Have you ever wanted to climb an active volcano? Well luckily for you there are a surprising number of places in Central America that will let you climb one. One of these places is the Island of Ometepe in the middle of the Lake Nicaragua. There is so many things to do in Nicaragua, but Ometepe Island was probably my favourite place that we visited. Concepción is the bigger of the two volcanos on the island, standing at 1600m high. If hiking a volcano is on your list here are some Concepción hiking tips to help you concur this volcano.

About Hiking Concepción Volcano

The hikes has an elevation gain of 130m, is about 16km long and takes approximately 10 hours. Understandably it is a pretty challenging hike, but it is also pretty spectacular. The first segment of this hike is relative flat past farms and jungles. Then it gets quit steep! For the first 1/2 of the hike it is pretty hot, but you start early in the morning and are in the shade for most if it. Look out for howler moneys in the jungle!

When you get out of the jungle you will enter another relative flat section this time covered in grass. This is most likely where you will have lunch. I think this is all where the best views of the island are! The final section is the hardest sections of the hike so some people will turn around at the half way point. The path to the summit from that point on gets alot more rocky and difficult. The path is less obvious and the rocks are usually loose. Your guide will likely give you gloves so that you can use your hands to help you up this section. At the very top there is are a narrowish ledge that you will have to walk along. The top is often covered with clouds / sulphur but you can kind of see into the volcano. But it is very satisfying!

Concepción Tip 1: You need a guide

There is no way around this, it is the law, you need a guide. Fortunately there are tons of them and they are very easy to organize. We just asked our hostel the day before and they found one for us. It was about $45 and you will be glad that you have a guide for the top section of the hike!

Concepción Tip 2: Bring all of the water

When we were organizing our Concepción hike we decided that we were just going to order the packable lunchs that our hostel provided. When they prepared them for us they handed up each 2 full litre bottle of water. Immediately all of us questioned if it was really necessary for us to carry all of that water all the way up the volcano. Our guide said yes, it was absolutely necessary we had that much water.

Man was he ever right! We drank all of the water we brought and even wanted more when we finished! It is a hard hike and the bottom is very hot, the last thing you want to be is dehydrated. Make sure you bring enough food and water for the whole hike.

Concepción Tip 3: Wear proper gear

Concepción is a hard hike, make sure you don’t make it harder by being ill prepared. Your guide will most likely give you a walking stick and gloves to help with your hike. These come in particularly helpful to the rocky section at the top. The rocks are sharp and you need the gloves to protect your hand. You WILL be using your hands to hiking the last section.

You will also need proper hiking shoes for the super sections. If you are planing on turning around at the grassy area running shoes are fine. I made the mistake of wearing hiking boots that were several years old and had lost pretty much all of their tread. This made the descent very difficult! There was a lot of sliding down the mountain.

Concepción Tip 4: Be prepared for bugs

There are more bugs then you can possible image on this hike, particularly at the top. Out guide had told us to bring jackets on the hike. We figured the jackets were because it got cold near the top. While it did chill down, the real reason for the jackets was to protect against the bugs! They were HUGE! Defiantly bring a jacket to help protect against them. It also means that you probably don’t want to spend that long at the summit.

Concepción Tip 5: Its hard, but not impossible

When we first started talking about hiking Concepción pretty much every other traveler we met said not to bother. That it was too hard with not enough reward. Chances are most people telling you this have never hiked Concepción. Most people opt to climbing the smaller Ometepe volcano – Maderas. It is a hard hike and I’ve seen better summit views, but it is very rewarding. Don’t let the fact that it is a difficult hike dissuade you from doing it, it is not nearly as hard as everyone had been telling us it was going to be.