Bay of San Juan del Norte

The bay of San Juan del Norte is a bay located on the seashore of the Caribbean Sea in the department of Río San Juan, in the Republic of Nicaragua. The bay was explored by Ephraim George Squier in 1849, as part of his reconnaissance to build a canal from the Caribbean to the Pacific, through the route of San Juan and Lake Nicaragua; in his travel diary "Nicaragua, its People and Landscapes" published in 1852, said "the bay is not large, but it is better and more spacious than is generally assumed. Its entrance is easily accessible, and only the bigger boats encounter with some difficulty to pass the bar and to provide in a comfortable and safe anchorage. " Attempt to build interoceanic canal

On August 26, 1849, the Nicaraguan government signed a contract with a group of investors led by the North American Cornelius Vanderbilt. The contract gave the Accessory Transit Company exclusive rights to build a canal between the Atlantic Ocean (the Caribbean Sea) and the Pacific Ocean within 12 years, and gave the company exclusive rights to operate a commercial route which crossed the isthmus of Rivas by land. The end of the canal in the Caribbean had been planned north of the mouth of the San Juan River, beginning in the Bay of San Juan del Norte, and then merging with the San Juan River after an estuary.

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