Hotel Villa Kairos Monte Rico

... rain. I went to the Explorations Café and logged onto the internet to see the weather report for myself. The official ships daily program said it was to be partly cloudy today. I was wondering which clouds they were talking about. . . since it was 100% cloudy. Thanks to www.wunderground.com, I discovered a storm lays just off the coast, and is projected to make landfall or graze the coast(depending on which projection you follow) around 5 am the next day ...

... climbing/overnight camping all of them, but a recent bandit situation and obviously an extremely unpredictable eruption schedule has us in a holding pattern until the terrain is deemed safe again. The volcano tour operators seem fairly organized and have been meeting weekly to discuss the timing of the next guided climbs and guesstimated around this time next month. To make us feel better, Andy and I are already signed up!

In the meantime, we're ...

... on our first stay there. The festival lasts for five days with an aray of different events each day including volleyball competitions, live music, air shows and, of course, the releasing of baby turtles into the ocean every day at 5.30pm. We had missed our opportunity to release baby turtles in San Juan del Sur due to the Independance Day celebrations, so when we saw that we could do it in Monterrico we thought we had better hop to the coast for a few ...

... them in the hatchery. This was so cool. Just look at the cute little guys. The group of volunteers was great as they were from all over the globe.
A typical day might start at 6am checking the hatchery for any turtles that hatched over night. We would place them in a bucket and let them loose at the top of the beach. They crawled their way down the beach into the surf and were whisked away. Then a few volunteers ...

... Monterrico.

In Monterrico, you'll meet backpackers from around the world. You can lie in a hammock, eat great food and drink a huge, inexpensive pina colada. You can play in the waves (a little too big for me). Walking down the street, you'll see the real local flavor, not a shiny facade put on for the tourists.

On Sunday we noticed a lot of military truck pull ...

... schwimmen gegangen. Tagsüber steigt die Temperatur auf 40° also rein in den Schatten, in die Hängematte und Liquidos trinken (Früchte, Eis und Wasser im Mixer). Auch nachts wird es nicht wirklich kalt was natürlich blöd zum schlafen ist.
Auf dem Weg dahin am Wegesrand die Einheimischen haben eigentlich nur ein Schlafzimmer und die Toilette mit Wänden ansonsten gibt es nur ein Dach aus Palmenblättern auf Stützen wo die K ...

... We found a crummy hotel with (so called) air conditioning and crevices in the walls and ceiling that allowed for mosquitoes to enter. In the middle of the night, Kristi opened the door to the bathroom, turned on the light, and discovered a bat flying across the room (see pic). While in Guatemala for ten days, we experienced an earthquake, saw a water spout, a whale, an active volcano with flowing lava, and a bat in our bathroom. Wow!

... et ramassent des fleurs qui ont été bénies par le passage. Puis de nouveaux quelques minutes avant le ramassage pour finir à la poubelle. Pour le déjeuner, on cuisine "français"-"allemand", quiche avec les moyens du bord, salade, et crêpes en dessert. On prépare la voiture pour partir à la plage et on remplit la piñata pour l'anniversaire de Laetitia. Et zou, direction le pacifique! On passera le week-end chez la tante d'Ana et yes!, la maison a une ...

... so the waves pound on the beach, so when you are swimming and playing in the waves you get pounded into the sand! The waves are great but very strong and there are tidal currents that can take you away and there is nothing that you can do about it- which is scarey!

... almost a private resort. We were staying there all week with perhaps 5 other families, but with everyone taking day trips and coming and going you rarely ran into anyone else.  This is great if you like peace and quiet. There isn't much going on except complete relaxation at the pool & beach. Many of the other amenities (massage, atvs, movie nights, entertainment) were all closed during the week. Personally, I was a fan ...