Waves and Wifi: solar power and real speedtests in Popoyo

Waves and Wifi is a coliving in Popoyo on Nicaragua's Pacific coast, built around the tagline surf, yoga, get shit done. Sixteen air-conditioned rooms, all solar powered, with a pool, gym, community kitchen, coworking space and an on-site cafe.

What Waves and Wifi Does

• Sixteen rooms with AC, desks and keyless locks. Booking includes access to the kitchen, pool, gym and coworking.
• Fully solar powered. Which in rural Nicaragua is the difference between working and not.
• Published speedtest history. Most recently 253 Mbps down, ranging roughly 180 to 520 across the year, which is far more honest than a quoted line speed.
• A community manager and weekly events. Movie nights by the pool, sunset drinks, yoga and baby turtle releases.
• Kooks Cafe on site. Plus bike rental and a three night minimum.

Why It Makes Sense for Nomads

Popoyo is one of Central America's best surf spots, with consistent swell year round and far fewer people than Costa Rica's coast. Nicaragua is also the cheapest country in the region by a distance.

The infrastructure is why this works. Popoyo is remote, and power and internet are the two things that fail. Solar with battery plus a published speedtest history is about as transparent and as resilient as it gets.

At around 1,425 dollars a month this is expensive relative to Nicaragua generally, and you are paying for the reliability rather than the location.

Pricing

From around 1,425 US dollars a month, with a three night minimum. Booking via the operator's system.

The only listing here that publishes a year of speedtests, which tells you something.