Granada

We were all excited to be heading to Nicaragua, so after a quick breakfast we packed and headed to the bus station in Alajuela to get to the Tica terminal in San Jose. Who knew that we would have such an exciting bus ride into the Costa Rican capital? Soon after we were on our way, we almost got into an accident, and the driver broke so fast that the wheels locked and burning rubber smoke filled the cabin. We were all thrown into the seats in front of us, and bags and shoes went flying towards the front; nothing serious happened, but there were a few tense seconds there. Once we got into San Jose, we had a bit of a walk to the bus terminal since we got off too early, but luckily we gave ourselves plenty of extra time to get there. Though we were there early, we ended up leaving about half an hour later, which was a bit worrysome since we could not make reservations to Hostal Oasis, and we would be arriving in Granada late in the evening. As we drove through the mountains we encountered more traffic than usual, since it was the beginning of a long weekend and the start of the 'winter' vacation for kids. We made our way through Liberia, passing through a few rain showers and watching really bad movies, which prompted me to read more and watch TV less. The border was also busier than normal, and it took us about two hours just to clear customs at both the Costa Rican and Nicaraguan sides.

As a result, we arrived in Granada more than 2 hours late, around 10pm in the evening, where we all kicked into 'Amazing Race' mode, since everyone getting off the bus had the same dillema as us: finding a place to sleep. We divided up responsibilities, Marisa in charge of getting a cab while Josh and I retrieved our bags, and we managed to be the first ones to leave the bus station. We arrived at Hostal Oasis just to be told that everything was full, but at least we asked at reception to call around to find a room for us. She did manage to find something at Hostal Mochila's, and we left Oasis just as the other people from the bus were getting there. Two Americans followed us hoping they would find a room as well, but they were dissapointed once we got to our hostel; selfishly, it benefited us as at least we walked in a bigger group through the empty streets of Granada with all our stuff on us, so it made us feel safer. At the hostel, which was ironically right across the street from the house of the Vilchez family where I stayed while taking my spanish course, we squeezed the three of us into a two person room, so I got to sleep on the floor for one night, which wasn't the end of the world, especially since I was dealing with a bit of back pain from the trip to the Volcano the day before. As everyone else went to sleep, I sat for a while with the guy working at the hotel, and I told him that we were heading towards Isla Ometepe in a few days, with one of our goals being to see the San Ramon waterfall. He told me that since they were hit by the tropical storm Alma in May, there was a series of landslides and the waterfall is not what it used to be and cannot be visited - lesson learned not to always leave things for the next time.

The next morning we decided to change hostels, since most of the people at Mochila's woke up at 6am and started slamming doors and yelling as if they were the only ones there. Josh and I ventured out into the city, and after a few tries, we found Hostal Dorado, housed in a colonial house with a beautiful interior courtyard, hammocks and free coffee and internet, all for about $6 a person per night. We grabbed our bags, moved in to the new place and started to work out a strategy about the rest of our trip. We decided to spend the day taking care of administration things: taking money, buying bus tickets to Honduras, making reservations etc. After breakfast at Amsterdam Cafe, right in the central park, we went to the travel agency to book our day trip to the Masaya volcano the next day, and we stoped on La Calzada to have a drink on the main street in Granada, watching the world pass by. We walked to the TransNica terminal to buy our tickets from Managua to Tegucigalpa, Honduras and we quickly discovered that Lonely Planet's maps are not always reliable, as the agency was a few blocks away from where it was indicated in the guidebook. We did find it eventually, after asking around, and booked our tickets, and as soon as we were finished, heavy rain set in, so we sat around waiting for it to stop. Eventually we decided to just hop into a cab to take us back at the hostel.

Once the rain stopped, we walked over to have dinner at the rib place that I discovered with Eric and Kellie back in February, but they did not open until 6pm, so we went back to La Merced and climbed the stairs into the tower to get a view of Granada from above. We took lots of pictures, watched the kids drumming and shaking around the giant puppets that are traditional to Nicaragua, and then, right at 6 pm, this guy comes up and barely gives us a few seconds notice before he starts pulling the ropes to ring the church bells. At least I had enough time to plug my ears, but Marisa was caught off guard while she was taking a picture of some other tourists, and she was so startled that she almost dropped their camera. With out ears still ringing, we went for dinner at Jimmy Three Fingers', had great food in a really nice atmosphere (though more Gringo-like than I am used to), then we returned to Hostal Dorado for the evening, using the internet and watching movies before going to sleep.