Nicaragua

Good Deeds Lead To Great Waves

I believe in Karma. Good deeds are rewarded. Positive vibes multiply. Giving back to a community is rewarded with big smiles and good waves. This week seemed to prove all those points. Ten friends spent a morning painting a new local school and then scored an amazing week of awesome waves. Click Play above to see how it all went down.

High School Students Give Back With Suave Dulce

A group of 17 high school kids from High Tech High in San Diego came down to Nicaragua with Suave Dulce for the trip of a lifetime. They learned to surf, did yoga, went horseback riding on the beach, and boarded down an active volcano. They learned to make tortillas and jewelry while interacting with the local community.

All that was fun and exciting, but the real reason for their trip was to give back by helping to build a new classroom for 4th, 5th, and 6 graders. They painted, dug trenches, and learned to mix cement.

Click “play” above to watch their story.

Emily Gives Back With Suave Dulce

Emily is a 10th grader at High Tech High in San Diego who had the opportunity to spend 10 days helping to build a school for kids in Northern Nicaragua. Aside from giving back, she learned how to surf, practiced yoga, and got to know the community.
Check out her story…

Ruth Gained Surfing Confidence at Suave Dulce

Ruth doesn’t look like a “Ruth”, so we started calling her “Adriana”.
She’s cute and sassy with the longest eyelashes I’ve ever seen on a surfer – definitely not what I imagined someone named “Ruth” to look like.
During her week at Suave Dulce the amiga formerly known as “Ruth” scored the best waves of her life and definitely increased her confidence in the water. Click “play” above to check out her story.

Ruth aka Adriana goes left

Perfect Your Pop-Up

For a sample of what you’ll learn during a retreat, watch the video above. If you’re already planning on coming on a retreat, start doing your pop-up situps now and be even more prepared when you arrive on day 1!

Raising Money for a New Elementary School Classroom

Imagine you’re a 12 year old kid growing up in a remote fishing village in Northern Nicaragua. You’ve spent most of your life barefoot, chasing chickens and skinny dogs through barbed-wire fences. You learned to ride a horse at age 5 and by age 7 your dad had you herding cattle between pen and pasture. Your parents keep you busy with the chores of survival. There’s a two room school house just down the street but not much incentive to attend so you don’t know how to read.

Then one day, some gringos show up and buy land nearby. They give your uncles jobs in construction building a small eco-resort called El Coco Loco. Your mom gets hired to help out in the kitchen and your older brother scores a job as a night watchman.

Coco Loco founds a community development focused non-profit called Waves of Hope to improve the lives of the community they’ve fallen in love with. Volunteers come down from the US and Canada, girls with big smiles that spend mornings in the little school helping the one teacher that is assigned to teach three grades at once. In the afternoons they organize soccer games on the Coco Loco field, do art projects, and teach English. On Saturdays any kid that has attended classes Monday – Friday gets to borrow a surfboard and feel the joy of riding a wave.

Suddenly, there’s a lot of incentive to go to school. Attendance skyrockets. The tiny two room school house is no longer big enough.

Then Waves Of Hope announces that it will build a new school room for 4th, 5th, and 6th graders. But we need your help!

The new classroom will cost $9,000 to build. You can help by donating to Waves of Hope. Every little bit helps.
Email hollybeck27@gmail.com or jamie@elcocolocoresort.com for more info on how you can make a difference and help kids go to school!

Surf Coaching, Yoga, and Adventure Retreat Info

Escape reality for a week of unforgettable adventure!

It all starts with surfing.
Whether you are ready to catch your very first wave, become more confident in the water, transition to riding a shortboard, or improve your existing skills while making new surfing friends, we will help you achieve your goals. There are great waves for beginners, advanced beginners, intermediate, and experienced surfers all within walking distance. Getting you into the best waves is our top priority. If you are willing to think positively, push yourself, and listen to feedback you will leave the retreat a better surfer.

A perfect beginner's wave

Lindsay McDonald from Halifax Canada on the wave of her trip!

After surfing we’ll do yoga.
Yoga is so good for your body and mind. After a morning at the beach and an awesome meal, we’ll head up to the elevated ocean-view yoga studio. Yoga is a great way for surfers to work on core strength, flexibility, balance, and breathing. The yoga sessions will vary between strength building and restorative yoga. The instructor will provide modifications of poses so that every yogi will feel supported and challenged.

Afternoon Adventures
If the wind cooperates and the waves are good in the afternoon, we’ll head back to the beach for a second surf session. Otherwise we’ll set off on an adventure. We’ll hop on horseback and gallop down the beach, take a day-trip to the colonial city of Leon and hike up, then board down an active volcano, get dressed up and indulge in incredible French food at a hilltop restaurant with a 360 degree view. If conditions permit we may take a boat cruise to check out a secret surf spot.

Open air travel

Gourmet dining

The Difference
The difference between Suave Dulce and other women’s surf and yoga retreats is attitude and experience. Unlike other places where the instructors are barely intermediate surfers themselves, when you stay with us you will be coached and supported by Holly Beck, a professional surfer with a keen eye for how to help you specifically improve. We video every session and go over the footage so that you can see what you’re doing right and what little changes might help you really improve.

We also create a culture of support. The other girls will become your new surfing sisters, yelling and cheering and clapping and dancing in celebration of your awesome rides. You just don’t get that anywhere else.

$1,700 all inclusive package includes ($1,600 early bird special if booked 2 months in advance):
- two way airport transfer (if you get a flight that arrives on the first date of the retreat and departs on the last day.)
- 7 nights accommodation in a shared cabana
- 3 deliciously healthy meals per day
- all beverages (juices, sodas, beer, rum)
- daily surf lessons with professional surfer Holly Beck
- all afternoon activities such as yoga, horseback riding, volcano boarding, estuary cruising, and other surprises
- professional video footage and photos of you riding the best wave of your life

Typical Daily Schedule looks like this:
6:30am wake up for buffet breakfast of coffee, juice, cereal, toast, yogurt, fruit
7:30am – 11am surfing, surfing, surfing!
11:30am delicious lunch
2pm yoga
4pm second surf session or other adventure
7pm dinner with new friends

See the Schedule Link for available dates

A 50% deposit secures your spot. Contact SuaveDulce@gmail.com for booking info or other questions

Cydney Gurvich – Meet Your Yoga Teacher

Cydney Gurvich:
“I initially sought yoga as a physical balance to enhance my surfing, snowboarding, basketball, and other high impact sports; I soon discovered yoga as a deep and transformative practice in my life. I developed a deeper sense of compassion and confidence while strengthening the connection between mind and body, and the relationships with the people I love.

I’ve been practicing yoga since 2006, and completed my 200 hour yoga teacher training in April 2011 with Semperviva Yoga studios. I am Yoga Alliance Certified in classical Hatha. I was fortunate enough to study with such inspirational teachers as Seane Corn, Janet Stone, Gloria Latham, and Cameron Gilley. I have been teaching since April at various studios in Vancouver. I have also completed a number of classes for charity organizations (such as Easter Seals) with plans to continue weekly charity classes in June and July with 100% proceeds going to my favorite charity, Waves of Hope.

My classes are a mix of Hatha and Vinyasa Flow, integrating alignment, core work, and breathing techniques with basic poses and creative sequencing. Each class is designed to energize the body, calm the mind and give greater vitality and health. It is my dream to take students to Nicaragua to practise yoga and experience the raw beauty of the country and it’s people.

Check out http://sukhaline.com/ for more from Cydney Gurvich

New Surf Instructor – Meet Jackie George

Jackie George is hanging out with Suave Dulce and ready to become your new favorite amiga! She learned to surf as a kid at San Onofre, growing up in the wave rich town of San Clemente, CA. After graduating high school, she moved up to the cold waters of Northern CA to attend college at Humboldt State, partly to be closer to her namesake “Aunt Jackie”, an awesome woman living solo on 300 acres in the woods who has made friends with wild stallions and eats daily out of her organic garden.

Jackie has worked as a lifeguard in San Clemente and a rafting guide in NorCal, but is loving her current job in Northern Nicaragua. She is always smiling and laughing. She can cross-step to the nose, and crank a bottom turn on a green twin-fin.

Come down and surf with us!

High Tech High Students – Volunteer, Surf, Yoga, Adventure

Imagine this for your winter break in High School – two awesome teachers take you and 16 of your friends down to Northern Nicaragua for an incredible week of surfing, yoga, horseback riding, volcano boarding, and helping the community by building a new school room for local 4th, 5th, and 6th graders. Sound too good to be true? Not if you’re one of these kids…

Two teachers from the public charter school High Tech High in San Diego did exactly that. 17 Freshman and Sophmores came down to Suave Dulce for 10 days of eye-opening adventure.

A few knew how to surf already like Jake Stutz (shown above ripping and painting), who was busting airs and trying to improve his cutback, but most were learning to stand up for the first time.


Lizzie and Sierra fell in love with riding horses on the beach and after asking very nicely, got to do it twice! Maya made a heart-shaped corn tortilla, Nico represented the boys at yoga, and Jadon and Zeek showed off their upper thighs by stealing the girls’ short shorts. Apparently, that’s the new skater style these days, along with calling everyone “daddy”.

Aside from the silliness and adventure, the kids made serious progress on the new school room. They shoveled rocks, learned to mix cement, did some painting, and dug a massive trench that will bring drinking water to future students. There were a few impressive blisters and everyone went home with a new appreciation for construction workers.

Most promised to return next year, if not sooner!
If you’d like to come down with your school for a week of fun and giving back, email us at SuaveDulce@gmail.com

Check out the videos below for more…