Great news! My laptop (with our vacation pictures easily accessible on it) is back from a long trip to the computer doctor, and I am ready to get back on the vacation-blogging wagon. We left off way back in January with Day 10 or if you prefer to see all the posts from our trip laid out, you can see them here.
Our third morning at Hostel Esperanza we finally took advantage of the free breakfast. It was very nice to enjoy a typical Nicaraguan breakfast in the cafe and not have to hike hungry up to the market, and Torre even got his own little plate with fruit and an egg. Fueled for the day, we decided to try and hike up to the Christ statue we’d been looking up at for three days.
Easier said than done. We walked to the edge of town and crossed a suspension bridge over a muddy river draining into the ocean. We found ourselves hiking along an unpaved highway, then we came to a neighbourhood of big, beautiful homes and several mansions under construction. The steeper the road got, the more epic the houses became, and eventually we realized we must have missed a turn.
As we backtracked we did find the road leading up to the Christo, where a sign informed us that passports and an entry fee were required for international visitors. We had neither with us, since our passports were at the hostel, and of the small change we’d brought, we’d spent 100 cordobas on a pair of sunglasses for Torre on our way out of town, leaving only 50 cordobas in our pocket – just enough for two ice cream cones.
Back at the hostel, we put Torre down for a nap, and I studied some Spanish while Matt went for a swim at the beach. Then when Torre woke up, we passed most of the afternoon chatting with two Brits named Sam and Jamie. Matt met Sam on his volcano boarding excursion, and Jamie was traveling solo but connected with Sam in San Juan Del Sur. They were really fun guys to chat with, and Torre was very accommodating as we set him up with a few episodes of Bubble Guppies on Matt’s phone.
Before dinner we took another trip to the beach to play, then we had a budget-blowout dinner (it came to about $60 Canadian after the exchange). It was a wonderful treat that we would never afford in Toronto (ordering anything we want from a top restaurant with our table and chairs literally in the sand of this great beach) and it was magical, listening to the surf pound the sand between courses of delicious food and live music from a band, ordering somewhat fluently and being sure that the ice was made from bottled water. A hopeful dog watched us eat from not far away, and the pizza we ordered for Torre off the kids’ menu was very gourmet (we ended up eating it later as leftovers), and the stars were so bright, and the breeze was warm, and it was a beautiful night in this country.