San Juan (Week 3)/Isla De Ometepe

It’s hard to believe that I have already been gone for 3 weeks. It has gone so fast! I can see how a year is just going to fly right by. As promised I will try to write this post in both Spanish and English so please see the Spanish version below where I am sure that I will have a ton of errors but I will try!!

This week was a bit different after my buddy Samantha left me in San Juan Del Sur. So let’s pick up where I had left off…Sunday Funday. So Sunday Funday was not quite my scene as I expected. On top of this, I was supposed to go with an Aussie girl that I had met named Jess. Then, she got sick and I had to go to this crazy party with 800 people where I did not know a single person. So, I show up at the first place and look around and it seems that everyone knows each other already. I think people met in hostels and came with groups but I was at a disadvantage because I stayed in a homestay. So basically the first hour was one of the most awkward hours of my life. After though, I saw a guy I had met the day before from Montreal named Alex and he seemed alone too so we got to hang out. After, we met Casey and John who were international teachers in Qatar. We had a really good time just hanging out and dancing. Everyone else there was really messed up though so I think that there were a lot of drugs being used as well.

The rest of the week until Friday was pretty chill. I hung out some with the friends I had met at Sunday Funday and just drank at some hostels. So I wanted to take this opportunity to talk a bit more about my homestay in general. Let’s start with the food. I have eaten rice and beans for breakfast, lunch, and dinner almost every day that I have been here. Either separate or mixed together in what they call Gallo Pinto. After this, I do not want to eat rice and beans for a while or chicken which we had all the time as well. The family I stayed with almost never left the house and they sold food on the side of the road every day from 4pm to 9pm. They were friendly by not overly friendly. The boys really liked to hang out with me who were 6 and 11 in age. I took them to the park a bunch and sometimes helped them with their homework. The education system is very behind the US here and the six-year-old could not count to 10 nor read or write anything including his name. Also, they only go to school from 8 am to 12 pm every day. The culture in San Juan was very relaxed and it seemed people just hung around their house all day long. I really liked it there but I think that I would hate to live there.

On Wednesday I hiked to an abandoned lighthouse and fort which is not a common hike in San Juan so I had it all to myself. It was really nice to hike up a mountain and do my homework overlooking the bay and the beach.

View from the lighthouse hike to San Juan.

(The lighthouse and the fort)

So one more story from San Juan. This past Thursday, I went back to Playa Hermosa (yes it is my favorite beach) to go surfing one last time. I was in the water for about 2 hours and was doing really well until I stepped off the surfboard and felt something cut my ankle really hard. Being from Maryland, I thought it must have been a crab that pinched my really hard and cut my ankle and it was bleeding pretty good. Then, all of a sudden I started to get severe pain in my ankle. Everything inside started to hurt really bad so I paddled out of the water and started to walk back to my stuff. As I was walking the pain spread all the way to my toes and halfway up my calf and I could not move my ankle. I was starting to freak out because I had no idea what was happening. I had gone to the beach with my school so when I get back to my stuff and described the pain to them they told me it was a stingray. I still can’t believe I got stung by a stingray. The pain was real. I had to soak my food in water as hot as I could handle for 3-4 hours and only after that did the pain go away. My ankle is still quite sore from the encounter.

Friday was my last day of school so after school was over I headed to Isla de Ometepe which is an island in the middle of a huge lake in Nicaragua. We had to take a chicken bus to get here that cost less than a dollar but everyone was packed (like chickens) inside of old American school buses that they use for public transportation. It was really uncomfortable because for about an hour the guy was leaning all over me and dancing/grinding on me with his penis. I was so grossed out. Then, we took a ferry for about $1.50 to the island. We stayed at a hostel called The Landing Hostel which is pretty good but the bathroom is this weird outside sink area.

Saturday was intense. We hiked up a volcano called Conception. I went with Nathan and a girl that I met from England named Charlotte. I thought it was not going to be so bad but it had no ups and downs of other hikes or flat bits. We just started going up and when I say up I mean like straight up this volcano. The first 1000 meters (3200 feet) were in the rainforest. We saw both white-faced capuchin monkeys and howler monkeys. Howler monkeys are really cool because the male monkeys make this very loud noise (like a growling kind of) that you can hear from far away. At one point on the way down, we encountered a male howler money that threw a stick at us. Then, a guy in my group started to call the monkey and he called back. The rainforest was also very loud because there were lots of cicadas as well and they chirped so loudly my ears hurt. Once out of the forest, we had a really great view of the surrounding area and the lake, but we could not see the top of the volcano because it was surrounded by a large cloud. After this first lookout point, the hike got much harder. The rocks were very loose and sharp as it was volcanic rock. It was really foggy (we were in a cloud) so you couldn’t see that far in front of you and I was scared a lot of the time from slipping and falling on the rocks. It took us about 2 hours to get up this part and finally, we got to the top….yet again could not see anything. The top was at 1395 meters or 4576 feet and remember we started at sea level. Getting down those rocks was even worse because of all of the loose stones. I am glad that I did this hike, but it stinks that we didn’t get to see anything at the top for all of the work we did, and my legs really hurt today.

So that was my week. Currently, it is pouring rain and I am waiting it out in a cafe until we can go have another adventure today! See below for a couple more scenery pictures.

Ahora en Espanol……

No creo que ya pasen 3 semanas. Fue muy rápido! Un ano va a pasar muy rápido. Este vez voy a escribir en Ingles y Español. Va a haber muchos errors y por eso perdóname.

Este semana fue un poquito diferente después de que Samantha fuera. Vamos a empezar con “Sunday Funday.” No me gustaba Sunday Funday mucho. Iba a ir con una amiga Australiana se llama Jess pero ella estaba enferma. Por eso tenia que ir sola a una fiesta con 800 personas donde no conocía nadie! Llegue al primero bar y había mucho gente en grupos y todos tenían amigos. Pienso que ellos se conocieron antes en hoteles y vinieron juntos pero me quede con una familia y por eso fue mas difícil. Pero de repente yo vi un chico quien conoci el día anterior se llama Alex y Alex estaba solo también. Después conocimos dos chicos mas se llaman Casey y John quien son profesores internacionales en Qatar. Con ellos Sunday Funday fue mejor. Bailamos y hablamos today el día. Pero en general, muchos personas ella estaban muy borrachos y pienso que ellos usaron muchas drogas.

El resto de la semana muy tranquilo. Junte con los amigos de Sunday Funday and tome en algunas hostales. Pero ahora quiero hablar sobre my casa y familia en San Juan. Entonces, la comida. Yo comía arroz y frijoles por todos los comidas todos los días, separado o juntos en Gallo Pinto. Después de esto, no quiero comer arroz, frijoles, o pollo (bastante pollo también) por muchos días. La familia nunca salen la casa. Ellos venden comida en la called todos los días desde 4 en la tarde hasta 9. Yo jugaba con los niños en la casa mucho. Ellos tienen 6 y 11 anos. Fuimos al parque muchos veces y los ayude con su tarea. La educación acá no es muy bueno. El que tiene 6 anos no puede leer o escribir nada. Ellos solo asisten escuela desde 8 en la mañana hasta 12. La cultura en San Juan es muy relajada y ellos no hacen mucho. Me gusta San Juan pero no quiero vivir acá.

Miércoles, yo hice trekking hasta un faro abandonado y una fortaleza. Este camina no es muy popular y por eso estaba sola. La vista fue muy buena del San Juan y hice mi tarea allá.

Una historia mas del San Juan. El Jueves pasado, fui otra vez a Playa Hermosa (si este en mi playa favorita) para surfear. Estaba en la agua por 2 horas y estaba surfeando muy bueno de repente algo corto mi tobillo muy fuerte. Pensé que eso fue un cangrejo porque hay muchos cangrejos allá. Pero después me duelen muchísimo mi pie y my tobillo. Regrese a mis amigos de escuela pero no pude caminar muy bueno. Después ellos me dijeron que una raya me pico! Tenia que poner mi pie un agua muy caliente por 3 horas y solamente después de eso el doler se fue. Todavía me duele mi tobillo un poquito.

Viernes fue mi ultimo día de escuela y después y fui a Isla de Ometepe. Ometepe es una isla en el centro de un lago grande en Nicaragua. Tenían que tomar y bus de pollo que es un bus publico y barato pero que contiene mucha mucha gente. Depuse tomamos un ferry hasta la isla. Nos quedamos en un hostal se llama The Landing.

El sábado fue muy intenso. Hicimos trekking en el volcán se llama Concepcion. Fui con Nathan y otra chica de Inglaterra se llama Charlotte. Eso fue muy muy difícil. Subimos el volcán pero el inclino fue muy fuerte. Los primeros 1000 metres estaban en la selva donde miramos dos tipos de monos, Howler y Capuchin. Me gusta los howlers porque ellos gritan muy fuerte. Había mucho ruido en la selva porque había muchos cigarras. Me duele mis orejas. Después de la selva tuvimos un muy buen vista de toda la isla. Después de este vista fue muy mas difícil. Había muchas piedras muy agudos y sueltos. Tenia media toda el tiempo porque fue muy fácil para caer. 2 horas después de la vista llegamos al cumbre pero no pudimos ver nada porque estuvimos en un nublado. La ultimo punto había 1395 metres y empecemos en 0 metres. Bajando fue mas difícil. Alegro que haga este camino pero es una lastima que no pude ver nada. Me duelan mucho mis piernas hoy!!

Entonces, eso fue muy semana. Ahora esta lloviendo mucho y estoy esperando en un cafe hasta mi proximo aventura hoy!