometepe Island by bike, day two

Everyone comes to Ometepe. But 80 % of the visitors stay just one night, take a quick tour, and leave. The island only reveals its true character starting on the second night, once the tour groups have left.

What I recommend to my clients: rent a bike for $5 a day in Mérida and head south in the morning on dirt roads. Thirty kilometers of scenery—coconut groves, crossing cows, kids waving, Volcano Maderas directly ahead. Lunch in San Ramón facing the volcano. Swim in the’Water Eye, a natural crystalline spring filtered through volcanic rock, clear as glass. Bike ride back at sunset.

I've made this trip three times between 2020 and 2023, and each time it was the same feeling: you're no longer in tourist mode, you're in the country. Not a single misplaced Spanish word that we had to try to hide.

2. The Catarina viewpoint, late afternoon on a Tuesday

Everyone goes up to Catarina. But at 11 AM, by group bus, with forty other people. Go up on a Tuesday in the late afternoon, when the buses have returned.

The Mirador de Catarina viewpoint likely offers the most beautiful panoramic view in the country: the Apoyo Lagoon below (a volcanic crater filled with turquoise water), the Mombacho volcano in the distance, Granada on the horizon. At 5 PM, the golden light falls on everything and there are perhaps three people at the viewpoint. The craft market in the village next door is where I recommend buying a hammock – a real, handmade one that lasts thirty years, for around $30. Not like the ones you find in airports.

3. Descent of the Rio San Juan by boat

River border between Nicaragua and Costa Rica, the Rio San Juan It connects the Great Lake to the Caribbean Sea. A two or three-day descent by lancha relives the epic of the conquistadors, English pirates, and the Californian Gold Rush — which passed through here in 1849, before the Panama Canal was dug.

Steps I give my clients: El Castillo and its 17th-century colonial fortress (which is still besieged in the imagination), a night in a lodge in the heart of the jungle in Sabalos (I particularly like Sabalos Lodge), El Rama, San Juan de Nicaragua at the Caribbean mouth. Three days out of time. It's a journey within a journey that few French people have taken.

4. Estelí, evening with the cigar rollers

In the north, in the region of Estelí, one of the world's best tobaccos is grown — a direct competitor to Cuba, and today preferred by discerning connoisseurs. The factories Joya de Nicaragua, Padron and Plasencia welcome visitors by appointment, but what struck me the most wasn't the official visit.

This is an evening I shared in March 2023 with a Roller (rouleur) who explained to me for two hours how the leagues — leaf blends. The wrapper leaf that must shine, the binder leaf that gives body, the combination that changes the final taste entirely. A bottle of Flor de Caña 18 Year Old between us, and a fresh cigar smoking slowly. This is the Nicaragua that the guidebooks don't show.

5. Kayaking in Apoyo Lagoon at 5:30 AM

25 minutes from Granada, the Apoyo Crater It is filled with clear blue water at a constant 28°C. Most visitors go in the middle of the day, in groups, on inflatable tubes. That's great. But that's not the lagoon.

What I recommend to my nature-loving clients: rent a kayak the evening before, sleep on the shore (Paradiso has cabins for $40 a night), and paddle at 5:30 AM. The mist rises over the water. Howler monkeys begin their concert on the banks. A toucan sometimes flies by. At 6:30 AM the sun rises above the crater, and the lagoon becomes incandescent. Almost alone. The silence is well worth the early wake-up.

6. A night with a host family in Solentiname

The archipelago of Solentiname, at the extreme south of the great lake, is a unique place. Known for its community artistic movement — naive painters and sculptors initiated in the 1970s by the poet-priest Ernesto Cardenal — this group of islands has remained preserved from mass tourism for a simple reason: it is very far away.

Access by lancha from San Carlos, in the south (flight from Managua + boat, or road + boat, allow one day). On site, you stay with locals – community homestay for $35 per night, meals included. You share meals with the family, visit painting and balsa wood workshops, and cross the islands by lancha in the morning with children going to school. One hundred percent of the proceeds go to the community. This allows me to send clients there with peace of mind.

Count on a minimum of two to three nights to truly feel the place.

7. Little Corn Island on foot, in two days

Little Corn is smaller than Big Corn, with no cars (banned), no roads, just sandy paths between the shacks. You can walk around it in three hours. But the real gift is staying three or four nights.

Learn the fishermen's first names. Dive on the reefs (the Corn Islands are ranked among the best dive sites in Central America, and there's almost no one in the water there). Share freshly grilled fish on the beach at night with four travelers met at lunch. Walk barefoot everywhere. Read an entire book in one afternoon.

It's Central America from thirty years ago. And that's precisely what makes the place precious. I've seen couples leave in tears there – not from sadness, but from gratitude. I tell this story twice a year.

The common thread: taking your time

In Nicaragua, what stands out are never the checked-off sites on a list. It's the encounters along a dirt road. That's precisely why we feel a much stronger attachment than for most destinations.

All these experiences have one thing in common: they cannot be lived in half a day. They require you to set down your bags, slow down, and sometimes accept the absence of Wi-Fi. This is precisely what makes them memorable.

It's better to explore three regions of Nicaragua in depth than six superficially. The country is too nuanced for a checklist trip.

For logistical basics (formalities, transport, budget), refer to our practical guide to preparing your trip to Nicaragua. And to understand the regional spirit, our founding article on Nicaragua.

Do you have any other hidden gems in mind, or questions about any of these experiences? Create your own custom trip at Toucan Discovery Dynamics, or by direct message with me.