K Wilder

¡Hola amigos y familia!

Max and I are enjoying the heat down here in Nicaragua, and we've spent the last week walking... a lot. We started out in Managua trying to find our way around the (unnamed) streets and local cuisine.

Here in Nicaragua most streets don't have names, and so addresses are given in relation to landmarks. Some of which no longer exist. For example, the address that we gave our taxi driver for our hostel the first night was "Donde fue el bar Chaman, 3 cuadras al lago, 4 cuadras arriba" or "3 blocks towards the lake (north) and 4 blocks up (east) from where the Chaman Bar used to be. And somehow it just works for them.

Max learned Spanish when he lived in South America for two years as a missionary. He's been able to pick it right back up and finds plenty of practice because the locals here don't speak English outside of the tourist spots.

As many of you know, taxi drivers are the bane of traveling and will try to rip you off every time. But all the taxi drivers we've met here in Nicaragua have been fair and friendly. We've received great tips, advice, and a surprising amount of history and politics from our drivers so far.

Our friends Daniel and Kalee flew down to meet us in Managua so we'll be traveling with them for the next week. Kalee is six months pregnant so this is their "baby-moon" before they become parents in April! We'll be visiting historic Granada, the volcano island of Ometepe, and then moving down to the Pacific beach before they move on to Costa Rica.