I caught a glimpse of blue-grey sky through the opening of the thatched roof as I sank back in the brightly colored hammock in the strong breeze, and yesterday’s travel headaches slipped away. All is well once again. Today is our first day in Nicaragua, and so far it’s been more than I hoped it would be with the promise of more to come. After the hustle and bustle of Mexico City, this is the perfect second stop.
We are staying for the next four days with Mark and Nannette (family friends of Jeff’s), who graciously offered their beautiful house in the town of Diriamba, where they will soon be joining us. In the meantime, Jose Luis has been more than kind, driving us around to different towns and sights, and practicing his English (which is pretty good), while we try our Spanish (still absolutely beyond embarrassing).
This morning we went to see the crater lake created by a volcano, which was breathtaking-unfortunately neither the pictures nor any description of mine can do it justice. We might go back down to the water for a swim one of these days. We read in our guide book (given to us by a fellow stranded traveler at the airport yesterday) that the water has healing properties and the sulfur wards off mosquitoes (guess we’re gonna be smelling gooood). Jeff is looking forward to seeing some monkeys, jaguars, and snakes – which are all local inhabitants – on the way down. I can do with just the monkeys.
Second stop of the day was the active volcano in Masaya. It was super hot. Not the melt-your-shoes kind of hot that we had heard about, but it was definitely steamy, extremely windy (which explains the crazy hair in pictures) and it gave us our second breathtaking view of the day. We stopped by a local market in what once was a castle and spent the rest of the afternoon lounging around in the hammocks in the backyard at the house. Aaaaaahhh. Our homecooked meals have been delicious. At some point, I may request the local specialty-iguana soup, but haven’t reached that point yet. So far, I’m loving the tiny bit of Nicaragua I’ve experienced, and definitely looking forward to what comes next.
