Magdalena&Michael-volunteering and travelling through latin america: In&Around Granada

LIFE IN GRANADA

Granada is not big, it has about 120 000 inhabitants and is one of Nicaragua´s most important city.
People here are extremely friendly and helpful! As a foreigner, this is amazing. It makes you feel so welcome! Nicaraguans are happy to show you around, answer any question you have and may even invite you into their homes.

And here are two old ladies walking up Calle Calzada - one of Granada´s main streets, famous for bars.

Grocery Shopping
To buy food we mostly go to the local supermarket "Pali". It is crowded, it is loud, crowded, warm (of course, no air conditioning) and you wait at least 10 minutes at the cashier.
If we need sth more "western" we go to a supermarket called "La Union" - it is more pricey, but has everything we have in Europe, too! And it is quiet and it has an AC:)!
However, for fruits and vegetables we always go the market! It is so cheap - you can easily get bananas, a pineapple, a watermelon and mangos for a total of 2,50€. Here are some pictures!

Now, we are looking forward to mango and avocado season which starts in March - yeah!

Great Food & Juices
The main dish in Central America is Gallo Pinto - beans with rice. You have it for breakfast, lunch and/or dinner. For example, once we had breakfast at La Calzada - some great pancakes, fresh juices and Gallo Pinto.

Every Sunday there is a all-you-can-eat breakfast at Granada´s Chocolate museum! It is delicious! You get pancakes, waffles, omlets, fruits, everyting - and the best: they serve it with their own chocolate! The museum also organizes tours to the local chocolate farms, but it is quite pricey - so we rather keep eating the chocolate:)

Gym "Pure"
I know it sounds posh, but the only way to do some sports here is in a gym. You could go running outside, but only before 6am - after that it gets too warm. So, we try and hit the gym 3-time a week! Machines are not the best - e.g. the running machine makes a strange noise while using it - but you get used to it!

Hotel Granada/Hotel Granada Spa
Another posh thing we do from time to time...since it is about 35 degrees everyday and since we do not have a swimming pool or anything, we use the pools of two hotels - either Hotel Granada or Hotel Granada Spa.
The pool of Hotel Granada is about 50 meters long and perfect for swimming.

Hotel Granada Spa has a small pool only, but a nice, cosy atmosphere with a terrace and a little bar. Oh yeah, and not to forget the 3 ducks that are swimming in the pool - and they might attack you if you get too close! So, watch out!

Terrace view

Pool

CULTURAL SIGHTS

Churches
There are several churches in Granada! The most important one is the cathedral right at the Parque Central.
Another one is Iglesia de la Merced! For only one dollar you can go the top and have a magnificent view over Granada and the Lake.
And the oldest church of Central America can be found in Granada, too - Convento San Francisco!

Las Isletas
As Granada is lucky to have a big lake just a 15min walk from the city centre, one of the MUSTS if you stay here for longer, is a boat trip to the hunderds of small islands in this lake. Although the people or the government of Granada does not care much about the lake and the contamination is getting worse, the boat trip is worth is, though.

our taxi trip with 7 people in 1 taxi

The boatman took a group of volunteers for a 1h trip around these small islands which once belonged to the habitants of Granada, till the government forced them to move to the Peninsula Asese, just next to the lake, in order to sell the small islands to foreigners or rich Nica people... So now you pass by these small islands, which are around 50 to 150 square meters, and every island has a sign which says something like "Johns and Sallys Place" or "Dueno Pablo". So each island has now one owner. The trip and the view are really nice, but to be honest: who the fuck wants to live on an island in the middle of a big lake which is full of sewage water?

THINGS TO DO AROUND GRANADA

Catarina and Laguna de Apoyo

We met with our Spanish friends and went by bus to the village Catarina, which is famous for its amazing view to the even more famous Laguna de Apoyo. We were lucky with the weather and saw even the Volcano Mombacho, next to Granada.

Then we decided to walk all the way down to the Laguna, instead of taking one of the cheap taxis which are waiting for all the lazy tourists... well, till now we are argueing if this was a good idea...haha. It took us about 2h through a forest. It was a real hike, and we all wore FLIP FLOPS!

But in the end it was worth it As we arrived at a lonely part of the Laguna and had a nice swim there.

Volcan Masaya & Mercado

Nicaragua is famous for its many vulcans and we are happy having 2 of them right next to Granada, so one weekend in February we climbed the first one: Volcan Masaya! We arrived by public bus at the entrance of the Volcano Resort. We walked all the way up and were overtaken by some buses full of lazy american tourists, called "gringos" here.

But after walking around 1,5h we were happy and proud and could enjoy the beautiful view. There were actually 2 craters and one of them still active, smoking like some kind of gas... a weird smell which actually ached a bit while breathing it. On the way back we were happy as one of the resort pick ups took us on his back all the way down... Friendly stuff! haha.

We took then a bus to the village of Masaya which is famous for his handcraft market, but before shopping a lot of nice things we had a nice lunch at one of this typical "comedores", these small restaurants are actually only a small kitchen outside thee house of the people, serving their small selection of food on 2 or 3 tables for the people passing by... but they all know to cook, so it is always good and very cheap!

4.3.2012
Excursion to vulcano Mombacho

Although we were still weak due to our parasites in us, we could not stay again a whole weekend at our house. So we decided to go up the vulcano Mombacho which is next to Granada and which you always see from almost every part in Granada.
You can decide wether going up by foot, which is a 2km walk, quite steep, or you take one of the pickups for a few dollars more... well, it is obvious what we did...haha. On the top you can decide between 2 walks. One is 1,5km and you can do it alone, the other one is almost 4km and you need a guide. So we booked a guide and he took us around the whole top of the Mombacho to different viewpoints from which we saw the Laguna do Apoyo, the lake of Granada, Isla Ometepe and so on... it was a nice walk up and down through a forest and the climate was so refreshing! We had great weather, that means it was sunny, almost no cloud so we had great views, and as at an altitude of 1200m it is usually quite cold, around 10 grade, we had around 18-20 grades and this was really nice!
Thanks to our nice guide Luis, a nica student who pays his university while working as a guide on Mombacho, and thanks to our amigos who joined us this day. Mombacho is really worth it, but we really recommend not to walk all the way up the vulcano, because the walks on the top are so much more worth it to do! And both is almost impossible...