Links of Interest

Project Bona Fide, Ometepe has been created out of a need to support rural Nicaraguan farming communities so that they may gain self-empowerment and economic stability. Sí a la Vida saves lost children in Managua and on Ometepe. People from Bainbridge and Ometepe help. Sí a la Vida means Yes to Life. In 1986, the island had four telephones. They have more phones these days, but not much Internet access. The Association is out to change that. Read about Association's Ometepe Freenet Project Earthquakes and eruptions--Ometepe has them all the time. Mostly they're a little smoke and ash and tiny vibrations, but occasionally they're more powerful. You can follow the seismic activities around Nicaragua at this site, run by the Nicaraguan government's equivalent of the Geological Survey. Volcano World, the Web's premier source of volcano info at the University of North Dakota, has some nice photos of both of Ometepe's volcanoes, Concepción and Maderas. The photos were taken by Association members on a delegation trip, and we're grateful to the webmasters at Volcano World for posting them. Tropical storms usually curve around in the Gulf of Mexico and menace the Southern US, but every year one or two blow right across Central America. To see a good satellite picture of the weather in Nicaragua, including on Ometepe, check NASA's page The Mesoamerica Visualization and Monitoring System Bainbridge and Ometepe both share petroglyphs, but Ometepe's are much more numerous. You can see some of them, and learn about efforts underway to preserve them, at the Ometepe Petroglyph Project web site. Ometepe Projekt Nicaragua was founded by Michael and Monika Höhn in the mid '90s. The project works to improve the lives of Ometepinos through medical care and recently, the Thousand Dollar Houses. The city of Herne in Germany has had a sister relationship with Ometepe since 1988. Their web site (in German) is here El Porvenir means "the future". Born in the 1980's as an off-shoot of Habitat for Humanity's self-help housing projects in Nicaragua, El Porvenir supports construction of community water systems all over Nicaragua, including on Ometepe. The New Haven/León Sister City Project has been operating since 1984, and it's still very active The Association is a founding member of the Northwest Shade Coffee Campaign, helping to encourage preservation of coffee forests. The Songbird Foundation believes that shade coffee can save songbirds. Let them tell you why. SoilSoup has made a gift of its compost tea equipment to Ometepe's coffee farmers. The farmers are enthusiastic supporters of organic methods, because it saves them from exposure to deadly pesticides and herbicides. They're also excited about learning alternate methods of pest control. SoilSoup Compost Tea is being tested at Hacienda Magdalena. The economies of many of the Third World's nations are to a remarkable degree affected by the policies of international lending institutions. Nicaragua is no exception. Two such institutions, The World Bank and Inter-American Development Bank have Web pages. A recent addition to Ometepe is the Biological Field Station. Sited on a former coffee plantation on the southwest slopes of Volcan Maderas, the Field Station offers courses in primate behavior and tropical ecology. Islands can be a source of endless fascination (especially to islanders!) Joshua Calder has collected a list of the most this-and-that called Island Superlatives. Ometepe is on Joshua's list. Lots of people seem to think that Ometepe is the largest lake island. It's not; that superlative belongs to Manitoulin Island, in Lake Huron. See if you can find out why Ometepe makes the list The University of Texas Latin American Network Information Center (UT-LANIC) maintains a large database covering international organizations, business, computing and telecommunications