I had a last walk around Granada on Tuesday visiting the market and seeing the bus station.
I arrived here by taxi/ferry/taxi. The ferry was a bit of a rust bucket and there was no drill but I think that's pretty usual except at home. The roads here are pretty well all gravel but the hotel is great with a main reception/ dining area overlooking Lake Nicaragua, with little cabins set into the hillside.
I have explored the local village.......
Sketched the volcano from the jetty
And been on two tours with my personal guide and driver. He is such a pleasant young man and talked with me about life here, learning languages and his hopes and aspirations. It is so refreshing to talk with people who have such an appetite for life and are full of hopes and dreams. It's good for the spirit. Life here seems quite tough although they are pretty self sufficient with food, fishing and they keep cows and hens that just graze anywhere, and grow crops too. My guide works in the fields when not guiding and used to work in a hotel. He hopes to have his own business one day. He is learning English and German and won a prize to go to Germany for a month. Tourism is very Important to them. He said my Spansh is good and my vocabulary very broad so I must be making progress. Have largely been speaking Spanish here. The island is like two circles joined in the middle with two volcanoes, Concepcion and Madera. Madera is deemed inactive but Concepcion last errupted in 1957 and there is smoky cloud around its summit all the time. The loud bangs we keep hearing appear to be the fireworks the children are setting off for Christmas. Still no need to worry about the volcanoes as there is an evacuation procedure!
Am not sure you would get far very quickly, apparently the plan now is to take to the boats, whereas last time they only had sailing boats.
My first tour included a primaryforest walk, where we saw monkeys and parrots and many other trees and butterflies, visited a natural spring pool and then walked along the beach. I then had a lobster lunch overlooking the beach before visiting a finca where we saw petroglyphs and many plants grown locally.
Today I nearly killed myself hiking up the volcanoe (Madera) to the San Ramon waterfalls. I got slower as we progressed and my heart got faster! But I made it and cooled off before returning. It was described as an easy hike and I consider myself pretty fit. At least we left at 7.30 so were back before it got too hot!
I was dry before I got to the bottom of the volcano and rewarded myself with a large mug of coffee and brownie and ice cream when I returned to he Omaja hotel. I may walk a while in a different direction along the lake later. Tomorrow I leave at 7.30 to go back to the mainland and on to Leon.
No comments:
Post a Comment