Nicaragua

In 7 days I crossed borders to another country, took 3 buses, 2 ferries, numerous taxis, and many car rides, visited 3 different places, and realized I am becoming who I want to be...a world traveler.

So here's a bit of what I did. We started in Managua, the capital city where we stayed with friends of my housemates. What hospitality! They had never met us before and opened up their homes to us for 3 nights! It was incredible. I enjoyed talking and spending time with my host family. My housemate Heather and I had a blast with the two little kids. We also got the chance to attend the Great Commision church there and eat lunch with them, spend Monday morning at their Nutrition Center playing with the little ones, tour a little of the city, and be crazy at the mall when we were finally aloud some freedom.





Tuesday we took off to Granada. Keep in mind I have been to both Managua and Granada before, but Granada is still just as beautiful and love it. It's the most colonial type city still. We stayed in a gorgeous hotel thanks be to God because there was a world poetry festival being held that we had no clue about leaving us walking aroudn the city looking for a place. We were being watched over. We spent our 2 days here swimming, walking through town, carriage ride tour of the town, kayaking, canopy tour, and coffee plantation.









Thursday we journeyed to the island. Isla de Ometepe is trying to become one of the 7 wonders of the world. It's made up of two active volcanoes in the middle of one of the largest fresh water inland lakes in Central America and has fresh water sharks (however, I didn't see any). We stayed at a great little place right on the beach, ventured through the lagoon, toured the island by taxi and stopped to see petroglyphs, monkeys, and swim in the natural spring. We played cards, talked with the locals and other foreigners, and enjoyed ourselves as our trip winded down.




After a 13 hour trip back due to stops in between, I'm back "home". Funny how prideful I've become of Honduras and even Tegucigalpa. Nicaragua, although very close and a great place to visit, I found to be very different. They speak different dialects of Spanish, the cities are different; nonetheless, it was nice to pull into my own town.

I realized how thankful I am that I have these opportunities to travel as I do. Many of my Honduran friends sure don't get this chance. I'm glad I get to know more of the world. I was also pleased to have served as the tour guide/translator for the entire week for my group of four other girls. It was great. I was always the one in charge of the big decisions of figuring out how to get to the next place or communicating our intentions. So there you go Mom, I'm working on my "translating" skills. That's something I don't get to do often.