Updates, updates, updates....

Well once again it has been quite a while since I have updated this lovely blog of mine. Everything is going swimmingly (literally and figuratively) down here in Zancudo. There’s not too much to update on because most of my days are spent relaxing. I have been slowly learning how to enjoy having time to myself. It’s been wonderful actually and I can only hope that I will be able to do the same back in Salt Lake City.
I have a general schedule that I follow most days. I run on the beach in the morning, it’s hard to sleep past 6am. On Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings I join my mom at Yoga. There is a group that gets together at Coco Cabinas at 8am for Yoga and a cup of coffee afterward. It’s great even though I am by far the youngest person there. The parents and I usually have breakfast together and then I spend the rest of the day reading, swimming, or playing cards with my dad. (We are always looking for new card games so if you have any suggestions please share.) In the evenings I cook dinner with my parents and then we usually put on a movie. It gets dark around 5:30pm and it usually starts raining at about 6pm. I really have no room for complaints. It is an excellent way to spend my last few weeks in Costa Rica.
Last week I did venture out of Zancudo. A friend that I met in Nicaragua invited me to come join her and her friend in Quepos to stay in the timeshare that her mom had. I had a great time and the buses to get there where an adventure in and of themselves: three buses in total, a man offering money for some reason that I couldn’t figure out, a two hour wait with a man screaming what I think was religious rantings, and then another two hour wait in a tiny town where no one knew when or if another bus was coming. But it was all worth it. I made it to the resort they were staying out to find Alana and her friend Mindy along with Niabm, another girl I met in Nicaragua, and her friend Leah. The five of us had a blast together. We kayaked, hung out at the beach, walked into town and cooked excellent meals together. Good times.
Oh and yesterday was an out of the ordinary day for me and my parents. We went on a tour up the river near the house with Susan, the woman who owns Coco Cabinas with her husband. It was a great time. Susan has been living in Zancudo for over 30 years so she is a wealth of knowledge about the history of the town and the plants and birds in the area. We spent half the day going up the river and exploring a side channel of the river. We took kayaks out in the side channel to explore around a bit. I had a wonderful time learning all about our “backyard.”
I can hardly believe it but I have less than a month until I return to Utah. Time has flown by and soon I will be going home. But not to worry I will enjoy every day I have here to the fullest!

On to Zancudo my new home...

Traveling with the parents is definitely a lot different than what I've been experiencing so far. We spent the first few days in the city getting supplies for my parents house and they bought a car as well. I am not a fan of the city at all and running errands like that made me dislike it even more! We went to places that were exactly like Costco and Home Depot except everything was in Spanish. It was an exhausting few days so we were all ready to leave for Zancudo by the weekend. Oh and Chris showed up at the hotel early in the week as well so the whole family was together to drive down to Zancudo.

So on Friday we were off with plans to get to Zancudo late that afternoon. But you know things never go as planned. We were about two hours outside of San Jose when the clutch on the car went out. We were able to turn around and make to a rest stop of sorts. Dad called the car place and they sent someone out to try and fix the car. We were stuck there for over two hours waiting. When they got there they were able to fixt he clutch but then a bunch of smoke started coming out of the tail pipe of the car. The final decision was for us to swap cars so that the busted car could be taken back to the shop and we could continue on to Zancudo. Only in Central America. We didn't have enough time to make it all the way to Zancudo that day so we stayed the night in San Isidro and took off the next morning to finish the trip. Of course we weren't able to make it without a few hitches but we did make it!

Zancudo is beautiful. It is exactly what my parents would want in a place to get away. The town itself is made up of one dirt road. As you are headed into town you pass by a few houses, stores and cabinas to stay in. Everything is very spread out. The center of town doesn't get that condensed either. My parents house is about halfway between the start of town and the end of the road. The house itself is incredible. We are all upstairs for now but I move downstairs next weekend. The ocean is a hop, skip, and a jump away and there is no one on the beach. I've been entertaining myself by hanging out with the fam, reading, swimming, exploring the beach and town, studying spanish, writing. Basically relaxing and doing whatever comes to mind. There have been a few ups and downs trying to get the house put together but for the most part things are excellent and I am looking forward to a few weeks of hanging out before I have to return to reality.

Oh and just so you know we don't have internet at the house. We thought that we would be we can't get a signal here. We are trying to get someone to come to fix it but everything here happens on Tico time so I'm not expecting anything soon. I am actually writing all of these blogs in word and saving them to the computer with the intentions of copying them over to my blog when we get a chance to go to a resturant with wifi. Which most of them are closing for the season so I don't know what's going to happen with keeping in touch for the next few weeks.

Costa Rica here I am!

On to the next part of my travels! After leaving Nicaragua I had a heartfelt ruin with my parents. I left Isla de Ometepe on a 5am ferry to see if I could catch an earlier bus out of Rivas, Nicaragua. The bus ticket I had purchased didn't leave until 1pm which would have put me in San Jose after dark and all the advice I had was to not take public transit after dark so I would have had to stay the night in a hostel if I took the 1pm bus. I knew that there were earlier buses so I figured I might as well try my luck out. And was extremely lucky to get the very last seat on the 8:30am bus out of Rivas. It was quite an ordeal to try and get that seat too. When I got to the bus "station" there were closed and it looked more like a tienda than an actual bus stop. Which it turned out to be. The woman at the "desk" checked tickets and then when it came close to time for the bus to come, walked us across the street and down the block to catch the bus on the side of the road. It was all very confusing with my minimal Spanish skills but it all worked out.

But my luck hadn't run out yet... The bus made a stop at the airport which I didn't expect. The airport is much closer to Alajuela than San Jose and so I figured there would be a cheaper bus from the airport out to where my parents where staying. As I was gathering my bags I realized that it was right around the time that my parents flight was supposed to land. I figured it wouldn't hurt to check the arrivals area to at least get information about their flight. As I was walking through all the taxi drivers trying to figure out where to get flight info I looked in the distance and low and behold... there where my parents!

Nicaragua! (In English)

Oh me oh my. I was, at one point, doing so well at keeping up on my blog. I must apologize for the lack of updates recently. Here is a full synopsis of my experiences in Nicaragua. It will be long but worth your time to read it. Nicaragua is incredible!

Upon arriving in Nicaragua I made my way to the Bearded Monkey Hostel with several other people that I had met on the bus ride from San Jose, Costa Rica to Granada, Nicaragua. I arrived in Granada late Wednesday evening so I had a couple days to explore the city before starting language class. The hostel I stayed at was excellent. Great food, relaxing atmosphere, free internet and friendly people. Thursday I wandered around Granada to get my bearings. I wandered down to Lago de Nicaragua (the 10th largest lake in the world). It has fresh water sharks in it! I was also able to find Casa Xaltava, the language school. I talked to a Jose Luis and Juan Carlos to set up a time and date to meet my host family. I was to come to the school on Saturday to meet my family! Friday I went with a group from the hostel to Laguna de Apoyo, which quickly became my favorite place to relax in Nicaragua. The lagoon is located in a large crater and it is protected so there is minimal building in the surrounding area. I spent most of the day there swimming, kayaking, reading, writing and relaxing. Saturday I packed up my belongings and headed to the school to be placed with my new family for the next two weeks. Upon arriving I walked into a group from the school who were going to Laguna de Apoyo. They asked if I wanted to join them and of course I couldn't refuse. The lagoon is that incredible! Plus when I walked in I was recognized by someone! Gina, a girl that I met in Panama, happened to be studying at Casa Xaltava. She had no idea that she was going to be studying there and either did I, it was a complete coincidence that we ran into each other but we ended up becoming fast and close friends.

After a relaxing afternoon at the lagoon, interacting with other students at the school, I went to meet my family. Living with a host family can make or break your experience studying a language. I was very lucky and got an incredible family. I wont lie and say that it wasn't awkward at times but they were so incredibly nice that I couldn't of asked for a better family. My host mom was so cute and fed me far too much! I had a host brother who was about my age, Luis. He would sit with me at lunch and/or dinner and help me with my Spanish. He was learning English as well so we went over some English stuff as well. He also came out dancing with me and my friends on the weekends. He was a sweetheart.

My classes ran Monday-Friday from 8am to 12pm. I was one-on-one both weeks that I was studying there. For my first week my professor, Fernando, did a tiny bit of review and then jumped into teaching me all the irregular verb conjugations and then went straight into preterit. Learning a language can be so overwhelming but it felt so good to be speaking only in Spanish during class! My teacher for the second week, Bismarck, took a lot of time making sure that my sentence structure and grammar was correct. This was great because it gave me a little more confidence in speaking since I had some understanding of what I should be saying so that I didn't sound like a child. :) Although I did find that as soon as I got out of class my communication skills were not quite as good as I thought they were. Believe it or not but people in the street don't talk as slowly as my teachers do. I wonder why?

Besides classes, Casa Xaltava offered a look of other opportunities for students. They offered excursions almost every afternoon. I went on several excursions with other students from the school. We went to San Juan de Oriente, where they make incredible ceramics. We were able to see how it was all made, try making a pot on their wheel and then purchase pottery from the locals shop that had shown us everything. Catalina offers an incredible view of Laguna de Apoyo. Another evening I went to Volcan Masaya where we were went to a museum, got a history of the area, saw lava and had a tour of the bat caves near the volcano. Both weeks I went out to the markets in Masaya to check out what I could buy for souvenirs. I didn't go with the school because it was far to expensive to rent a private van when you could take the bus for 30 Cordoba or $.75.

Another excellent part of Casa Xaltava are the children. The school didn't actually start out as a language school. It started out as a house for young boys to live and get supplemental help with their schooling. Today the kids don't live there but they come every morning to get help with their homework. Most of the students who have classes in the afternoon worked with the kids in the mornings. I wasn't able to take classes in the afternoon because of space issues but I was able to play with the kids a lot. The kids were great to practice Spanish with. They were patient to an extent and weren't afraid to correct you. The last week I was there I was able to take the kids out to a baseball game with some other students from the school. Although the game was not all that exciting it was a lot of fun to go with the kids. (Baseball is bigger than soccer in Nicaragua.) The boys were definitely ladies men and I had one, Luis, decide that I was his new girlfriend. It was so hard to leave the kids. They made the experience that much better!

So the first weekend that I was in Granada they had a running of the bulls. It was Sunday and I went out with my host brother and some of his friends to watch. It was interesting but I didn't find it all that scary whereas others thought it was terrifying. The bulls were "let loose" in the streets and "chased" those "brave" enough to run in front of them. In reality the bulls were completely emaciated and did not want to be running anywhere. One of the bulls laid down in the middle of the street. Plus for the most part the bulls were under the control of the horseman who had them wrangled with ropes. Every once in a while a bull would get away and I did hear stories about a bull getting into the lobby of a hotel. So there was some excitement. What I found to be the scariest part where the other people. I was actually standing on the sidewalk right at the level of the bulls running by. I found absolutely no reason to run except for when the people around you pushed and shoved you. It was all very interesting in a sociological sort of way. I think that I was one of a small minority that felt bad for the bulls. The men and boys would rip off branches to slap the bulls with to try and egg them on. It was actually horrible to watch and I don't really feel bad for the people who were injured by the bulls. They kind of deserve it right?

The next weekend that I was in Granada happened to be the biggest weekend of the year. Good timing on my part! Usually the city it fairly quiet, as cities go. It is a beautiful colonial city, perfect for walking around without worrying about getting too lost. Anyways, for this particular weekend people from all over Nicaragua come to Granada for the festivities. On Friday I went to the rodeo, which is much different than rodeos at home; it isn't uncommon for people to die in the rodeo. Saturday I hiked Volcan Mombacho with two other girls from the school. That made me realize just how out of shape I've become from traveling but it was an incredible hike. We had spectacular views. In the afternoon the carnival started which was a massive parade with lots of bands and floats. There was a lot of advertising for the national beers as well, Tona and Victoria. (Each country in Central America has it's own national brewery.) Sunday was the Hipica. As very traditional horse parade. Unfortunately no one warned us that it would be nearly impossible to get back from downtown after the parade. There were so many drunk people and horses (yep they give beer to the horses) in the street that you could hardly move. Oh and at night we spent a lot of time at Cafe Nuit. A local dance spot. They would play your regular reggatone but they also had a live band who played meringue and mariachi and salsa. We had a lot of fun times at Cafe Nuit. :)

For my final weekend in Nicaragua I decided to spend time relaxing on Isla de Ometepe. An island with two volcanoes out in Lago de Nicaragua. I was planning on going by myself after my last day of class and then traveling on to Costa Rica from there. Well it just so happened that there were a lot of other girls interested in coming with me. (Did I mention that the whole time I was studying at Casa Xaltava there was only one boy studying there and he happened to be the youngest of all of us and had come with his mom.) So I went to Isla de Ometepe with 6 other girls from the school. We had a blast on the island. We rented bikes and rode all around the island, hiked on some trails and swam in the lake. There was hardly anyone else there so it felt like we had the whole place to ourselves. It was an excellent way to end my trip to Nicaragua!

What I did last weekend...all in Spanish!

La fin de semana pasada yo me quedé en Granada por las fiestas. El viernes yo fui el rodeo con mis amigas Gina, Diana, Diana y Darsee. Después el rodeo comimos pizza a Don Lucas. Mis amigas quisieron mi a ir a la Café Nuit con ellas pero fui cansada entonces fui a mi casa a dormirme. El sabado fui subir Volcan Mombocho con Diana y Alana. Aunque es posible a tocas un carro arriba subimos la Puma sendero con un guía. En todo subimos 10 km. Después subimos Volcan Mombocho fuimos a ver el carnival en la calle. El carnival estuvo interesante pero salimos temprano porque extuvimos hambre. Tuvimos cena a la Braba de Mono. La comida allí es muy buema y barato. Después de comer fuimos a bailar y tomar a la Café Nuit. Yo no regresé a mi casa hast 3 en la mañana. El Domingo yo me relajé en mi casa con la familia. En la tarde yo encontré mis amigos a ir a ver la hipica de caballos. Me gusta a ver la hipica pero no me gusta caminar en la calle con otras personas y los caballos. La noche de Domingo tuvo cena con my familia pero después de comer yo salé a bailar con mis amigas. El Domingo estuvo mi amiga, Gina, ultima noche en Granada entonces quisimos a ir a bailar una otra vez juntos. Yo tuvo mucho divercion en la fin de semana pasada.

Today is the day!

In a very short time I am going to be leaving the world of living hostels and moving in with my host family to begin my two weeks of language classes. I am a little nervous but more than anything I am extremely excited. I am ready to get away from the travelers world and settle into a place for several weeks. And about all else I am ready to learn Spanish. I even bought a silly notebook from the grocery store yesterday to keep notes in. So hopefully by the time I get home I will be able to hold an intelligent conversation in Spanish!

A little about yesterday... The morning began with torrential rain but it lightened up just in time for me to catch a ride out to Laguna de Apoyo. An incredible place! It is a lagoon at the bottom of a crater. It was so incredibly peaceful. I haven´t been in such silence in a very long time. So I took the day all to myself. Kayaked out on the lake for a few hours, swam in the water, read and wrote in my journal. A wonderful day to ponder my last few weeks of traveling.

Alright off to meet my family of the next two weeks...

Nicaragua!

It is official, I am on my own! Lauren flew back to the US yesterday and I took a bus to Nicaragua. Another leg of the trip has begun. I am really looking forward to hanging out in one place for longer than three days. Currently I am staying at a hostel in Granada with plans to move in with a host family on Saturday and start language classes on Monday.

Today I spent the afternoon wandering around the beautiful town of Granada. I can´t wait to get to know the city even better. There are horse drawn carriages and brightly painted houses, cafes with wonderful outdoor seating and a local market to get lost in. I also found the language school that I will be attending and had a chance to meet some people there. I am really looking forward to starting classes! The school is a non-profit organization that helps young boys get through school so I will have the chance to volunteer helping the boys with their homework. I am a bit nervous to try and take on the task of learning a foreign language but I have more motivation now than I ever have before. How could I not? Living in Central America would make anyone want to learn Spanish. I feel like there are so many friendships and connections that I have missed out on because I don´t speak Spanish. I especially don´t like not being able to communicate with the kids that I meet. But that is all going to change soon...