Nicaraguan Adventure

Buenos dias el mundo! I have returned from my weeklong adventure through Central America. If I were to choose only three words to describe it, they would be “test of limits.” The whole thing felt, and continues to feel, like a sluggish dream of heat and color. Hopefully by writing it down, I can separate some of the memories better for myself and will have something something to look back on later since I'm not one for picture taking. (though I've already stolen everyone else's pictures from the trip) I'll start out by telling you about the people I was with, and then I'll make a post for each day and describe what we did. As I get to the last few days, the descriptions will get much shorter because I got sick towards the end and remember less. Anyway, vamonos!

My friend Destiny is in this outdoor adventure club at UF called OAR that does trips all over the world and the United States. They're all experienced hikers, climbers, skiers, kayakers, etc. Destiny really wanted me to come and the plane ticket roundtrip was about $200, and I was promised I'd spend less than $100 while I was down there so I said what the heck, why not, and went for it.

The group consisted of:

Jeff, the group leader. He was 5’7’’, tanned, with the facial features of a Stone Age homo sapien. Looking at him you would never guess he was 28 years old and a world traveler because he was very gentle and shy. Jeff wore one pair of jeans and one shirt for the entire trip. Champ.

Mike, the asshole. Over 6 feet, loping gait, rodent-y eyes that are always scanning the situation for an opportunity to seize. Objectively good-looking, but unattractive personality. He has hitch-hiked across the United States and has been skydiving hundreds of times.

Matt, the angel. Crinkly blue eyes, ruddy complexion, full beard. Matt is a nurse in the psychiatric ward so every time one of us was close to an emotional breakdown, he talked us through it. He’s one of those people everyone instantly trusts upon meeting because you can just tell he has a pure soul. I don’t know what we would have done without our group cheerleader.

Rachel, the fake hippie. Cropped red curls, pale freckly skin, thin, vacant eyes. Hard to gauge her personality because I got the impression she hasn’t figured one out yet. She seemed to be stuck in the middle school stage where you define yourself by the fads of your friends. Plus, she was just really daft….

Carolanne, the linguist. Sturdy build, not very distinguishable. Very nice girl, monotone voice, bit of a blinking problem. She spoke Spanish for the group the majority of the time.

And then there was Destiny and I. I don’t even want to try to characterize us.

Map following our route:



Sunday May 1st:

So our plane left at midnight. First funny thing that happened was we had to fill out immigration forms and Destiny needed her passport which was in her bag in the overhead compartment. I had the aisle seat so I offered to get it. One of the flight attendants was coming and I didn’t want to be in his way so I grabbed her wallet out of her bag and attempted to toss it to her (somehow I thought this would save time and get me to my seat faster?) but instead I apparently nailed the Nicaraguan man who was sitting between us right in the head. I felt terrible but I just broke into a fit of nervous laughter and squeaked out an apology. Luckily he was really nice and found the whole thing amusing.

We arrived in Managua at 2 am and were planning on crashing at the airport until sunrise because Managua isn’t safe to travel at night but shortly after we had all laid down to get some rest, a taxi driver came over and persuaded us to accept a ride. We piled eight people into a five-seater with Mike sitting in the front seat with me on his lap and everyone else crammed in the back. We drove like that for two hours and saw lots of strays, drunks, and prostitutes.

Our plan was to catch the first ferry to Isla de Ometepe, the island in the Lake of Nicaragua, so the driver dropped us off at the shore. The moon and stars were visible and the lake was a black mass lapping at the sand. Rachel and I looked for a spot to pee and had to settle for a shadow behind a house because there were no trees and it was almost all open space. We rejoined the group, next to a tent adjacent to the fence of the dock. A woman was sitting in the corner and after a moment, I realized she was sitting next to a closed casket. Apparently someone she knew had died and she was transporting the body to the island.

We had about an hour before sunrise by that point so we all lied down on these metal benches and tried to get some rest. I just kept stealing glances at the woman in the tent whose face was bathed by the moonlight and I could see her lips moving as she muttered some prayer over the body. It was surreal.

Finally, the sun came up and we milled around on the beach waiting for the ferry. We discovered a monkey in one of the trees we had been sleeping next to and had a good time observing him. People started to gather on the beach pretty quickly, to collect lake water for baths and to set up to sell their wares. There was a thin horse and its foal wandering around as well.

The ferry came and I couldn’t tell you how long the ride was because we all passed out. Once we got to the island, we got breakfast. My omelet was probably the best thing I had on the whole trip. Then we debated what to do next. Our group was torn between trying to hitch rides around the island and renting motorcycles. Eventually, we decided against the motorcycles due to lack of experience and were walking through the town to get our bearings when one of the guys from a motorbike place approached us and convinced us to try them out. Each of the guys took one with a girl on the back but that left one girl left over to ride a bike herself. Destiny wanted to do it and picked it up really quickly, and then we were on our way to visit a waterfall. The road was pretty rough and even Matt, who I was riding with and who had been riding bikes since he was five, found it difficult. At one particularly gravelly part, we actually tipped over and hit the ground. Matt’s elbow and my hand got cut up. Destiny had a few nasty falls, one in which her bike hit a tree and her face hit the handlebars. Her chin was bruised and there were some busted capillaries in her nose but thankfully she was fine, just shaken up. Matt rode our bike up to the others and Destiny and I walked up, leaving the other bike in the forest. We got picked up by these two British surfers who were going to hike up as well. We met up with the others and started the hike up.

It was grueling for me because it was my first real hike in years and I hadn’t established a steady pace that worked for me so I found myself gasping for breath trying to keep up. It was very steep and by the time we reached the top we were drenched in sweat and I was beyond exhausted. We stripped to our underwear and jumped in the water. Once we felt refreshed and rehydrated, we started our hike back down but came across five or six wild horses on the path. Every time we approached, they became skittish and pawed and snorted nervously. A couple of times they actually almost charged at us and we went running for 20 yards or so. Rachel had this incredibly annoying way of pretending to be “zen” and sitting in trees in yoga poses, but then three seconds later she would chirp, “Can you take a picture of me like this for facebook?” When this horse situation happened and everyone was muttering insults about the horses, she put on her holier than thou voice and said, “Guys, shh, they can hear you. Just ask the universe for what you need and she will give it to you.” And she then proceeded to pick up a palm frond and wave it around all airily like a Wiccan or something and the horses actually began to move. It was such a ridiculous situation that I could not stop laughing. Every time the horses stopped, Mike would bellow, “Rachel move out of the way, I’m getting a rock!” and then they would paw in his direction and he would take off running for cover. Eventually the path widened and we inched our way around them and FINALLY made it out. We rode to the hostel where we crashed for the night after getting a quick dinner from a nearby restaurant.