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Esteli and the Tisey Reserve
Entry 32 of 33 | show all | print this entry |
Yesterday, Mel and i made the agonizingly long trip to Estelli. In the US, this trip would probubly have taken an hour, but in Nica it took 3.5. The road was so potholed that during one stretch of an hour, i don´t think the bus topped 10 miles an hour. We bought a big thing of water before the trip but couldn´t drink it because there were no bathroom breaks in this trip and the shaking of the potholes had us both needing to go!
Our non-express bus only went to San Isidro, so we caught a second short bus to Esteli. During that trip, i chatted it up with a woman who convinced mel and i to forsake the Miraflor reserve for the closer Tisey reserve. Tisey is a huge organic farm and reserve co-managed by the Nature Conservancy and a moon guide must see. Miraflor would have required yet another interminably long bus ride. As it turns out, the bus from Esteli to Tisey was 10 miles straight up hill on a gravel road in a packed school bus, so even that took another hour and a half.
During that trip i met a woman who just aquired the extremely-difficult-to-get US visa. She plans to visit LA in January and wants to stay as an illegal alien. She has a nice life here, a 2 story (very rare in nica) house right off the tisey reserve. But she has illusions about the US and what she can earn there. I told her that it would be hard to create a good life for herself as an illegal. Big life changes ahead for her!
By the time we arrived we didn´t have much energy, but luckily the ´best vista in all of Nicaragua´ (according to the moon guide) was .5 miles away, so we walked up a hill behing the Posada and from the top was a stunning 270 degree view of the entire country, and views north of El Salvador and Houduras. Amazing.
Then we rested the afternoon away in our cabana before dinner. There was a rockin´ party going on nearby with some of the worst karioki in history of the world. The best part was when the drunk men attempted to sing english songs (none of them speak a word of english). Their rendition of Hey Jude had mel and i cracking up. In general, we were annoyed as we came to the country side to get away from obnoxious noise.
Our anger didn´t last long. During dinner, one of the men in the group came up and chatted us up. He had only arm and explained to me that the part was an after work afair for a non proft group devoted to making Nicaragua more accessible to those with disabilities. I will really, really miss the nica people. Not in a million years would someone have just come up to our table in the US and started chatting with us.
After our first cold night in 3 weeks (we´re up in the mountains now), we woke this morning and hired a guide to explore the reserve. The guide, Victor, was extremely nice and took us on a long meandering walk through the fields and forests. I was super impressed with mel as she chatted victor up for hours in spanish. Her spanish has come so far!
We saw shade grown coffee cultivation, observed many interesting birds including a cool woodpecker, saw orchids growing in the trees of this cloud forest, treked through fields of cows and horses and generally had a wonderful walk with victor and the 3 posada dogs. And we stopped by a local farm that is famous for its swiss cheese (mel and i bought some).
But the highlight and if you go to nica you MUST MUST MUST meet this man, was the 75 year old sculptor. To help cure his boredome he began chisteling in the local rocks a few decades back. Over time he as created a magnificent wall of sculputures that outline the culture and history of nicaragua. But like most of our best moments here, the best part was the man himself. Missing all but 4 teeth and living in a wooden box of a house not more than 200 square feet, he litterally jumped out of his shack to greet us. As we walked up to the rock wall, he pointed out the pinapples, papaya, coffee, oranges, sweet limes and other inhabitants of his lush garden.
On the way, he asked how we were doing and victor answered that we were tired and a bit thirsty from all the walking. Well, this man immediatly bound straight up an orange tree to retrieve some fruit for us! I have a picture of him hanging, at least 30 feet up from a tenousously small branch!, picking the fruit off. "Don´t worry, i´ve only fallen once!" he exclaimed. 75 years old!
As the juice from the organic oranges dripped down our faces, the man excitedly showed off his sculputures, dusted off benches for us to rest and generally treated us like royalty. After an hour so (and a fresh sweet lime, which he insisted we try), we left. I gave him a nice tip for his hospitality, which i can´t do justice in words.
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