Playa Ostional in San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua.
El Ostional is a comunity of about 4000 lifes. Farmes and turism workers for the most.

This town is still a fisherman area. Boat all over the beach in some days.
Ostional is just near playa La Flor. A natural reserve where Olive Redley turtles come to lay there eggs.

EL OSTIONAL, NICARAGUA. FOR LOVERS OF ECOTOURISM AND RESPONSIBLE TOURISM
After a long time without blogging, I have finally found the motivation to do it again and… what a great feeling! It seems that he needed a compelling reason to do it and that reason is El Ostional, in Nicaragua.

El Ostional is a town or community of Nahoa descent, with a population of just 1,200 inhabitants (although it has more communities, which increases this figure). It is located in the Municipality of San Juan del Sur, in Rivas, on the Pacific coast, very very close to the border with Costa Rica. Its activities are fishing, artisanal diving, agriculture, livestock and ecotourism, without great luxuries.
Its name comes from the large number of oysters (a type of oyster) that were in the area at the time of its discovery. This produced the greed of the colonizers and, well, you can imagine the rest ... I, honestly, neither want nor am I going to focus on that in this post. As you can see, I do not have an objective view on this issue.

In El Ostional there are no ATMs or ATMs, so make sure you bring cash because when I was there you couldn't pay anything at all with a card. I take this opportunity to tell you that the card that has worked the best for me in Nicaragua is the Revolut, I'll leave you my link here in case it would be useful to you. I also use the Bnext, but for this area I do not recommend it.

What makes El Ostional a special place?
ITS BEACH
It is an almost virgin and quiet beach, little known and even less visited. A beach of inordinate beauty with views to the bottom of the province of Guanacaste, Costa Rica, that few have had the opportunity to observe and enjoy. Losing track of time watching the waves sway with that image in the background, believe me, it's a unique experience.

I do not know very well yet if luckily or unfortunately, but the fact is that this area does not have enough resources to make large tourism investments. This is something that I, right now, appreciate and, for this reason, this place only admits and should admit, as the title of this article says, ecotourism and sustainable tourism. The preservation of places like this is very important. There is no place for mass tourism here, and I sincerely hope it never will. Luckily, to this day, there is no capacity for it either. If this is not your travel style, it is not an area that will interest you very much ...

However, and despite not having great resources, the area offers different attractions and tours so that the visitor has a unique experience of the place. Which? We go in parts. Later I will tell you about this in the section What to do in El Ostional?

YOUR MANGROVE
The El Ostional mangrove, like all mangroves, in addition to being a very fragile ecosystem and being threatened by lack of resources, protects the people from adversities such as tropical storms, tsunamis and tidal waves, which are so common in areas of volcanic activity.

It is a small mangrove, but very special, since in its approximately 16 hectares of extension it not only shelters an infinity of animal life, but also houses almost all the mangrove species that occur in Central America. It is even made up of some species that, until recently, were only believed to be present in its neighboring country, Costa Rica. These mangrove varieties are the Piñuela Mangrove and the Paloma Pie Mangrove (Tabebuia Palustris), with a beautiful white flower that characterizes it.

It is also special for the number of nuclear species that occur in it (unique in the plant kingdom: its seeds germinate still connected to the mother tree, resulting in the creation of new trees already grown before making individual contact with the soil) and the abundance of a tree called Manzanillo, highly poisonous and very curious. I encourage you to do a little more research on these species. With these data, you will understand the importance of this mangrove and, obviously, the importance of preserving it.

Perhaps it is a unique place on the planet and, even if it was not, I assure you that it is a place that gives off a very beautiful energy, I would say even magical. It's lovely.

I also want to tell you that there is an open project for the construction of an outdoor classroom inside the mangrove, I leave you more information in Profile Project Aula de Aire Libre Sendero Accesible Las Piñuelas, the entire mangrove dossier is extensive, they have been years and years of research, the passion of any biologist and / or naturalist.

You can contact Salvador, who is carrying out this project, and / or also make your donation through Western Union, although the cheapest way is to do it in one of his offices. The banking system in Nicaragua is crazy and that in Spain is getting worse ... He set up a bank account specifically for the project and the small fees charged by Nicaraguan banks for receiving international transfers, I was amazed. He had to return the transfer to me and we tried this other method.

The village of El Ostional is under the administration of the city of San Juan del Sur.The village has about 4000 inhabitants scattered over various communities, hamlets and places called.El Ostional bay still lives to the rhythm of fishing and tourism. El Ostional has many unspoiled beaches with limited access, making it an incredible destination for all tourist activities around nature, discovery and relaxation.The tourist offer remains however very limited, the village counts around fifteen inns with prices of nights ranging from $ 8 to $ 40 per person.El Ostional beach receives massive arrivals of Olive Redley turtle spawners during the months of June to December.The main spawning pole is the Flor beach, a natural reserve, located 4 km to the north. This a magnificent beach for swimming and to see the spawning and birth of turtles.

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