Border Run - Part 2

The Orosi Valley is a beautiful and peaceful destination, located just outside Cartago and south of the San Jose metro area.  It's like a completely different world from the hustle and bustle of the city.  Many Ticos make it a day trip on the weekends just to get out of the city.

To give you a geographic reference for this post, here is a map of the area in which we spent these few days of our border run:

And here, also is a link to the Garmin map of our trip around the valley:  Orosi Valley Loop
We came in from Cartago, through Paraiso (upper left, above).  It was getting up on lunch time and we, of course, already had our sights set on a particular place on our food itinerary.  My personal travel agent (and wife) had read about a great restaurant that we had on our 'places to eat while off the island' list.  The Sanchiri Hotel y Restaurante sits high up on a hillside overlooking the Orosi Valley.  The views are breathtaking, even during this time of year when it's so damn dry.  We enjoyed the views and a fantastic lunch, as well as watching a very ingenious hedgehog sip lemonade through a straw out of a Tom Collins glass.

What an inviting little valley

Looking up from the bottom of the twisty road.  We ate where that open window is

After lunch we headed down… down... down the steep road to the valley floor.  At one point early on the descent we pulled off to take in the views.

But wait, there's more valley that way

Soon enough we arrived in the little town of Orosi.  Check in time wasn't for a few hours yet but we pulled off the main road to scout out the location of our place for later.  After swinging by the hotel, we left Orosi to drive the loop.  Heading south out of town, we missed our turn at Beneficio Orlich, a coffee finca (plantation) and processing plant.  The Orosi Valley is renowned for their coffee, by the way - it's delicious!  We reached the gate to the Rio Macho power plant before realizing we were on the wrong road.  Meh.  Flipped around, backtracked and made the correct turn toward the bridge over the Rio Reventazón (labeled on the map as 'Rio Grande de Orosi', for reasons unbeknownst to me).

The bridge that spans the river was pretty cool!  One lane only, a guard on one end that I suppose controls traffic on an 'as needed' basis.  Bex! got out and walked across so she could take pictures of me driving over.  We got caught up in Orosi Valley rush hour, however - another car came up behind me.  So I couldn't dawdle!  

I call it 'Puente Turnádose'

That one at a time thing must only be a suggestion.

After picking up my cute hitchhiker, we drove through the small village of Poloma.  Then we pulled over to check out an incredible footbridge that runs from the east side of the river to the town of Orosi on the other side.  It's the dotted line you can see on the map that extends into the right side of the Orosi inset rectangle.  

This bridge is even smaller than the last one.

"Come back!!"  "But I just want to see what's around this corner."
Bex! crossing Rio Reventazón toward Orosi

After exploring the footbridge, we continued the meandering drive through the valley.  The road follows the river for a while then cuts east where it hugs Lago Cachi.  This lake is formed by the Cachi Dam, which supplies hydroelectric power in Costa Rica.  
[Note: If you have any dam questions, I'd be happy to get back to you with the dam answers.]

The lake is all thanks to those little blue things; the green you can see is actually the lily pad covered surface of the lake

We decided to stop at La Casona del Cafetal for coffee because, well, I wanted to and I was driving.  Seriously, this place is pretty great, a large coffee finca with stunning views overlooking the lake, nature trails, a playground, and paddleboat rentals.  We shared a dessert, a dee-lish flan that went really well with our coffee.  Yes, I said 'our' coffee.  My tea-loving wife actually had her very own cup of coffee!!  When in Rome… and all that, I suppose.  It was extra cool because they serve - nay, present - the coffee like this:

Note the presentation includes the color of the Costa Rican flag

They had vines growing on trellises around the restaurant with these huge seed pod things that I bet contain some sort of alien life form:

File under 'C' for 'Creepy, Cool'

The artistic landscape helped the coffee and flan taste extra good

After gettin' our caffeine on we drove to the Cachi Dam and got a few pics there.  The Cachi Gorge is pretty amazing, from everything we've read - no time to explore it this trip but maybe another time.  

No diving allowed

This is not the workplace for ladder-phobes

After that it was on to Las Ruinas de Ujarrás, the site of an old church that was originally built in the 1500's.  Rather than reinvent the wheel, you can just read this from a sign on site:

Or, if that's just too many words, you can look at the pictures on this sign.  It doesn't tell you anything about the history of the church, however.

Adam and Eve are not welcome here

The Costa Ricans have this great habit of building parks around ruined churches 

We LOVE these old churches and their two foot thick walls!

The timber over the window (top) is about 8" thick; note the small cross on what would have been the altar

This church had many arches, these were a rather tricky building technique back then!

After touring the grounds at the ruins and tipping the guy who offered to keep an eye on our car for us while we did so, we left the valley floor and started up the hill to finish the loop.  To give you an idea of 'up', this road sign was pretty close to spot on.  The ol' Daihatsu Bego barely made it!  Up until this point, it seemed like a pretty nice road for a bike ride.

This sign is not an exaggeration.

After getting to the top, we felt like the car deserved a rest so we stopped at a mirador (viewpoint) that looks over the Ujarras area.

Five minutes from the church ruins, as the crow flies or the road climbs; the building right in the middle of this picture is the old church we had just visited

We made our way back to Orosi and checked into our room.  We stayed at the Montaña Linda in their Dragonfly Guest House.  They also run a hostel and a Spanish school here, as well as provide tours and other activities in and around the Orosi Valley.  Our room was very comfortable and the price was a great value, too.  Four thumbs up!  That evening, we had dinner at the Bar y Restaurante Coto, which was recommended to us by Ronan and Mathilde, some folks from France that were also staying in the guest house.  It was a Monday evening so the place was dead.  In fact, we had to walk around the rather expansive restaurant until we found a guy watching TV at the bar.  Then, suddenly, we had a server and we could hear people in the kitchen.  The food was fantastic and they had wine.  Like, real wine.  We were excited by that alone.

I've mentioned the need to be flexible in this part of the world.  Our original itinerary was to visit Volcán Turrialba bright and early Tuesday morning as the first volcano on our three volcano tour this trip.  However, due to increased volcanic activity on Turrialba they had it closed to visitors.  Thankfully, we found this out Monday at the hotel.  So we changed our plans, scratched Turrialba off the list and decided to visit Volcán Irazú instead.  Our new friends from France had plans to visit the same volcano on their way to the bus station in Cartago before heading back to Europe, so we offered to give them a ride.  They were quite happy about this, as it meant they could get an earlier start.  The volcano tour bus they were planning to take didn't depart Orosi until 10 AM and it was, you know, a bus.  

Before leaving Orosi to look at craters, we walked a couple of blocks to the Panadería Suiza, yet another place on our food hit list.  The proprietress, Franzisca, is the most energetic person I've seen in a long time, considering she works 14 hour days.  Seriosuly, she starts baking breads, pastries and other deliciousness at 2 AM, opens for breakfast at 5 AM and we saw her closing up shop around 4-4:30 in the afternoon.  Always with a smile on her face.  We selected a few pastries to fuel us through our morning and promised her we'd be back the next morning for a proper breakfast.

One of the perks of being away from home is that it puts us in a position to meet so many wonderful people.  Sure, you can do this at home but people tend to interact with a core group of family, friends, co-workers and are less likely to seek out newbies, which is completely understandable and fine.  Being in a foreign country I feel almost obligated to introduce myself and strike up conversations with locals and tourists alike.  It's like I don't want to miss the opportunity.  This is one of many new perspectives I hope to bring back with me from this experience.  It was nice to have the company of Ronan and Mathilde on the drive up the mountain, getting to know each other better.  Plus Bex! got to speak French.  (Cue brain cramp in 3… 2… 1…)

Can you spot the hedgehog and the blue footed booby?

Our early start meant we were at the park entrance before the park employees!  The clouds tend to roll in daily around 10 AM or so, so we wanted to have the best chance of seeing some crater bottom.  And we did!  

Proof we didn't miss a minute

The smell of sulfur in the air was a constant reminder we were standing atop an active volcano.  The best result from our early morning arrival was that for most of our visit we were the only ones there.  Being the dry season the crater was empty of the water that usually fills it.  Fine - seeing down to the bottom was pretty sweet!

I tried to channel Kenyon for this shot - D

Yes, I actually wore a jacket!  It was a little chilly!  And no, I'm not about to climb over the fence!

No one tells Beauregard what to do!

After having the run of the place for over an hour, we knew it was time to leave when the tour buses started showing up, one after another after another.  Several of them were loaded with school children on field trips; others with tourists.  It got packed fast!  Time to go!  Besides, the clouds and fog had rolled in so the views were limited.  It was a great visit!

Going with our new friends means we have a rare picture with both of us in it

We drove back down the volcano to Cartago, dropped Mathilde and Ronan off near the bus station and said our goodbyes.  Then we made our way to Costa Rica's Craft Brewing Company, a very cool place just outside of Cartago.  I worked at a craft brewery, Widmer Brothers Brewing, for almost 19 years and enjoy seeing small breweries in action.  We received a full-on company history lesson and tour with Fabiana, our tour guide.  She is awesome, by the way!  

A great tour and a great time!

Except they made us tend bar to work off the beer we drank.

Then we were fortunate enough to intercept Christopher, the head brewer, who hails from Colorado USA.  Brewing is largely about timing and a brewery this size does a lot of work by hand, with very little automation.  He was gracious with his time and stopped to chat with us.  Once he discovered our roots in the beer biz (Bex! also worked at Widmer for five years), Christopher started bringing some samples out to us at the bar, samples that weren't on the tasting menu, in particular a rum barrel-aged barley wine and a Pacific Northwest-style IPA.  (That IPA tasted like home!)  Plus we enjoyed the CRCB's flagship Libertas and La Segua as well as a couple of others.  This visit made me realize that I would love to work at a small brewery again someday - not the overly corporate, shareholder driven beast that my old company has become but something more like CRCB.  It is a fun industry!

Look familiar - Kurt, Rob, Doug, Joe, Ike, Ben??  Wait, never mind - it's the Rose Garden!

Buzz in hand, we drove up the road a half mile or so to a recommended lunch spot.  Food and a Coca-Cola were a huge help!  After that, we drove back to Orosi and our room, where we relaxed the afternoon away - and, okay, slept off the brewery visit.  Instead of going out to eat, we hit a couple of stores for fruit, veggies, some cheese and ate dinner at the guesthouse.  With a bottle of wine and plenty of water, it was a very nice meal.  Needless to say, we slept very well that night!

The next morning, we kept our promise and visited Franzisca for breakfast.  We ordered what might be called in brunch-crazed Portland a 'breakfast board' - three different fresh baked breads, meats, cheese, fruit and drinks.  I tacked on a couple of scrambled eggs and it was perfect.  Strong, black Orosi Valley coffee for me, tea for Bex! and fresh juice for us both.  Franzisca kept the coffee refills coming, too.  It was fantastic.  After we ate, and knowing we were hitting the road for the next leg of our adventure, we purchased some items to go.  Bread, pastries (both sweet and savory), a bag of ground coffee for me.  And Franzisca even threw in one of her huge, decadent double chocolate brownies as a thank you to us!  We considered blowing off the rest of our trip and staying in Orosi the remainder of the week.  Just kidding, although we'd go back in a heartbeat.  We had more grand adventure ahead of us!  We packed up, checked out and hit the road.

Next stop:  Volcán Poás.

Beauregard Triumphs Over Adversity

Loyal readers,

While you're impatiently awaiting our next post and constantly clicking refreshing in hopes in will appear, here is a short photo essay about Beauregard Honeysuckle Hedgehog III and his triumph over adversity while on the road in Costa Rica.  Victory has never tasted so sweet and so much like very excellent limonada con yerba buena.

Mmm, limonada con yerba buena.  This will be refreshing.

Gar-kon!  This is not a hedgehog friendly class.

I've got an idea.

Erg.  Ooof.  Is this some kind of Cross Fit challenge?

King of the Hill.

Ahh, victory is sweet.

In the 'You Can Never Really Totally Relax Here' Category...

We interrupt our regularly scheduled blogging to bring you this special report...

Dateline:  20 April 2014

We discovered that we have an olive tree in our yard and so we thought we'd try our hand at brining some, to see how they come out.  Bex! isn't big into pickled foods so we're trying a salt brine to start.

We harvested some olives and cleaned out an empty peanut butter jar.  We slit the olives length wise, which was a helpful tip we found online.  After shaking the jar to dissolve the salt, we filled it up with what will hopefully in a few weeks' time be a special treat for us.

Bex! decided she wanted to document this little culinary experiment, so she went to get  her camera.  She unsnapped her camera bag, pulled out her camera - the strap was all bundled up around her camera, her hand and her arm.  As she untangled the strap she felt something moving on her forearm and as she moved, she heard a 'plop' as this little cutie fell on the floor - 

This dude was about six inches long and mean as hell.  By far, the largest scorpion we've seen here.  I killed a brown one in the sink last week - he was only about 4".  We're told by our Merida friends that the brown ones will make you feel crappy but the black ones are very dangerous.  Getting zapped by one of them means an automatic trip to the hospital.  

Fortunately, there was no sting and I dispatched this diablo with one smack o' my chinela (flipflop).  Then we did a thorough top-to-bottom house inspection until we were satisfied this one was working alone.

All's well that ends well.

We now return you to you regularly scheduled blog posts.

Our First Border Run - Part 1

The first week of April was spent doing three things:  
1]  Wrapping up the first semester of classes before our two week break for Semana Santa; 2]  Packing for our border run to Costa Rica - part vacation/part renewal of visas;  
3]  Trying to get all of our students to understand that there would be no classes for two weeks, that classes would resume the week of April 21st, that there would be no classes for two weeks, that 'No' there were no classes next week and that classes would resume the week of April 21st.

After clearing that up...

"But there are classes next week, correct?"

Oy.

We had been looking forward to our border run for weeks!  It was hard to believe that nine weeks of teaching English in Merida had already passed.  Wow!  Time was flying by, in some ways.  Still miss family and friends, of course.  Still miss baked foods, good cheese and wine.

We were going to cure the latter on this trip!

Merida is a safe village.  We've never encountered any situation we considered dangerous or scary here, other than giant insects.  Walking around at night is fine, especially since most everyone in Merida knows us and knows why we're here.  If anything, I'd say we have people looking out for us.  However, we were advised by several people to make sure we had our house watched while we were gone.  There are still those that would take advantage of the opportunity to relieve us of our stuff, should they get the chance.  We arranged for our friend, Maykel, to come by daily to check on the place.  And Hamilton happily agreed to sleep over at night, lights on, house occupied.  We were confident things would be fine and they were.  Good friends to have!

Saturday morning we got up early, had breakfast, hoisted backpacks and walked out to the road to wait for the chicken bus to Moyogalpa.  

Did we remember to turn the gas off, let the scorpions out, bring our chicken?

We loaded up and proceeded to pick up more and more… and more people.  This Saturday morning the bus was extremely packed, and it was hot and dusty so we were ready for the ride to be over!  Oh, and if you wonder why it's called a 'chicken bus', I had this right next to my head for a good part of the trip:

Bok-bok-bok-bok-bok… ba-GOK!!!!

Arriving in Moyogalpa early enough to grab lunch was part of the plan, so we excitedly headed for The Cornerhouse for delicious chicken salad sandwiches on their fresh baked bread accompanied by fruit smoothies.  Yeah, we were gonna eat our way through this trip.  After lunch, we walked down to the dock and boarded the ferry to Puerto San Jorge on the mainland.  Pedro Pablo met us at the dock on the other side and drove us to our first destination - San Juan del Sur - where we would spend the night.

We also gave Pedro Pablo a shopping list and some cash.  While we were gone, we would have him pick up some toner cartridges and the necessary hardware to hang our hammocks.  Like I said, we've rapidly built this awesome little network of people who are more than happy to help us out.

We arrived in SJdS at Casa Ariki, a really neat little hostel just off the parque central and close to pretty much everything in town.  Four rooms with a shared bath and a very comfortable setting - too bad we were only staying one night.  But we figure we'll hit this spot again for sure.  A great value!

After dropping our bags, we made for the Tica Bus office so we could buy our return tickets for Saturday April 12th.  We had our tickets to Costa Rica already.  We had our friend, Noldan, pick them a couple of weeks prior to our trip.  Recall that when entering Costa Rica, you have to show proof of onward travel or they won't let you in.  "Welcome! - just make sure you plan to leave, okay?"  Unfortunately, all the buses were filled for the date we wanted to return to Nicaragua!  Semana Santa is a huge travel week in Latin America, with families traveling to visit relatives for Holy Week or to party at the beaches.  The next available tickets she had for us were for Monday the 14th.  No biggie - flexibility is the key down here, so we just figured we'd spend another couple of nights in San Jose and get back when we could.   

Tickets in hand, we walked back to the hostel, changed into swimsuits and made for the beautiful beach of San Juan del Sur.  It was much busier this visit, with even more people than when we were here at Christmas.  We found a good spot to drop our stuff, made for the water and… froze out butts off!  Damn, the water was cold compared to our lake back home.  But, plans were plans, and swimming in the ocean would not be deterred by water temperature.  Plans were altered, however, because once we got in the water, it was 3… 2… 1… and Bex! got stung by a jellyfish.  Oh well.  Swimming is overrated and certainly ranks below our other priority for the day - drinking piña coladas on the beach.  This turned out to be a much safer activity for us, much more suited to our true talents.

We love our diet on the island.  We eat really well, considering the limited resources for food shopping.  That said, the #1 priority for our night in San Juan del Sur was dinner.  I've written about the pizza place in town, run by an elderly Italian gentleman named Mauricio.  Mauricio's Pizzeria is the real deal.  We had been looking forward to this particular dinner all week and it did not disappoint.  Plenty of red wine, a big salad and a couple of Diablo pies later, we were sated.  Everyone we meet who has been here keeps telling us we have to try the scratch made pasta dishes but we can't get past the thin crust pizzas.  One of these days…  

We even had some entertainment during dinner in the form of…

The dude on the right is obviously waaaay too cool to be doing this shit

The next morning, Pedro Pablo picked us up right on time and dropped us in Rivas on the Pan-American Highway to wait for the Tica Bus coming from Managua that would take us to San Jose, Costa Rica.  During the wait, we stood around taking in the sights, such as this one - a car, rope out the passenger window, leading a horse down the road.  Or a horse tailgating a car.  Either way, not that unusual, actually.

I wonder how many horsepower that thing's got?

After about 40 minutes, we were on the bus and prepping for the border crossing.  All went well enough, by which I mean 'at the usual slow pace'.  Lots of waiting around while Nicaragua processed us out of the country, then another wait in line to get into Costa Rica.  Meh.  "It is what it is - Bad Bill"  

Travel buddies waiting at the border between Nicaragua and Costa Rica -
Booby, the blue footed booby and Beauregard Honeysuckle Hedgehog III 

 One kinda cool thing happened, though.  While waiting in line at the CR immigration desk going in to the country we looked across the way to the line of people waiting to get processed out of Costa Rica and saw our friends from the island -  Jamie, Jen and Jalen!  Small world.  They had gone to CR the week prior to make their visa run and were heading home to Ometepe. 

More stamps!

 After the border, it was iPads and dubbed movies during the bus ride.  We arrived in San Jose, jockeyed into position to claim our backpacks and selected a driver from the crowd hustling for fares just outside the door.  We stayed at Hostel Mi Casa, a short cab ride from the bus station and right across from La Sabana Metropolitan Park, which I wrote about in a previous post here.  The hostel was really neat - nice rooms, a fantastic inner courtyard, a pool table, a foosball table, an actual lawn with patio furniture, a large selection of games and movies.  A great spot!  So great, in fact, that those extra two nights we now had in San Jose would be spent here.

The evening of our arrival in San Jose was also Election Day in Costa Rica so we watched the results come in and victory declared while we ate dinner at Rosti Pollo's, a chain restaurant that does chicken.  Lots of chicken.  For the record, the election was won in a landslide by Luis Guillermo Solís, in case you were curious.  His opponent, Johnny Araya, actually quit campaigning several weeks prior because he knew he would lose and didn't feel right about spending the money or wasting people's time.  Ah, yet another thing I wish the US would learn from the rest of the world.  (sigh)

Hostel Mi Casa was a great location because it was just a short journey to the Alamo Car Rental office in downtown.  Okay, it was a bit of a walk but we looked like real backpackers this time, not dragging around seven suitcases, so it was all good.  And on the way to the car rental place, we experienced what can only be described as the highest of highs and the lowest of lows.  

If you know my wife at all, you know she loves loves loves pie!  Well, imagine her complete elation when we walked past this place called La Casa del Pie - The House of Pie, right?!!!  

"Holy crap!  This is perfect!  Remember, we miss baked goods?!  This place must be incredible!!  I think I'll start with a slice of berry pie, then get a slice of…"  

"Honey, …" 

"…strawberry rhubarb, then…"
  
"Um, honey - stop for a sec."  

"What?!  Don't 'honey' me.  I want pie and - look - it's The friggin' House of friggin' Pie right here!!"

Ooooh, yeaaahhh!

"Yeah, sweetie.  But remember 'pie' in Spanish means, uh, means… er, 'foot'.  Sorry.  This is a, um, podiatrist's office."

Yeah but… Yeah but… Awwwww

Oh boy.

Thankfully, getting the car rented was distraction enough.  Diego, the Alamo employee who helped us back in January, remembered us from our previous visit.  That was pretty cool.  He asked where we were off to this time around and we explained to him our plans.  Once again, we got a Daihatsu Bego, although this one was a newer model year.  Nice ride, plenty of room, 4-wheel drive, and with no more horsepower than we saw in Rivas.

After the paperwork and pre-trip inspection, we were off!  Driving in Monday morning rush hour traffic!  Fun times!  Seriously, it is pretty cool.  This time we actually made it all the way through with no getting lost or backtracking!  Our destination for this leg of the adventure:  the Orosi Valley. 

Another Heinz Post

That's right - more ketchup!

(Get it?  'Ketchup'… 'catch up'...)

Let's see… oh, yeah!

Boy, is it hot.  And dry.  February, March, April constitute the biggest chunk of the 'dry season' here and they are not kidding.  There has been only one rain of any significance in the last couple of months and about all it did was settle the dust.  It sounded like thunder on our corrugated metal roof, which was incredibly awesome!

Last fall when we arrived on the island the first time around, Ometepe was green and lush, the lake was full and the Rio Istian was actually accessible by kayak.  Now the island is not so green, not so lush.  It's still beautiful but the fields are dry, some of the trees have shed leaves and the little ponds scattered about that appear when it rains regularly are no more.  As we walk down the road, little clouds of dust rise up with every step we take, like Pig Pen in the Charlie Brown comics.  The Rio Istian has reverted to its natural state - that is to say the swamp that it really is, accessible only by a portage of a couple of hundred meters.  When it's been raining, you can kayak in and out easily.  The picture below is from last fall when there is a plenty of water.

Looking out the mouth of the 'river' to the lake

There is a piece of driftwood on 'Playa Gringo', what we've named the beach at our house.  It's a log, about ten feet long, with a piece that juts upward.  When we moved in the only part of this that was exposed was the piece that sticks up.  Now, the log is completely exposed, with an additional fifteen feet or so of rocky beach between it and and the lake.  The water level is way down!  It means we have to walk farther to go swimming, damn it.  I know, I know - first world problems, right?

In November, we didn't even know this rock existed

We are fortunate to have running water in our house.  A kitchen sink, a bathroom sink, toilet and shower.  It truly is a blessing.  But during this dry season, there are many days when there is no water available.  The village has no real reservoir.  There is an aquifer and when it's dry, it's dry.  The water supply comes off the volcano and it's kind of 'first come, first served' meaning those that live higher up the hill get water first.  The lower downhill you live, the less water is available.  While there are many benefits to living on the lake as we do, we are about as close to the end of the line as we could be!

The aforementioned sink, toilet, and shower

This means that when the water is running, even a dripping trickle, we fill pots, pans, water bottles, pitchers.  We fill a bucket from the lake to rinse dishes and flush the toilet.  At night, after a long hot day, nothing feels better than a cool shower.  When there is no water, we climb the barb wire fence, stumble across the rocky beach in the dark, wade out into the lake until we're about waist deep and dump buckets over our heads or even go for a short swim.  It's a little creepy being in the water in the dark.  It's a huge lake and the inability to see the far shore or even beyond the next few waves is a little anxiety inducing.  Not exactly sure what I think is in the water that should make me afraid but…. SHARK!!  Just kidding.  There are bull sharks in the lake, but not in this area.  They hang out southeast of here, where the Rio San Juan runs out to the Caribbean.  But the stars!  Oh my!  The stars are amazing!  You can get lost staring at the sky at night.  Virtually no ambient light means the heavens look so close.  Awe inspiring.

There have been stretches of several days with no water.  Rinsing in the lake only goes so far, so on a couple of occasions we've showered at Hacienda Merida.  They are on their own well, so have a fairly consistent water supply.  We've also purchased several 2 liter bottles of water to have on hand in case things get really bad.  So far, so good - and the rains usually start in May, so we're almost there!

[I think 'Dripping Trickle' should be the name of a whisky or a bluegrass band.]

***************
We spotted our first hummingbird!  That was pretty cool.  So cool that now the hunt is on for a DIY feeder, one we could make from recycled or scrap material.  If anyone has any ideas, let us know.  We've found a few ideas online and are experimenting.

***************
We are both intelligent individuals with a solid grasp of the English language.  We know we're new at the teaching thing but we believe we're capable of figuring out how to succeed at what we're doing.  We're both driven to excel at this.  However…

… there have been a few times when students have asked us questions that have truly stumped us.  We're not so proud or cocky that we BS an answer.  We tell them straight up that we don't know and we'll research the answer.  Which we do.  But it is humbling when we get stuck!  A student in one of our adult beginner classes asked us to explain the difference between 'make' and 'do' - ex. I do the laundry; I make dinner.  "Why?"  Good question!  We found the explanation and did a whole class on it, and it cleared up the confusion.  We learn as much as our students sometimes.

Another great example was a question about the use of 'could' and 'would' in the first conditional (only allowed in specific circumstances).  Another:  'I will help you carry the couch' vs. 'I will help you to carry the couch' (both okay, but one or the other may sound better to you depending on your particular dialect of English).

English are is hard.

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Bex! took me to visit the kindergarten class at the public school in the village.  It was a blast!  Much more organized and structured than what we see at OBS, although we're making improvements with our kids.  They start each day with breakfast (supplied by the Ministry of Education), then they go outside for morning exercise - songs, active games, calisthenics.  We led them through the ever-popular 'Hokey Pokey' and 'Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes'.  The teacher, Nellie, is great with the kids.  They told us we are welcome to visit any time we'd like.

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Like many houses here, we have an 'antena parabolica' on the roof of our house.  It's a satellite dish used to get a TV feed.  We don't have a television so we don't use the dish.  No time for Spanish-language telenovelas (soap operas) anyway.  One day we were sitting on the porch working on lessons, the wind was blowing hard and had been for quite some time, with huge gusts.  We heard a loud 'BANG' that sounded like it came from inside the house.  Assuming it was one of the heavy wooden shutters slamming in the wind, we got up to investigate but found nothing out of order.  A short time later, I walked around the side of the house and saw our dish on the ground.  The wind had ripped it right off the roof!  Hamilton checked the roof for damage and it passed inspection.  Whew!!

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We teach a class at our friend Noldan's house.  His parents are great people.  Classes finish after dark sets in, so they always have someone walk Bex! home, at least far enough up the road until I meet up with her.  The village is plenty safe but it's a nice gesture and we are grateful for their friendship.  Bex! was walking home from a class one evening, being escorted by Noldan's little brother Yasir, when they saw a man in the road ahead dropping a big rock on something.  The guy walked off, so they went over to look.  It was a snake.  And it was still alive, although mortally wounded.  Yasir finished it off.  I came by a few minutes later, from my class on the opposite end of town.  We looked at the snake - pretty sure it was a fer-de-lance.  Yasir had a different name for it - a Spanish name, obviously - but said it was one of the most dangerous snakes on the island.  AKA, if it bites you and you don't go to the hospital, you die.  At the very least, you'll lose some weight - click the link to see what I'm talking about.

Yikes.

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Ometepe es la mayor isla del mundo dentro de un lago de agua dulce

The lake sometimes reminds us who is in charge.  Sometimes the water is calm, serene.  For a few weeks, however, it was angry and violent.  This is a large body of water, so when the waves get going they can be pretty nasty.  Our house is on the lake and situated between Hacienda Merida and the Rio Istian, one of the most popular kayaking destinations.  Several times during this angry stretch, we found kayaks stashed at our beach because tourists just couldn't handle the water.  They bailed out, making for the nearest place to come ashore, then would walk back to the hotel.  Smart move, too.

Really sad news - the lake showed just how angry it can be by taking two lives from the village in a weeks' time.  The first was a young man who was out fishing with his brothers.  The stories conflict on details, but what we heard was that he was using one of those circular nets to fish, the kind with weights around the edge that you throw out.  They sink to the bottom then you pull them up, drawing the edges together and netting fish.  In a poor village like this, fishing gear is valuable and it appeared that the net got caught on rocks on the lake bed and he dove down to free it and possibly got tangled up.  It took them several days to find his body.  Very sad times. 

That same day, a friend of ours was cooling off from the hot day and dove into the lake off the dock at Hacienda Merida.  As I said above, the water level is dramatically lower than normal, which Jamie found out when he hit the rocky bottom - with his face.  A nasty gash on his forehead, another right below his eye and 30 some odd stitches later…

And sadly, a week later some young folks were enjoying the lake at another nearby dock on yet another dry hot day.  A young man did a back flip off the dock and landed on his neck right on a rock, killing him instantly.  

When a community this small loses one person, let alone two, it has such an impact on everyone.  People of this age are earning money for their families, working the farm, working in tourism.  They are 'bread winners'.  Losing them is bad enough, of course, but it has many other consequences that go beyond their passing.  

So, hug your loved ones, please.

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After one of our afternoon beginner classes failed due to lack of attendance, we decided to replace it with an early morning session.  This class is extra awesome because we hold it right on our porch, twice a week at 7 AM.  This one immediately took off!  We had to buy more plastic chairs to accommodate the number of people, and may have to add to our collection soon.  Bex! loves early mornings.  Umm, yeah.  I am not what one would call a 'morning person'.  But this class is a great way to start the day, with eager people who are so excited to learn.  We are thinking of adding a day to this one, to make it three classes a week.

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As part of our financial planning while on this mission to teach, we have an entertainment budget.  Mind you, there ain't a whole helluva lot to spend money on here.  So we were rather excited to have been invited to attend the viewing of the Classico:  FC Barcelona vs Real Madrid.  At a cost of a whopping 60¢ each, plus a few beers during the game, we would have to watch a LOT of soccer to blow our budget.  

Soccer - not my favorite game, by far.  But we're living in futbol country and before we came down here, we promised we would engage the culture in every way we could, so this is part of that commitment.  And it was a blast!  We arrived at Rancho Merida and watched the game with a large chunk of the village population.  In fact, there were so many bikes and motorcycles parked on the road, a pickup that was trying to make a delivery to a nearby hotel couldn't get by, so the driver threw a horn-honking fit until someone went out to clear the way.  He was probably pissed because he was working and not watching the match.

We were all packed in a large room; it was hot and everyone was sweaty.  Drinking beer, high fiving,  trash talking.  Half the crowd was rooting for Cristiano Ronaldo and Real Madrid while the other half was cheering for Lionel Messi and FC Barcelona.  Us gringos, the only ones in the room?  We were rooting for FC Barcelona.  Why?  Two reasons:  all our Nica friends were fans of Messi and his team; Bex! was wearing red and blue which, unbeknownst to us when we arrived, just happens to be the team colors for FC Barcelona.

The game itself was very exciting, each gooooooooaaaaaaallllll bringing simultaneous cheers and groans, but as we were told by one of our friends, 'during the game everyone roots for their team, but after we are all friends'.  As this contest worked out, we won!!!  And we celebrated with the rest of our amigos as Tia Margarita's restaurant up the road.  It was a great time and we were happy to have been included.

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The last Friday of each month is what y'all in the US would call a 'teacher in-service day', so March 28th was a down day for us!  We spent all of Friday planning lessons and researching teaching techniques.  This made for a glorious - and unexpected - three-day weekend.  Hell, all day Saturday we felt like it was Sunday - and we still had another whole day off!!  Ahhhh.  

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And - boom - done.  Now we're into April...