Nomadic Narrative

My thoughts of Ometepe Island were dominated by images of scaling active volcanoes, biking around the lake and kayaking across the island’s isthmus. Once there, I started to hear accounts of more cultural pursuits: petroglyph viewing.

I had plans to climb Maderas Volcano where evidently some 1700 boulders with petroglyphs scatter about the base. I’m not alone in my surprise about this lesser known and lesser studied archaeological wonder. Today, archaeologists are trying to piece together the history of the area. It’s thought that people inhabited the island as early as 2000 B.C., but which group is responsible for the petroglyphs is unknown. (If you’re interested in doing volunteer archaeological research, visit the Ometepe Archaeological Project.)

I decided to spend a few nights at the base of Maderas in Santa Cruz. About three hours by bus from the port of Moyogalpa, the village of Santa Cruz, though somewhat remote, is centrally located if you want to go sunbathing at Playa Domingo, hiking to San Ramón waterfall, climbing Maderas Volcano and perusing the petroglyphs.

I arrived in Santa Cruz on the local bus late in the afternoon and followed a large, white sign pointing to the Albergue Ecologico El Porvenir. Not far from the bus stop sat an enormous cement sign with the hotel’s name. I turned into a lush tunnel of trees wrapping around a one-lane road.
A few yards along the road, I noticed a giant boulder resting under a shelter topped with tejas. It was getting dark, so I had to leave the road and follow a footpath into the clearing to see why this rock deserved its own house.

I knew that I’d find petroglyphs in the area, but I had no idea that an impressive collection would be scattered around the hotel’s property. I stood still on the serene and elevated slopes of Maderas Volcano looking over the isthmus to Concepción Volcano. I was surrounded by ancient rock art an engulfed in a profound sense of spirituality.