We were packed early and decided to leave @ 3:30 instead of 4. Good choice. We left the first time and got about 6 blocks from home and remembered that Meghan and I had not taken or Durkrol. So once   we got that done we were on the road, well for 3 blocks, then Meghan remembered she had not packed a towel. Back home again.

Ok we are on the road now, it’s 4:00 our planned departure time. So that worked ok ok.  We got about 15 min from home and Meghan remembered she had not packed her dive log. A quick detour to the closest dive shop and she has a new dive log. No we are on the road for sure!
The border crossing ended up being a piece of cake. There was one car in front of us and when we got to t

he front, he asked where we were going and we told him, Nicaragua for some scuba diving. “Hmm, did not know there was good diving there” he said. We assured him there was and we were on our way, less than 5 min total!
We were trying to find a “Cheesecake Factory” to have dinner in on the way down, but by the time we found one, in the heart of the business district, with no apparent street parking anywhere around we gave up on that and heading to the airport.  We scoped out the places to eat along the way and found one about 1km from our long term parking lot. Great dinner, we were all fed up and ready to go!
Due to my over cautious nature, I ended up getting us to the airport about 90 min earlier than we really needed to be, oh well better safe than sorry.
With a last minute switch of gates we boarded our pl

ane to Huston and were in the air. When we landed in Huston, I released I did not have my Tilley hat with me. I figure I either left it at the gate or it was somewhere tucked under the seat of the plane. I’ll have to contact the airline when I get back to Seattle and find out if they found it or not.
That made for some shopping fun in Huston. We were able to score a coffee and bagel for breakfast, which hit the spot. (thanks again Carolyn)  Then I was off on a mission to find a brimmed hat. Found a few, but they were felt and did not want to take something like that on the boat. I did end up finding a straw hat, which is REALLY nice that would work, but I have to resign myself to it getting trashed in the wet and on the boat.
Once we landed in Managua we headed off to the national airport to check our bags in and then see if we could get some lunch. All of our bags wer

e over weight, Steve leading the team with 61 lbs followed by the ladies at 46 and 44 lbs. so we were a tad over our 30 lb limit!
Going back to the International airport, wouldn’t you know it there was a cotton hat that would be perfect for the boat, right at the Managua airport. Seven bucks later and I now own two new hats!

We had a gourmet lunch at the airport, (Subway) and then headed back to the national terminal to catch our flight. We saw the plane that Stu took from Managua to Big Co

rn Island and were waiting for us to get called to board.  We noticed a series of much smaller planes arrive, leave and arrive while we were waiting.  They final call our flight and direct us out to the tarmac, not to the plane we thought we would be getting on but to this TINY SINGLE PROP  HIGH WING creation that looks like it seats 6 people! (it actually seats 12 plus the pilot and copilot.) I think Carolyn was taking some deep breaths and saying to herself, it’s a adventure, it’s an adventure.  I am not sure how she felt once we were on board and found out that the seat belts are not regular plane seat belts but 3 point harness!  I think after the quick, and smooth take off she relaxed fairly quickly – she fell asleep – right beside Meghan, no stress for these two!
We finally landed on Big Corn Island and were able to catch a “taxi” to the panga (boat) that goes to Little Corn Island, boy the islanders are friendly, they all wanted to help us, for a tip of course, and due to our ‘light’ traveling the help was most welcome, we were all starting to fade at this point. But not for long.
We got on to the panga and headed for Little Corn. Almost there! Disney needs to take some lessons from this boat ride. HUGE bumps up and down. At times the wave ahead of us was taller, much taller, that the boat! And once you crest the top of that wave, you come crashing down the other side, which was not only like the best stomach throwing roller coaster you could imagine, but very very very wet. (Ok Carolyn may not have had quite as much fun as Steve and Meghan had, but she did get wet)
Once we landed at Little Corn Island, Adam from Dolphin Dive shop was there to meet us, which was a nice and welcome surprise. Apparently the boat docked at the north wharf instead of the usually one. (Which is about 300 meters from the dive shop) So we had to hike our gear about 1.2 km to the hotel.
Once we got our rooms, which are nice, we all wanted to shower and get out of our dripping wet clothes and unpack our other gear so we could dry out the stuff that go wet.
It was then off for dinner at the hotel. Starting with these bowl sized strawberry margadacuaries. (we called them that because they looked like a dac, but had rum and tequila in it. Nummy, no matter what. We go the menu and it took us about 30 seconds to decide on the lobster. I had the Caribbean sauce (a cream dill type sauce) and Meghan and Carolyn had the garlic sauce. Huge meal. 2 lobster tails, rice, salad, French fires all for 14 bucks.

After dinner Carolyn and Meghan went to the beach area in front of the hotel to dip their feet into the water and test out the sand, which meet to their standards. Then it was off to bed. Not diving tomorrow, we are going to kick back and relax and start diving on Saturday.  Long day, lots of fun.