Granada, by Jodi

We’re back from Granada and tired and bug bitten and happy to be home.

It was an amazing trip though. The border crossing was painful, but not nearly as painful as it could have been had Troy not connected us with the Nicaraguan he’d met on one of his border crossings. There are about 8 different obscure people you have to see if you want to cross the border in your own car and they’re not at all obvious or well marked and there’s no sign that explains what you need to do. So, unless you really want to save $20, you hire someone to guide you through it.

The horses mating 3 feet off the road was unforgettable. I seriously couldn’t breathe, I was laughing so hard.

Kevin managing to steer our car around the horse carriage without hitting oncoming traffic was a flat out miracle. This is what the horse carriage looked like, but in the dark, with absolutely no reflectors. It still amazes me that we came out of that one not only unscathed, but completely untouched.

This was the site we saw as soon as we crossed the border, of 2 huge volcanoes across a lake the size of a sea.

The house we stayed at was incredible. It was this villa with four big bedrooms and a big courtyard with an outdoor kitchen and seating all around the courtyard. We got this awesome deal on a vrbo rental since we booked last minute and it was less for the whole house than for a single hotel room.

Jack would wake up each morning and race to the hammock to swing himself as high as it could go. Then the girls would pile on and at some point, everyone would be fighting. But, it was still really fun.

And they loved the pool. It was about the size of a giant hot tub. But the kids didn’t seem to mind.

We ate at a bunch of fun restaurants, all of which had beautiful courtyards full of jungle vegetation and fountains.

There was a little fountain feature on the side of the pool.

Jack thought it was funny to open up his swim shorts and let the fountain fill them.

Tessa thought it was funny, too.

I cleaned the car right before we left. Not so clean any more. Can you see Jack through the window?

Lake Apoyo was a huge highlight. We followed the GPS only to find that the horrible dirt road we’d taken for the last 20 minutes ended with an impassible stretch of road.

Poor Kevin.

However, one of the locals told us about a paved road that we’d missed, so we went back and found our way to the restaurant the Blanchard’s had told us about. Jack and Autumn had the best time jumping off the platforms into the lake. Sadie kept a vigilant eye on our things during this part. She told me later that she didn’t even like sitting on the tire chairs next to the edge because she thought someone might accidentally bump her in the water.

  

We found the lake.

This is what lake view property looks like in Nicaragua. Crazy.

There was also a floating platform about 20 meters out that they all swam out to and slid or jumped off of. I think this lake was the highlight of the trip for Jack. He really wanted to go back.

 

We took a horse carriage ride around the city to see some of the historical sites. The architecture there was beautiful and very much reminded me of Europe. Did anybody else know that some American named William Walker took an army down to Central America in the 1830's and declared himself President of the whole area, claiming it as part of the Confederate states? Apparently when they said "no," he lit Granada on fire. He actually was President of Nicaragua for close to a year, but they managed to defeat him and he retreated to Honduras where they executed him.

William Walker's house.

I think this was one of the churches that got burned and they restored.

They had lots of cool doors.

Fun ice cream shop we found.

Eating outside at a restaurant in a touristy area means you get bombarded with vendors trying to sell you stuff. But, at least we got to do some of our souvenir shopping while sitting down, eating our dinner.

They had tons of knock off Ray Bans and other sunglasses.

 

We found this awesome hammock store. We really like hammocks. We came home with 3.

The funniest part for me of the trip, aside from the mating horses, was when Autumn and I got some earrings while souvenir shopping. I left all my jewelry at home because I’d never been to Central America and I thought if I wore jewelry, I might get mugged.

So, this was the first time I’d tried to stick earrings in my ears in 5 months and one of my holes had started to close up. So, I’m like, “hey Autumn, jab the earring through the hole and re-pierce my ear for me.” Now, this would be no big deal for me or for Jack. Jack would have totally loved stabbing a piece of metal through my ear. But, I don't trust him. Unfortunately, I had completely forgotten that Autumn takes after her dad and has a very low tolerance for seeing others in pain...like when she came to see me after my hernia surgery and passed out on the floor while they were talking about my recovery procedures. 

So, being my sweet helper and not wanting me to not be able to wear my cute, new earrings, she managed to jab it back through and I thought everything was great. Not five minutes later she says “mom, my stomach really hurts,” and suddenly, it all comes back to me. I rushed her outside to get some fresh air, but it was too late and the next thing I know, I’m trying to help her puke into some pots outside while I run back in to find a bowl of some sort. I see a bunch of sugar packets in a bowl, dump them out, and run back outside to find that Autumn totally missed the pots. It’s really nice at times like this to realize that there is pretty much no chance we’ll ever see any of these people again. And, I definitely won’t be encouraging Autumn to go into a medical field when she’s older.