Nicaragua

Nicaragua offers what its famous neighbour did twenty years ago: the same volcanoes, beaches and biodiversity, minus the crowds and at prices that feel like a misprint. Granada is the showpiece, a lakefront colonial city of butter-yellow arcades and horse carts, with boat trips weaving through its 365 private islets. The volcanoes perform daily. Peer into the glowing lava lake of Masaya after dark, sandboard down the black slopes of Cerro Negro, or hike the twin cones of Ometepe, the island that rises from Lake Nicaragua like a myth. The Pacific coast keeps some of the hemisphere's best and least crowded surf around San Juan del Sur, with barefoot-chic lodges appearing along the headlands. Coffee farms, cigar towns, rum older than most guests. Nicaragua is raw, warm and rewarding.