Not ready for prime time Nicaragua

Thanks to all those who have commented. I feel so “followed!” Yeah!

This is a hard one for me folks. So bear with me as I make my way through this post. Here’s the thing about Nicaragua. I laughed, I cried, I laughed until I cried. I burned, I composted, I scratched. It was unbelievable, but here goes.

Ricardo had plans for Nicaragua for his literature class and this made me think this was the perfect time for me to travel with The Kid on our own. So looking through the handy dandy SAS Field Program Guide, The Kid and I chose what looked like a fabulous trip to an EcoLodge on a private wildlife refuge. The trip involved a visit to petroglyphs (something The Kid loves) a boat ride, wildlife, and a city tour. Sounded great!

It turns out that we didn’t really get the code words clearly enough. You see “low impact environmentalism” actually meant “compost toilet.” A compost toilet is a bucket with compost in it that you crap in and then add more compost on top of. “Enjoy a candlelit dinner” meant “no electricity.” Basically what we had was four walls, two plank beds with pallets on them, mosquito netting, and a pipe that delivered water to a spider-infested shower.

I will interrupt my story here to make a few side comments about Nicaragua. Nicaragua is a stunningly beautiful place. It is full of rich, dense jungle, lakes and volcanoes. The food is to die for, the people could not be nicer, and it is in fact true that there is nothing in Costa Rica that compares to Nicaragua. That is except the tourist infrastructure. That is in its infancy here. More on that to come.

We ate lunch in the palapa overhang of the so-called dining room. This consisted of “red bean soup” which tasted not unlike the stone soup of childhood as was pointed out by one of the students who were with us. Basically it was water, three red beans, and dirt. The star fruit juice was fabulous however and we sucked down several glasses of that eagerly and happily, while we took in the site of chickens pecking around a spider monkey chained to a tree called Fabio. Fabio’s main activity was standing up and playing with himself and then throwing things at the chickens.

After lunch we took a two hour hike through the property of Domitila. Domitila is a dry forest, so it’s tropical in so far as it has some palms and plenty of acacia trees and a whole lot of bugs. But it lacks the beautiful heliconians, the ginger, the bromeliads and the other epiphytes. What it does have is monkeys. In fact we saw over 20 monkeys, all howlers, and all quite dramatically howling. The Kid was thrilled. It almost made up for having to get a “peon” to come in to dispatch the big, hairy spider that was in our shower upon our return. We had dinner at the “lodge” (also not so fab) and were treated to a very dramatic and moving (for her) story of the proprietress’ foray into the Realm of Ecotourism.

After dinner there was literally nothing to do since there was no light to speak of (kerosene lanterns) and there were a bazillion mosquitoes who seemed to find the taste of deet delectable. So the kid and I retired to our “room” and hid under our mosquito nets where he read with the flashlight and I sweated myself into a pool of salt and waited for the benedryl to kick on so that I no longer wanted to claw my own ankles to shreds.

We were awakened the next morning at 4:59am by the sounds of howler monkeys. If you’ve never heard a howler monkey, it’s hard to imagine both the volume and the horror it can elicit in you. They are a cross between a roaring lion, a screaming banshee, and a homicidal maniac. And they live in the tree behind The Kid’s bed. This was fine since we had been told by Doña Maria (the proprietress and the doppelganger of my mother-in-law) we needed to be up by 5 am so we could have breakfast by 5:30 and load the ox carts by 6am for our Lake Nicaragua voyage.

Yes. You read that right. Ox carts. More on that to come.

The Kid and I threw on our bathing suits, put on sunscreen and packed our backpack to be ready to go. The guide had told us it was not necessary to wear jeans so we fished out shorts and were ready to depart. More on that to come.

Our chariots awaited us. These were three different ox carts loaded with folding chairs, coolers with lunch items, and various other picnicking supplies. The 18 of us, the Belgian entymologist, and the park ranger, climbed into the various carts and began our lurching ride to the shores of Lake Nicaragua.

Within 10 minutes, ours had a flat. Doña Maria came stalking past us with her energizer bunny walk screaming, “Ya, Vengo!” and we sat on the motionless cart. A few minutes later we hear the roar of an engine followed by incessant honking of a car horn. I turned to The Kid and said, “I bet you 1 million dollars that that is Doña Maria.” I won the bet.

She pulled up in a 500 year old Suzuki 4 wheel drive, jerked to a stop and threw up the hood of the car. She pulled an air compressor pump from the front seat threw it at the peon who had eliminated our spider the night before and told us the walk was 10 minutes, the cart had a flat and would catch up.

We jumped down, grabbed our stuff and started walking. 10 minutes became 15, became 30 became 50. Doña Maria came marching up and said the cart was right behind us. We never did see it until the afternoon. More on that later.

After an hour long hike, we were told we needed to get into one of the other ox carts, because the “pangas,” the local boats could not pull up to the shore. So we hopped up onto a different ox cart and began our journey across the marsh and into the lake. Words cannot describe the bizarreness of this. So I will refer you to the picture of the oxcart level with the side of our panga and surrounded by water.

Once on the boats (which leaked in a fairly intimidating way) we motored on out to a river so we could see birds. The birds we saw were chickens. Eventually we did see some egrets, but mostly what there was to see was cows, chickens and laundry hanging out. Eventually we turned around (several people were bothered by the intense, 7th circle of hell heat). We were then motored to Zapatera Island where we were to take a short, 10 minute hike to a volcanic crater which had become a lagoon and where we would see birds. We pulled up in front of a house where there were chickens and laundry hanging. We jumped off the boat and began the trek. Except there wasn’t really a path. And there was poison ivy everywhere. And we didn’t have jeans on because the guide said we didn’t need them. After 15 minutes, The Kid decided the trek was too hard and we went back to the boat. When we got there, he decided we were missing out and we should turn around. So we did. We rushed on trying to catch back up, assuming that since it was a nature walk, people would be stopping to see the nature. Wrong! They were basically double timing it to the lagoon.

Pretty soon though, we were overtaken by a guy in shorts and flip flops, smoking a cigarette and carrying a machete. He halfheartedly hacked at the path ahead of us and told us that the lagoon was very nearby. The path was steep. The day was hot. My head was pounding and we kept on. Finally we reached the downhill which was so steep that we slid down parts of it and The Kid fell several times. But we made it.

As soon as we were reunited with the group, the guide announced it was time to return. By then I really didn’t feel well. I drank about a liter of water and poured the rest over The Kid and myself. I was lightheaded, dizzy and beginning to feel nauseated. It was 90 degrees, humid beyond belief and only 10 am. I insisted they wait until I could catch my breath.

The “lagoon” was the mankiest, nastiest, rankest pond of green sludge I have ever seen. When the students threw rocks in it, geysers of verdant slime erupted from its surface. It smelled like feet and the air was so still it was hard to breathe. Eventually I gave up trying to feel better and we began to hike back. Oh yeah. And there were no birds.

We met the pangas on the beach and by then I knew I really didn’t feel well. I had stopped sweating and began to feel tingly. I thought it was probably some dehydration so I began to drink more water. But apparently the issue was not water but salt. Luckily for me, one of the life-long learners realized that I was not so good. She leant me her hat and hooked my up with some electrolytes and suggested I get straight into the water when we got to the beach.

The beach (described in the book as white sand) was made of black volcanic sand. The Kid and I walked up to the tables, put down our things and stripped to our bathing suit. We left our shoes and socks. MISTAKE! Halfway across the sand, I realized it was hot. And that’s when The Kid began to scream “HOT! HOT! HOT!!!!!!!!!!!” We were burning the soles of our feet on the volcanic sand. I began to run and so did he. We slid our way into the murky water and sank to our necks, rubbing sand on the poison ivy oils on our skin and cooling our feet. I was brought electrolytes and in a half our began to feel much, much better.

But then we had to get out. I figured it would be better because our feet were wet. Wrong again! We burned ourselves all the way back until we made it to the cool sand under a beautiful tree infested with gnats. It was 11:30am.

We ate lunch (our major protein was the gnats we inhaled and swallowed since the chicken kebabs were not cooked through and I wouldn’t let The Kid eat them). After we ate we wore our socks to get back into the water. As all the students and we lay in the water cooling our burned, bitten, and heat exhausted bodies, we were told that it was time to climb to the petroglyphs, a short 10 minute walk.

I’d heard that before.

We stayed in the water while the first group went. When we got the report that it actually was only a 10 minute hike, The Kid, the photographer (who is the nicest person and was a fantastic trip leader!) and I went with the park ranger and the entymologist to see them.

They were spectacular! It was a huge basalt table, which had been carved with many glyphs and basins. And it was not fenced in or anything so you could really see them up close. They dated from between 800-1200 BCE and the ranger said they were pre-classic Mayan (although the book had said tolteca). We stayed up there for about 30 minutes or so looking at them and talking with the guides who were really knowledgeable and also very, very patient with all The Kid’s questions. And since we had them to ourselves it was especially magical.

After we hiked back down, we were told we had another 2 hours left to our stay there. What the heck were we going to do? Basically we sat in the water until I was so burned I needed to get out. Then we sat under the tree and inhaled gnats and talked. At 3:30 we left the island in the pangas and returned to the ox carts.

And this is where the fun began!

The first two carts were loaded with people and supplies. We were the last cart and so we had the garbage, the coolers and the folding chairs. And the “burros” which were the legs of the tables and which Doña Maria was demanding the boys hand to her personally to put into the cart. We loaded ourselves into the cart. The Belgian entymologist, The Kid, a student who was allergic to everything on earth but who had not brought her meds with her, a photographer and his partner, Karla (more on her, she is the bomb, to come), a lifelong learner, and I crowded ourselves into the cart amidst garbage bags of dubious funk. As soon as we cleared the marsh, the entymologist bailed on us.

And then there were 6.

The Kid was sitting in the very front of the cart and Karla and I were behind him. We’d decided since we’d been cheated of our ox cart ride out there, we were going to stay on the whole way back. Pretty soon after Karla’s partner jumped off, deciding he’d prefer to walk.

And then there were 5.

Our oxen were the two kids in school who hate each other so much the teachers recommend that they be placed in entirely different wings of the school to prevent fights. And their heads were lashed together. These were not the beginner, easy oxen. These two punk assed oxen kept their butts so far apart from one another that the driver was constantly whacking them to make them move ahead.

And so the journey began. The boy with the machete, he couldn’t have been more than 12 was sent on ahead to get an older peon to come and help with these oxen. Our driver drove them by jabbing a sharpened stick into their butts and screaming at them. This made them go ahead but they tended to veer towards the left. This mean that we kept hitting trees with the left hand side of the cart. So we’d run forward about 10 paces and then whunk! We’d hit a tree. Stop, back up, forward, run, whunk! When we weren’t hitting trees though, the Kid and Karla were leaning into our laps because there isn’t much on the ride except acacia trees. These are lovely trees with ginormous thorns and which are infested by fire ants.

By this time, Karla and The Kid and I were laughing hysterically because this is the most ridiculous thing we have ever done and it is clearly absolutely absurd. After the 50th tree hit (we were down to a mere 3 bolts left in the wheel and a strange clanging noise when it turned) we lost the lifelong learner.

And then there were 4.

By this point it was dark and it had begun to rain. We were rank with sweat and muck from the lake. Our butts were bruised. Our necks were rattled. Our throats hurt from laughing and everyone on every other cart was certain we’d lost our minds. And Karla let out a scream the likes of which I’d never heard. So I looked at her pointing and there on the back of our driver is a beetle the size of an ipod mini. So I began to scream. And we were ducking the thorns, and pointing at the bug, and screaming and laughing and crying. The driver looked at his shoulder and reached over. Squash! It’s dead. So that set us howling again.

By now we'd hit several trees and should be quite used to it. But then we hit the mother of all trees, and The Kid let's fly with the f-bomb equivalent in Spanish. I gasped and chastised him. Karla asked what it means and I whisper the translation. She howled with laughter and gasped for breath which just set the two of us off even further.

Apparently in the other carts they were quite upset with us because they were miserable and whining and didn’t understand how we could laugh at this. I ask you. How the hell could we not!

We headed down a steep hill, Karla and I grabbing The Kid by the shorts and t-shirt to keep him from falling off and then we headed up where we ended up prone from the force. The oxen began to poo which sent The Kid into further gales.

When we finally made it to the lodge, it was 4:30, nearly dark, and raining. We were burnt, bruised, tired, and bitten. The Kid and I went to our “room” and showered (a pipe with a valve you turned on, no hot water, but none needed).

At 5 pm we were told we would eat at 7. What the heck would we do until then? We were some of the only ones with a flash light and there were no lanterns yet. It was pitch black. So we asked Doña Maria for a lantern and we cracked out our Uno cards. We played several games (I lost all of them, some to The Kid and some to the student who played with us). We played by passing the flashlight so that you could see the difference between the blue and green cards.

Finally we ate and it was the best food I’d ever eaten (Really? Asked Karen, one of the TAs on the ship. No but we were so tired and hungry we’d have eaten more gnats). At 8pm, The Kid and I got into our mosquito nets. I drugged myself into oblivion with benedryl and knew no more until the howler monkeys started up at 4:30 in the morning. The Kid announced he was going out with Karla to record the sounds of the monkeys and I said fine. At 6am I awoke to find him still asleep in his bed with no clothes on and the mosquito netting twisted around his feet. I took a shower, which made me feel immediately filthy again and began to pack. At 6:30 I shook him awake and we went for breakfast.

By 8 am we had hiked to the bus (it couldn’t get to the lodge) and left in air conditioned comfort for the lovely city of Granada. We went to a cigar factory, a museum with statuary from the petroglyph site, and wandered the streets of the city a bit. There, having been bullied and rushed through everything but we were able to escape briefly to walk about the square and take a very nice although short horse cart ride through town with the photographer, Kris who led our trip. We ate a fabulous lunch at La Gran Francia, which was named for a French nobleman who’d murdered his wife and escaped to Nicaragua by getting Louis-Phillipe to help him fake his death. No matter, the Churrasco was outstanding. Just when we’d given up hope, we ran into Ricardo who took the bus back to Corinto with us, a 4 hour drive. Just as we arrived at port, we saw a rainbow, like a beacon guiding us to the air conditioning, electricity, and running water of the boat.

And for this trip The Kid and I paid near to $700 dolars. But it was an experience. That is for sure!