Back in the hostel in San Jose but just for tonight, tomorrow night Iīll find a place to stay in Heredia which is where all my stuff is and itīs closer to the airport. I fly out mid afternoon on the 7th for Santiago, Iīm pumped. The second half of my Nicaragua trip was dope. I stayed in Granada another night, then bailed early the next morning for Ometepe, the cool island in the middle of Lake Nicaragua. Thereīs two volcanoes on the island and the second day there me, two aussies and a kiwi climbed a little less than half of the tall one called Volcan Concepcion. There were monkeys in the trees, and the kiwi was really excited about that, taking pictures and not heeding my warning of not getting too close lest she get shit on. She escaped unscathed. This time. That first night was spent in Altagracia, the second biggest town on the island, and it was kind of a dump so I bailed the second afternoon for Merida. A few people in the hostel in Granada told me it was a good place, and man they were right. There was this neat little hostel right on the lake that was all full of travelers. Last night me, a Dutchman, an Israeli, and two Swedes played this really fun card game where we bartered farm animals and tried to make money, we played twice and I lost both times but I could feel my skills for market capitalism being strengthened during those two hours. Earlier yesterday an Aussie and I went kayaking on the lake. This time I was prepared with the knowledge of how to kayak without throwing my back out, and it was much better. It got a bit sad, however, when we rowed out to this tiny island about 40 meters from the main island, this little island was seriously about 20X30 meters, and some bastard had put two spider monkeys there for the tourists to look at while they did boat tours. We got close to the island and the monkeys stood really evil looking on the rocks above us, they had bugs all over them and would probably have thrown shit at us if we tried to dock. I met this Spaniard later last night who told me that he feeds them twice a day and is working on getting a friend from Costa Rica up to help him transfer them back to the mainland since the poor guys arenīt even supposed to be on Ometepe island. He said they were getting all lethargic and only got active when a boat got close, which means they were either going to get fed or try to get the tourists to stay off the island.
Last night I slept on a shit bed out in the open wearing my sweatshirt, using one shirt as a pillow and wrapping another around my feet to keep the winds at bay, and I slept like a baby. I almost fell asleep on the bus back to Costa Rica this evening. All this means Iīm mastering one of lifeīs best skills, that of being able to fall asleep really easily in not the most comfortable positions, like on beaches, in hammocks, all sorts of places. Rad, huh. I was up on a bus at 8 this morning, took the long ass bus to Moyogalpa where the ferry back to the mainland starts from, then had my favorite moment of the trip when I was laying on my back on the top of the boat and my head resting on my bag and the sun out and every time I closed my eyes I was relaxed and every time I opened them there were two volcanoes in front of me. It was amazing, one of those moments when never having a home again starts to sound like a good plan. Meanwhile, that bed in dorm room four around the corner is starting to look really good, and tomorrow Iīll find a good couch to sleep on before I floss and fly this mofo all the way to Santiago on Tuesday morning.