Rain Comes Falling Down Today, Sun is Shining Tomorrow
That line is a lyric from one of my favorite songs. The flipping nature of life is bizarre. I`m speaking metaphorically here, it is still very much in the heart of the dry season. I have yet to see an ominous cloud during the day.
So yesterday I was paying US$20 for a dingy off-green room, with a pillows as soft as a rolled up pair of jeans, and two dead cockroaches of considerable size on the floor (atleast they were already dead, surely they`d placed poison somewhere out-of-sight). Regardless of the friendliness of the staff, I knew I needed to find something else.
I got up early and ate a sweet omelet at a nearby cafe. Then I started searching. One popular hostel was booked solid. Across the street was another, Bigfoot, listed in many guidebooks. Bigfoot is one of many places being thrown up on the auction block by its owners, so already I was skeptical of the place. Let me put it out plainly… what a shithole. Seriously, it was as if I had walked into the bathrooms at a 1980 Grateful Dead show. There was not one person there without filthy dreadlocks, and no one was clean. The room I was showed had four dingy walls and two matresses flat on the floor. The man told me it was US$12 for the room. I was actually considering it because of how much I disliked my current place… then I looked at the key.
The key that was hanging in the door was attached by a cord to a block of wood. I shit you not, this block of wood was about 3 inches square on the ends by 10 inches long. I looked at the guy and asked him,
¨Is that seriously the key to the room, or is it just your master key?¨
¨No, that´s the room key¨
¨How am I supposed to go out walking with something that big?¨
he shrugged ¨Its so you don`t lose it¨
So that was it, I didn`t need to know anything more. They obviously cater to the underbelly of wayward hippies who float in, and furthermore don`t trust their clientele in the least bit. A-DIOSSSSS
I walked around trying to find another place I had been told about by a woman in the INTUR (tourism) office in Ocotal. It was a newer place owned by a US/Nicaraguan couple called La Tortuga Boluda (the lazy turtle). It took me some searching but then I found it. I was shown around by the Nicaraguan half of the couple, and it took my breath away. What a little paradise, a nice room with a locking dresser, new fan, and a shared bath with the adjacent room. US$10 a night.
I flew back to my mediocre room from before, knowing full well that the checkout time of 11am was rapidly approaching. I tried to wait for a taxi, they buzzed by full of people. I decided to hoof it, hustling up the road. 11 came and I was still several blocks away, I took off my watch and winded the minute hand back (i`m sweet like that). I told the owners that my friend had arrived in Managua and I had to hurry out to meet him, but that I would be back in a few weeks. Hah. Anything to save US$20. They said it was fine, grabbed my things, settled up and left.
Perfect! I`m in such a nice little place its amazing. There is a free billiards table here, two guitars that were already tuned, a bongo, tons of sitting areas, hammocks, an open kitchen, a pila for washing clothes and clotheslines strung about. PERFECT! I`m back under budget, not at budget, which is where I wanted to be all along. Sun is shining today!
I`m about to head out to tour the Ruben Darío Museum. Should be splendid. Then I`ll have a few drinks and try to get to bed early. I leave at 415am to climb Cerro Negro tomorrow. I have also arranged to go on an overnight trek to summit Momotombo, a mile high epic volcano of considerable history and force. Indeed, I`m only interested in climbing active cones… there´s no thrill involved with dormancy! :) More to follow…
4 years ago