Mari and I are in Leon Nicaragua. We stayed last night at a restaurant/bar/hostel named Via Via. The guidebook said the bar was a bit noisy with rooms nearby so we almost skipped it entirely, but on a whim we checked it out and fell in love. Its a perfect space for a wonderful hostel. The restaurant and bar are on the street, and walking through the restaurant and well into the back are wonderfully cute rooms set around an inside courtyard full of plants. We sat last night eating dinner and drinking beer dreaming of opening such a place somewhere else in the world. The building is exquisite, the amount of space is amazing, the mix of internal and outdoor spaces mingle just right to set a perfect balance. They have a book exchange, and tons of information both locally and throughout Nicaragua for travelers such as us. As you can see, we are highly enjoying it.
Today we signed up for a night tour to a local active volcano named Telica. We meet around 9:30 pm for dinner, then set off for the mountain. Arriving around 11 or 12 pm, we start our way through farmers fields in the moonlight and once hitting the woods start our climb up the mountain. Its a 4 - 5 hour hike and we will arrive on the summit to see the sun rise over the area, with a view of many other volcanos set both north and south along the range. They need a minimum of 6 for it to move forward as a tour, but we are hopeful that 4 or more people will indeed sign up over the next 2 days. I read there are somewhere around 50 volcanos in Nicaragua, with 7 of them being active. Telica is one of the active ones. Hopefully, at night, from the rim we can look down to see lava and steam and all sorts of other volcano type things besides the eruption part. It was difficult to choose which one we wanted to climb as there are so many in the vicinity. But Cerro Negro seemed to easy and unchallenging, while Momotombo seemed a bit too challenging for Mari. We settled right in the middle. The overnight tour with meals, water, gear, park fee, transportation and guide is $40 a piece. Not too bad, but definately over our budget. But the good thing is we were slumming it and pushing forward pretty fast prior to this stop so we earned a good respite and deserve some good natural fun.
Last night we went to the local cinema (our first movie on the trip) and watched The Tourist, or El Turista as it is called here. The movie stars Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp and started off as a romantic spy type thriller that quickly devolved into absolute crap. I like all movies, and I have to say this one was pretty bad. But, it was fun none the less to be in a small city with actual city attractions.
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