Introverted in Granada

This weekend I escaped to Granada. I didn't invite anyone to come with me. I just packed up and left.

On Friday I called ahead to reserve a room at Hostal El Momento (no small feat as it turns out). Went for a run. Went to the gym to work on my arms (I have seen no discernible impact). Had some housekeeper-made dinner. Watched Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights (swoon. Diego Luna). Packed some clothes and some lunch. And then puked up my guts for a good two hours.  And all I could think was "I wonder what is happening here physiologically" and "Boy, I hope I get enough sleep to leave early tomorrow bright and shiny."

The first question was answered by this fantastic website (which also informed me that the ideal vomiting position is with your head below your waist which would indicate standing and bending over into the toilet) and the second doubt was allayed when I sprang out of bed at 6:30AM. Ok, I didn't spring but lurch but I was awake and hungry and that's what counts.  After breakfast and my typical Saturday morning conversation with my 12 year old gardener (the water pump is broken again and I bought the wrong type of fertilizer and no he's not really just 12.) I headed to VOLCANO MOMBACHO! woot!

The road to the trail heads are up a big hill (Obvis. It's a volcano pues.) so my Toyota toaster wouldn't be able to make it. Instead, tourists take a truck straight out of Jurassic Park which leaves at 8, 10, and 1 and is surprisingly punctual. After paying an arm and a leg for being a foreigner ($16!) I hopped on the 10AM shuttle About halfway up the volcano the shuttle stopped and the driver didn't really explain the purpose of the stop which led to some confusion. I stepped in to ask the driver what was going on and then had to tell everyone else (Nica and tourist alike) which then led the driver to enlist me in explaining to some Americans that they had to pay for their tickets which was super awkward. Anyhoo, the idea was to allow us to explore a coffee farm, get a free cup, and hopefully drop some bills on a snack at Cafe las Flores (a chain store which I am not afraid to admit is my go-to cafe because they have really good brownies and mediocre chai and because they're Rainforest Alliance certified).

Our chariot awaits

Cafe La Flores has a coffee farm complete with nursery and processing center on the volcano

COFFEE!

On the way back onto the truck I overheard an American woman say to her companion that they had to wait for another girl who had gone to the bathroom. I decided to befriend this woman immediately because as a solo lady traveler I am always in search of a bathroom-stop-looker-outer. It turns out that E, as she was named, and her colleague A work in Managua with a friend of mine from Peace Corps! (The bathroom girl is M.) Upon arriving at the Visitor Center, we endured a short introductory talk from the guides and some significant naysaying from an older German tourist lurking about. He was dressed like a stereotypical German hiker in some pretty technical gear and grousing about how cloudy it was and how we wouldn't be able to see anything and how he'd been waiting in the lodge since 8am for it to clear up. EMA and I, embracing the fact that we were in a cloud forest and that it's supposed to be cloudy, decided to spring for a guide anyway ($12/group in Spanish. slightly higher in English) to hike the El Tigrillo trail. (For your information, the volcano has three trails; Crater Trail is 1km, Puma is 4km and closed at the moment, and Tigrillo is probably 2km. The issue is that if you come up on the 10am shuttle you're supposed to go down on the 1:30 shuttle and I think they expect you to be very slow.)

And J, our guide, was fantastic. We ate plants, stuck our hands in weird holes in the ground, made fart jokes, learned all about ants, did NOT touch the huge spiny ferns, compared our vocabulary word lists, and had some absolutely spectacular views. Take that surly German tourist!

Take THAT surly German tourist! Take it!

A view of Laguna de Apoyo, my regular weekend haunt

Even my least stunning photo is still lovely

After returning to Granada, having the myriad of hostel rules explained to me, and taking a shower, I headed out to lunch (an overpriced burrito with a free jamaica margarita) and then to explore the city.

I started with the churches.

Granada cathedral

Iglesia La Merced

While I was up in the bell tower of La Merced, I realized what time it was and that I'd have to skedaddle quickly if I didn't want to go deaf. However stairs and I are still not friends and I started down very slowly. Seeing my hesitation, a Nica yelled in a perfect Rob Schneider "You can do it!"

The view from the bell tower

Another view from La Merced

Granada is small. When climbing the bell tower of La Merced I ran into a guy who I had seen earlier (and who creepily reminded me that he had seen me earlier). I also ran into EMA at La Casa de Los Leones, a cultural center with a radio station, violin workshop, art studios, and Esperanto classes. They had just come from the bookstore which was my next stop. Books are super expensive in Nicaragua and Lucha Libro, which sells used classic paperbacks for $4, is considered cheap. (It's a fantastic shop selling a wide range of new and used. They aggressively weed out mass market crap and the inflated costs are totally justifiable. Also, cute puppy in residence.) I bought a $7 copy of Innocents Abroad by Mark Twain and retired with it to dinner. Passing by all the lovely and exciting hubub that is the Calzada, the main drag for restaurants and bars, I ducked into Cafe los Suenos which was beautiful and tranquil and served the best veggie quiche I have ever had in all my life. Their salad dressing was also fabu.

I was in bed by 10.

I had planned to go on a kayak tour of Las Isletas on Sunday morning but when I woke up I decided that I didn't really feel like sweat or exercise of any kind. Also, the photos of the tour that the guy at the hostel showed me heavily featured monkeys which did not appeal to me. Instead I wandered over to Kathy's House of Waffles for some blueberry pancakes (!) and hot chocolate. It is a popular spot and they didn't want to waste a whole table on me so I said that I could totally make friends and I was plopped down with a pleasant older Nica couple and some American Habitat volunteers. They didn't talk to me so I immersed myself in Pilgrim at Tinker Creek. (To be fair, the Nica couple told me that my pancakes looked delish and the Habitat ladies commended my choice of reading material.)

Post-breakfast I checked out the San Fransisco Convent and Museum. The church next door was having service and so I listened for a while from a rocking chair in the Museum terrace.

The lovely patio at the Convent

The display of giant heads at Convento San Francisco

And then I headed home to Managua to do my laundry, sip some chai, take a nap, and finish my French homework. My anti-social weekend was just so pleasant!