nicaragua

some pictures from Nicaragua...

Granada...
is stunning, with and old world feel that cant be put into words..so i won't even try:






San Juan Del Sur...
this peaceful pacific town used to be a beachtown hideout for the sandinista rebels and FSLN graffiti and flags show the mark they left on the town. we tried surfing here, and lets just say we wont be quitting our day jobs, well if we had day jobs that is..
this church's plaza was filled with friendly dogs and surrounded by murals, we celebrated the sunset with ice cream. Not and uncommon combination on our trip.

The Border...
the border is a busy place, especially on a monday. Costa Rica has a lot of jobs, and Nicaraguan workers often fill those positons. With the crowds came some down time, and nicole passed that time drinking orange juice from these carts. They are pretty amazing self contained, mobile juicing stations.

stoked volume one

Somewhere along the way around Costa Rica Nicole and I decided that although we knew what and amazing time we were having, our pictures might not reflect our boundless enthusiasm for costa rica, travel, and our time together. For your benefit we let our true inner feelings shine forth in these photographs. Without further ado here is stoked volume one.

Nicaragua

Its harder than we thought to keep up on a blog while we are on vacation. Usually the bad internet connections have kept us from doing more...as well as the beach and the scenery.

Since we last wrote I feel like we have traveled thousands of miles. We made it to the Carribbean coast, to a town called Cahuita. It was a quaint, laid back one road town with lots of flavor. We stayed for two nights spending the days in the National Park with howler monkeys and beautiful alcoves of white sand beaches. After Cahuita, we took a bus inland...and then another bus closer to the coast, and finally a taxi to a place called Cano Blanco where we waited for a water taxi to take us to Parismina, a town close to Tortuguero National Park (where the leatherback turtles are). According to our book, its egg laying season and tourists rarely visit Parismina, yet more turtles go there than the park. Its obvious the town has not seen many tourists, there are no cars, no motorized vehicles, no bank and not one supermarket. Just a familys home with the essentials for cooking. After such a long day of traveling, we felt ill...it was hard for us to say yes to a local conservationist to take us on a turtle tour...but we did and it was the most amazing and thrilling sight. We saw a green turtle, a little smaller than a leatherback, that was about 5feet long and 3 feet wide...it was so amazing to see the turtle climb to the top of the beach to find a place to lay her eggs in the pitch black darkness. Her tracks were like a fourwheelers tracks would have been. Jackson and I, still feeling ill, thought we were hallucinating.

That night, we took off our sandy shoes and fell sound asleep. In the morning, we walked out to get ready to pack up to find that our shoes had been stolen. We were left with flimsy flip flops, and to this day are shoeless. Jackson especially hates it since hes told me about a million times now that he hates flip flops. We planned on heading to Monteverde and Volcan Arenal, but with the lack of shoes we would be unable to hike, etc. (And you all know, we are too cheap to buy new shoes). So, that day, we decided to take about three buses to get to San Jose and to go to Nicaragua.

We arrived in Nic. about three days ago after a grueling and sweaty bus ride. About 9 hours...that is, after the other three buses we took before. I must say, though, that it was well worth it. Granada, a city on Lake Nicaragua, was beautiful and bursting with cultural flavor, something that Costa Rica lacked. The architecture was simply amazing, with colorful walls and antique doors. We took more pictures in Granada than any other place...wish the internet connection was better so that we could post them. But, we will be home soon enough and can post all of the pictures.

Now, we are in San Juan Del Sur, a small beach town on the Pacific Coast where everyone has a bottle of rum and a hammock. We havent explored much, but realize this town is more expensive than its neighbors, too bad for us. Although, you can still get a three dollar bottle of rum.

We have decided to come home early, nearly a month early, but have had such an amazing time in the past six weeks. We realized that our heads are in the clouds, where they intend to stay, but our wallets are just as light as those clouds.

Missing you all!

Love

JandN

Tell me lies tell me sweet little lies

We are still in San Isidro, enjoying sleeping in, eating late breakfasts and avoiding any form of physical activity. We have explored, a little bit, with help from the public transportation system. Its nothing like the walking we did when we stayed near the beach. I think most of it stems from the fact that we planned on hiking the highest peak in Central America, but were sorely dissapointed to find out that in order to make it up the mountain, we had to reserve a spot at the hostel half way up. After a long day of holding our heads down and eating our miseries away in a shaded and air conditioned room, we decided we would sign up for a tour to a majestic looking waterfall near Dominical. So, by lunch yesterday, everything was set up, a guide, two horses and lunch. All we had to do was wake up and be to the bus station by 7 am. Im sure you all know us too well...we slept right through the alarm and the phone call. Feeling guilty, around 11am, we decided to sneak out without, Juan the nicest man in the country who reserved it for us, found us, guilt stricken.

We got out to the bus stop, thinking we had made it and could think of a story for later, but just then Juan comes running up to us...half smiling half annoyed. Jackson and I played ro sham bo earlier this morning to see who would have to make up an alibi better than sleeping in upon seeing Juan. Well, what happened is that Jackson told him we didnt feel well and that I was sick all night and all morning with travelers diarrhea, not too far from the truth, but still. So he persuades us to get into his car so that he can drive us to a farmacia where he tells the pharmacist what my ailments are...and I end up spending 15 dollars on some positive flora capsules. At that point we felt even worse, but realized if BMXing and art dont work out for us, we may have a carreer in acting.

As far as our day went, we ended up going back to the hotel (exactly where we wanted to escape from...and from being lazy yet again) we laid in the sun, sunburn to show for it, and played pool. I beat Jackson...TWICE! That never happens.

Now, I know you are all thinking, they are in Costa Rica, they should be doing exciting things everyday. I dont have an excuse for it, but I can say that being lazy isnt entirely terrible. We know the city now like the back of our hands and the megasuper, a mall down the street with a movie theatre...and pizza.

On Sunday, we head to the Carribbean Coast for more adventures in the sand. We also plan to meet up with my former roommates who are currently in Nicaragua, Laurel and Marcelo.

Until then,

All of our love.

Nicole and Jackson or Yackson, as they call him here.

pictures

pictures, they can stand on their own

Follow Up

Noted by Jackson already, we rented a car. As it has been a clutch, it has also made us feel as though we are a part of this country and not just one of the many tourists crowding the seats of buses. Learning to drive in this country has been interesting to say the least. The drivers here are agressive, confrontational and muy loco.

We arrived in Dominical from Manuel Antonio two days ago, a little surf town with a big attitude. There are more signs in English than in Spanish and those working behind counters are white, but bronzed surf bums. Golfito was the opposite. No beach, about two other tourists and a history and culture that we have been longing to discover. Remniscent of Cuba, as Jackson said, the town offered a certain nostalgia of a cape town. One of the tourists we met in Golfito, thought he would hardly call himself a tourist, named Ray, plopped himself down at our lunch table and ruled the conversation. He knew everything about Costa Rica, well, he thought he did at least...and he revealed the secret to good health and longevity, cocunut water. Although we both thought the sailor, who had given up his job selling VW's in NYC, was a little crazy, we stopped at a fruit stand on our drive and ordered up fresh "pipa fria," or coconut water. It was hardly tasteful.

Tomorrow we head to San Isidro to get ready for our "relaxing" part of the trip. We're staying in a time share for a whole week next to Chirripo, the tallest mountain in all of South Central America. We plan to take the two day trek up the mountain staying at a small hostel half way called Crestones. (After hiking through the park in Manuel Antonio, we're sure both of us are in for it).

Missing you all!

rental cars, ray, and rain

so we rented a car..we caved in, in a sense, but it is so wonderfly to fly, or as nicole might say, jet, around the country. we used our new found freedom to go to golfito, not necesarily one of the classic tourist destinations in the country, which was refreshing. golfito is sandwhiched between lush hills and a small inlet, which is part of the larger golfo de dulce, which is totally as sweet as it sounds. the town could be a backstreet in havana or san francisco in the 20s, colored houses squeeze in shoulder to shoulder and shops crowd ontop of grocery stores.

not that golfito is without modernity, at the end of the town is a couple sq. km enclosure ringed in barbwire where you can buy anything legal without sales tax. the duty free zone as it is called is a new world bazaar where tico families, and from what we saw, no tourists, go to buy refrigerators, kitchenaids, sunglasses and shoes. we couldnt quite figure out the duty free zone so we windowshopped until we felt sick...to feel a little more alive, we stopped in at the most beautiful cemetary on our way out of town, each above ground tomb was intricately tiled and the graves looked out on the tranquil bay... now we are back in dominical, site of our rental car agency and the last place we stayed before golfito.

Internet connections being what they are, picture posting has been hard so if this post doesnt have any maybe the next will...this lack of pictures is unfortunate too, as we´ve both had our cameras out more often and have seen some amazing stuff. today red tailed squirrel monkeys, little whitefaced, and well, you guessed it, red tailed monkeys, swarmed all over our hostel. the proprietors of the place feed them bananas daily so they are pretty adventurous with people.

we are now in manuel antonio, the site of a small but very popular national park. this morning we left the nicoya coast, and the sleepy beach towns we loved so much. a two hour speedboat ride isnt a bad way to start a day, unless you were up all night drinking like some of the people our boat. we loaned one guy a plastic bag...we told him he could keep it after we saw what he used it for. vomit. the guy vomited. nicole was sitting next to him. when he vomited.

-Jackson

So, this is my first blogging experience. Take it easy on me. The last two weeks have been amazing, and it´s hard to believe that the time has slipped away that fast. After leaving Nosara and the surrounding beaches, we headed to Samara, a laid back beach town home to the love of my life, Chola. A blacklab-looking mut who hung around the beach last year. She followed us to our rooms the two nights we stayed and trotted along the shores on our daily beach walks. She even dined with us late in the evening. In Samara, a Budget car rental agent offered his bungalow, quaint and modest, but it had a TV! Something we´d been missing almost more than all of you on this trip. It was nice of him, especially since we didn´t rent a car from him.

After Samara we arrived in Carrillo and stayed in the downstairs of an American families house. It had a full kitchen and a beautiful view of the ocean from the hillside. Their dogs also fancied us and ¨took¨ us for a walk on the beach every morning. They watched us do yoga on the beach. Taking advantage of the kitchen, we took turns cooking for each other. I made pasta with tomato-garlic and onion sauce and Jackson made a tico favorite, arroz con pollo (chicken with rice).

Last night we just left one of my favorite places, a laid back hippie town that is stuck in another era. At the El Sano Banano rest. and bar we paid six whole dollars for drinks so that we could watch nightly movies, The Motorcycle Diaries and the next night, The Queen. We tried to leave the day before yesterday, but had set our watch to an hour later than the rest of the country and missed our water taxi, it´s a wonder we made it in time for anything.

We have read two books together since being here, aloud. It calms us down after a long day of swimming and walking. I reccomend both of them, Entering Fire, a City Lights book and ¨Not a Country for Men¨by the man who wrote All the Pretty Horses.

The internet cafe is closing, so we must be off. With the money we´re saving on our room tonight we´re going out for Sushi in quepos.

pictures

these should have been with that last stuff, here we go!

Thunder only happens when its raining

We are in Nosara now trapped in a rainstorm, replete with thunder and ligtning (relampago y sonido) but have had an amazing trip thus far. From San Jose we took a crowded and sweaty bus to Playa Coco where we got our feet wet and havent really dried out since..from there we went to Brasilito, which really is a little piece of brazil, tranquil blue green waters, a nearly deserted beach (with just the occassional party of drunk americans zipping by on ATVs) made the beach Nicoles favorite. and mine. If we were having a bugbite contest Nicole would be winning in a landslide though I too have a bunch o bumps.
We also got a little lost on the way to a different beach but we found an enchanted little road with an amazing view in the process. Our rooms have been really comfortable if a little hot but that doesnt stop us from sleeping in like teenagers sometimes..last night we shared our room with a crab, maybe a picture of our little friend next time. Oh, and speaking of little friends Nicole has a million roosters to paint now, and hundreds of dogs and cats she wants to bring home...

COSTA RICA

Nicole and I are leaving on Sunday for Costa Rica and beyond..we'll be gone 66 days in total, and our loose itinerary includes, well, all of Costa Rica and some other places to boot. We talked about it and agreed a blog would be the dorkiest and most efficient way to keep people up to date on our travels. Speaking of dorky and efficient, and color coordinated, check out the stuff we are taking. Without discussing it we both picked a color and ran with it. birds of a feather..