Leon and Granada

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Hey!

We are now in Granada, Nicaragua which is a lot like Antigua. Very safe, touristy and colonial. Big beautiful cathedrals and cobblestone streets and a central park. We took the bus this morning at 7AM from Leon and it took 2 chicken buses and 3 hours (and only 4$) to get here. It´s really annoying because it´s all Nicaraguans except for us so they charge the Nicaraguans one price and then wait until we are getting off and ask us for more than everyone else pays. That happens all the time with chicken buses but even if you can´t argue out of it, it´s still way cheaper than any other buses. We are at a nice hostal in an old colonial building with huge rooms and vaulted ceilings. We are travelling with a Dutch couple (students from Amsterdam) who are very nice. Today, we had gringo sandwiches (SUCH a nice change from beans and chicken and rice!!!) and iced coffee for lunch. Then, we walked down to Lake Nicaragua which is like an ocean and ate ice cream and took a horse carriage ride through the park. THEN we fell asleep and just work up to do laundry and report to Mum. I think we will have pizza tonight at Mona Lisa Pizza. We miss Ms Vickies salt and vinaigre chips like crazy.

Yesterday, we went sand boarding on a volcano. The boards were very crude pieces of wood with nylon straps which weren´t very effective. We hiked up the volcano which was very pretty and had a gorgeous view. The slope we went down on was hella steep... almost black diamond steep and I was like whaaat! But then sand boarding is actually way slower than snowboarding and much more uncomfortable. You can´t really carve, you just stay on your front edge facing the hill and go down at an angle and hope your feet don´t come out of your shoes. It made me really appreciate snowboarding. I wouldn´t do it again but I guess it was a good one time experience. There was also some kind of festival in Leon last night so everyone was out and there were strange costumed people in central park doing some crazy dances.

We will probably stay here tomorrow night because it´s so nice here and then head to the ferry to hop over to Ometepe for a few days. I´ll add some pics now from the last few weeks that I´ve been putting off. Enjoy!

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