San Juan Del Sur
We were happy to see Sea Whisper still anchored here.
Checking in was a breeze and we celebrated by watching the sun set at the Girls favorite hangout…Iguana’s . we met up with their Smither’s friends and we all had a laugh…are you still here? It turns out we both arrived in San Juan at the same time after months of travel adventures. They like it here and I see why.
We met up with the boys from the Dive shop and they were really glad to see us.
We love this town again after such a bad time with the sail….and it is a whole lot easier to be here with without the girls to worry about.
We took a tour to Granada, Rivas and Masaya Volcanoes
Rivas is a really funky town like Chinindega with lots of bike rickshaws and people selling home made snacks. The road out of San Juan Del Sur is terrible, infact, much worse than the last time I was here. There are virtually no trafic signs and half the road is closed while the other half has boulders strewn all over the place, never mind the pot holes. I was having deja vous of an imminent car accident . …I don’t really want to go over on my side again.
We made it to Granada and toured the majestic cemetery. It is filled with mausoleums that are dedicated to family. A nice custom to have all your family members burried in the same place. The statues were amazingly, beautiful and really quite a testament to the family buried there.
They even had a separate mausoleum for dead presidents.
Granada is colorful with the colonial structures each with brightly colored doorways opening to a beautiful inner courtyard, I love this style of home.
I was going crazy taking pictures, it was just so damn beautiful.
There are literally hundreds of poor selling what ever they can to the visitors of this town. I really felt kind of sad watching a family while I ate lunch sell chicklets and single cigarettes for a pennies.
The whole days take may muster up a dollar or two. Which does not go far here..
Fuel is so expensive and the price of food is increasing as well. Most can not afford anything beyond rice and beans.
Nicaragua is definitely not as affluent as its neighbors however, the people seem friendly and have a sense of pride. They recycle here and there is little garbage on the streets. I saw bales of plastic on the side of the road waiting for pick up.
I wish El Salvador could do the same.
In contrast to El Salvador the Nicaraguans seem to be hard at work everyone works. The only hammock people I seem to notice are the elderly and small children.
Women can be seen gathering wood from the side of the road , washing, carrying things on their head, or sweeping. They keep their yards very clean and many homes have brightly painted walls with gardens at the entrance.
The men can usually be seen working on the side of the road, either in construction, burning fields, farming, or ranch handling. It is apparent that the young boys are left with the "cow boy" duties.
There are more families traveling here riding in horse drawn carts than in the rest of Central America.
The Masaya volcano was definitely a highlight. This is the most active volcano in Central and South America. We climbed to the top to gaze into the sulfur rock spewing active volcano. It was hot humid and smelly. The cross on the top of the climb was erected by a Spanish Catholic Priest apparently as an exorcism ritual. The priest was convinced that the volcano was the gate way to hell.
The locals believed it to be a mystical place of the gods. They perfomed sacrifices there by throwing young virgins into the steaming hole in the earth.
The caves near by were used to discuss who would be considered worthy for the ritual. It was a tremendous honor to the family to have a child chosen to sacrifice.
The volcano was believed to be the home of a witch who the locals would consult for information about crops planting and other worldly concerns.
The caves were used to hide fighters during the war and also later for satanic rituals. Today, they are a park and visited by 3 varieties of bats, boa constrictors and birds.
Parakeets like to nest there apparently, they have adapted to the sulfuic atmosphere and their predators have not
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