A few nights ago, at 4:30 am, Nicole and I were awakened by the sound of a car alarm--completely foreign in a place like this, an area where roads are dominated by horses and motorcycles. Turns out it was a bunch of gringos who have showed up to build 2 houses this week with another NGO. They were weird...they sleep on army cots in our front yard, and the first night tried to turn our patio light out at 8pm while we were eating dinner! However, they quickly learned we lived here and got a lot nicer. On Monday, one of them came to see me in the clinic cause he was sick...turns out he had strep throat. I have him a nice big shot in the butt of Penicillin, and the next day he was a new man! In gratitude for the free medical care, and sleeping on our front lawn every night, they invited us on an afternoon excursion to hike Cerro Negro--a nearby active volcano!
Half the fun was the transportation--we hopped in the back of their fancy new Toyota Hiluxes (the ubiquitous truck of Nicaragua), and bounced and bumped our way down various dirt roads in the countryside for about an hour until we were suddenly at the base of the black behemoth. We made friends with the students in the back of our truck, and got absolutely covered in dust.
The hike up was beautiful and windy, and after rest and pictures, we headed over to the rim where one of the newest Nicaraguan pastimes was born--volcano surfing! But our experiences sand boarding in Peru, plus the ridiculous cost ($20 USD per board, how much Nicole and I spend on 6 meals here), told us that sand boarding was not the answer. We ran down, and man was it a blast!
After collecting ourselves at the bottom we made another bouncy journey home.
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