Nicaragua Part III: Granada

Now, finally the last leg of our tour of Nicaragua was to the city of Granada.  I was most excited about going to a place named after my beloved Granada.  It was a nice small city that used to fight for control of the country with León.  

Catedral de Granada

Paulina and I went a day earlier than the rest of the crew because we preferred to see more cultural sites than relaxing at a lagoon.  Our friend Michelle came along too because she wasn´t feeling well and needed to see a doctor.  

Once in Granada we settled in and took our own tour of the city.  We went to the Poets´ Park and the old train station, then we went off to explore the old hospital, the military fort that we couldn´t enter and the churches and other cultural parts of the city.  

Old Hospital

The following day we finished our tour and saw the last few sights we hadn´t seen the day before and then took a boat tour of the Isletas de Granada (small islands near Granada in the Lake of Nicaragua).  It was a fun hour long tour that included seeing isletas that had houses, bars and one isleta that was only inhabited by monkeys that a vet had brought there years before.  There were the white faced capuchín monkeys and spider monkeys.  When our tour ended we returned to the shore as the next group got on.  This group contained 2 strangers, one of my 6th graders, his brother in 2nd grade and their parents.

Isletas

After the boat tour we met up with the rest of the group, took an official tour of the city, had dinner and in the morning we returned to Monteverde!

Xateva and La Maria Churches

Nicaragua Part II: Laguna de Apoyo and Masaya

Laguna de Apoyo

The second leg of our trip was to the Laguna de Apoyo and Masaya.  The Laguna was a beautiful, quiet place to relax and swim.  I was glad to swim in a natural body of fresh water.  Since I grew up going to the Otsego Lake every weekend during the summers, I have always preferred natural bodies of water to pools and fresh water over salt water.  At the small resort we were able to relax because aside from us and a handful of other visitors at the same hotel there was no one within sight.  This meant we could take the kayaks and row around the laguna, swim and enjoy the sun and water.

Mercado de Masaya, Masaya Market

On our second day at the laguna we took a day trip to the town of Masaya where we went to the two biggest flea markets in Nicaragua (or so I´m told at least).  They had a lot of wood and leather products, but mostly touristy and rather kitsch-y.  But it was fun.  We also go to see the national baseball stadium, named for Roberto Clemente as he was on his way to bring aid to Nicaragua when his flight went down.  We learned that in Nicaragua, baseball is more popular than fútbol (soccer).  On the day trip we also went to a hammock factory where most of us bought hammocks.  Most of them cost 400 córdobas (about $20)!  We also got to try out nice swing hammocks that we call chairocks (chair and hammock, a word coined by our friend / 1st grader- Logan) that stretched out to be long enough that I could lay down and have the hammock wrap around my feet past the toes and still support my head!

We then went to a lookout on the other side of the Laguna de Apoyo and Laguna de Masaya, from which we could see the city of Granada, Nicaragua from a distance.  It was beautiful, and I am still waiting on the pictures from that I took with a friends camera.

Nicaragua Part I: León

On Saturday morning we took a journey to the Costa Rica - Nicaragua boarder, crossed the boarder on foot with our bags and took another van to León, Nicaragua.  León was beautiful.  It had most of the things I think every city should have, including kebabs!  

León is a beautiful despite all turmoil they have seen over the last few decades.  It was a lot of fun to walk around León because we could see a lot of their history in their statues and churches.

Cathedral in León

The cathedral was a lot of fun because there were a series a paintings depicting Jesus´ struggles, death and resurrection.  When we went on a city tour we got to go to the top of the cathedral, climb around and see the entire city.

View from our hike of volcanic ash and the lowlands between volcanoes

In and around León and the rest of Nicaragua there are over twenty volcanoes (and I thought Costa Rica had a lot!).  As a group we took a journey to one of the youngest volcanoes and went "volcano boarding" which is similar to sledding on a toboggan on volcanic ash instead of snow.  We went, along with some people from The Netherlands and Australia.  We took nearly an hour hike up the volcano, put on orange jumpsuits (but I got a blue one for some reason).  2 by 2 we took off and down we went.  It was fun, much faster that I felt I needed to go, and we got a lot of rocks thrown into our faces, but I would recommend it to anyone.  Below is a picture of someone from our group going down at about 30km/hr (18mph)

Beautiful Friday at School

WHAT A BEAUTIFUL DAY AT THE  CREATIVA

After more than 2 weeks of almost non-stop rain here in Monteverde we finally got a sunny day again on Friday.  I had spent all afternoon Thursday making plans for something to do with the 5th and 6th grade classes for inside recess and inside PE class with very limited space, and we get up the hill and this is what we see!  The mountains of Costa Rica (from here we´re almost a mile high) straight to the the Gulf of Nicoya and the Nicoya Peninsula.  (If you look at a map of CR it´s the big peninsula on the Northwestern part).  It was a beautiful day and a pleasure to get to see our view once again.  So I went inside and started to get ready for the first part of the day... SCHOOL SING!  

School Sing is a tradition at the Cloud Forest School (yes, we call it the Cloud Forest School, but the Creativa in Spanish.  The name´s don´t translate, but it´s fun that way.  The legal names do translate and include both names, so don´t worry it´s not too confusing once you´re down here).  Every Friday morning the classes from Kinder ( 3, 4 and 5 year olds) all the way up to 6th grade get together to sing a few songs.  Usually we sing the school song and one class leads us in that and about 5 other songs.  This week was the 5th grade´s turn.  So that meant that my crazy kids who struggle with English more than some of the younger classes, who are all very stage shy got to sing the school song, The Littlest Worm, a song from the World Cup, Primavera (by Carlos Santana, which they signed the chorus to!) and The Duck Song (from youtube, thanks to my friend AnnA Monkey)  They were amazing and adorable.  I was very thrilled with their performance because we´ve come such a long way as far as behaviour and because I was the first of the new teachers to go.

Oh yeah, and we enlisted our friends in kinder to be the ducks in our duck song performance.  The lil ducklings are right here... 

So after school sing, I was thinking, we haven´t seen the sun in ages, the kids haven´t played outside in almost a week, let´s go on a hike!  What a muddy hike, since it had rained for weeks, but hey, we´re in Costa Rica, we practically live in the mud.  So the kids lead me (because I had never been there before) past the spring, up to the Monkey Palace.  We didn´t see any monkeys this time, but that didn´t stop us from acting like monkeys the entire trip!

The monkey palace is one of the students´ favourites places because it´s very difficult to climb up the side as you can (possibly) see below

Coming down is another story, it´s not just difficult it´s almost impossible.  The students have done it several times and failed to maintain control all the way down.  I on the other hand just sat in my urban surfing pose and slid down like you´re inching down a ski slope in your skis, but faster.  After this we went to snack, PE which was a fun game of 5th vs 6th grade kickball!  GO 5TH GRADE, WIN 5-4, (although I was hoping for a tie or a 6th grade win because my kids tend to be good about defeat).  Then the kids ran off to their Spanish class and we cleaned up, they went home for the weekend and I went to my staff meeting.

The weekend started off well with a beautiful morning for the feria, and then we went to play frisbee in the mud at the Friends (Quaker) school up the road.  As much fun as it was, I should have taken the day off because it set off a 102´F fever that made me stay home on Monday.  I went the the Dr who said I had a bad sinus infection, gave me meds and I got a shot at the pharmacy, my temp dropped below 93´F and somehow Tuesday it was more stable so I went to school, still not feeling great but went because today, Thursday was round 1 of the parent-teacher conferences (my first ever).  Part 2 is tomorrow and the first quarter will be done!  Then off to Nicaragua on Saturday for a week journey!