Howler monkeys, every morning 5:30 am
04/06/2016
Yesterday, we went to the craft market in Masaya. This is situated in the old market call el Mercado Viejo and is completely surrounded by an old wall which looks much like a castle. Inside, are stall after stall of local handmade products, mainly leather and cloth goods with some pottery and paintings. There was even a Jaguar skin hanging on one wall which I cannot imagine would be legal to own. While we were headed in a man on the street offered to wash our car, which turned out pretty good. Although, I can't imagine how he managed without water. There were also quite a few children "giving" us flowers and insects and other designs made from palm hearts (like a tall grass) woven into the various shapes. Of course, they were wanting money in return. Anyway, this was a really nice and interesting place to visit. The following are all photos and a video from the market. Sorry, the video is dark.
04/08/2016
Today we drove south down the coastal rode as far as we could go. I saw on Google Maps that there was a small rode crossing the border into Costa Rica in that direction and we had heard that they were putting in a new crossing just for tourists there. We also wanted to see all the beaches and beach towns in that direction. Shortly past the surprisingly large town of Ostional, there is a military check point. We think one may be allowed to go to Playa Manzanillo just past there, but We am not sure we were understanding and it was clear they weren't thrilled with the idea of letting us through so we went back the way we came. It looks like the land is starting to green up a bit. We have had a couple of nighttime rain showers. Since we left the US in January, we have only seen it rain 4 or 5 times.
Tomorrow we may buy a pass for Morgan's Rock resort, next door. It looks like there are a lot of activities on their 4000 acres.
04/10/2016
Our home here is interesting. It isn't air conditioned. It hits 95 degrees every day and drops to about 77-78 at night, but it isn't uncomfortable. The house has very high ceilings and sits on a ridge with very large screened windows on every wall that catch the constant 20 mph winds off of Lake Nicaragua. There is a constant gale through the house all the time. It often sounds like we are living next to the subway with the roar of the wind. Combined with the howler monkeys and parrots and insects, it is actually quite a noisy place to be. The power is out a lot for 4-5 hours at a time, many times we don't realize it has been off for quite a while because we just aren't using anything.
(04/03/2016)
After 2 weeks at home, working and running a lot of errands, we are back in Nicaragua. We flew into Liberia, Costa RIca and then drove across the border into Nicaragua. Our car was where we left it, very dirty, but in good shape. Border crossing took about 2 hours and was relatively painless. We collected our things from the caretaker of our last home and drove to our new home. We are staying in a place called Casa Luna in the Balcones development behind PLaya Maderas. http://www.casasdebalcones.com/casa-luna/ . It is hot here. There is still a breeze, but 97 degrees every day. We are already burnt from the sun. We have been without power during the day, I don't know if this is typical or something unusual. It just came on at 6 pm today. Our internet is much better than at our last home ,so hopefully we will be able to post more videos and pictures. Lots of howler monkeys around here, also scorpions and other less pleasant beasts.