A day of rest
Trip Start
Aug 21, 2008
1
14
59
Trip End
Ongoing
Granada,
Nicaragua
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
So we didn't really take in Lesson #1 from the day before ("Do your research for each activity the night before.") and again found ourselves spending another hour trying to sort out our day trip to Laguna de Apoyo. We eventually decided to use the hostel's pre-packaged tour and suck up the $10 per person cost, which I have slowly started understanding is a lot of money in Central American terms.
In preparation for our day trip, we stopped off at Central Park for more street food as breakfast and the supermarket for lunch supplies. Then we headed back to the hostel for the 10:30am shuttle to The Monkey Hut - a small little resort at the edge of the water. Once we were there, we realized that spending $10 pp was definitely well worth it.
Mer and I
It was such a cute, quaint hotel/hostel with a large porch balcony overlooking the water. Laguna de Apoyo is basically a lake created by an implosion of the volcano and rainfall. We took a couple of kayaks and were mesmerized by the grandeur of the place. The water was gorgeous! Blue and so clear!
There were about a dozen of us at The Monkey Hut and we befriended a New Zealand and a Belgian couple... and it turned out, between the 3 couples, all the guys liked to play chess. So the rest of the lazy afternoon was spent on the porch with the guys playing chess and the girls occasionally spectating - well, as much as you can spectate chess. Mark lost to the NZ guy, after being a bit too cocky at the start, but gained back some pride winning against the better Belgian opponent.
[Side note: By law, Belgians are allowed to choose between 4-day work weeks... OR 12-months unpaid leave every 5 years with a guaranteed job upon return. Ummm... so why am I living in the U.S.???]
The chess-filled afternoon came just in time, as dark clouds suddenly filled the sky, the rain began to downpour and lightning bolts flashed around us
Apoyo AM
. Back in NY, this would create a very depressing atmosphere... but somehow, here inside a dormant volcanic crater / lake, it was so surreal and relaxing.But all good things must come to an end... the shuttle picked us up at 5:30pm to took us back to our hostel, where we showered and went for dinner at Cafe Bohemia (just ok food, but my first real salad!). Afterwards, we walked down the "casino" strip, which consists of mini casinos (or medium-sized rooms) filled with slot machine rejects from Las Vegas. The one where we chose to lose our money at was called, Circus Circus, after the Vegas casino of the same name... ha! Very sketchy people. One guy got so frustrated over his loss, he broke the glass on his slot machine!
50 cordobas ($2.50) and one hour later, we came back to the hostel and again crashed in exhaustion, which seems to be a recurring theme...
