San Jaun del Sur and Parque Madaras

Last week was amazing! We arrived in San Jaun del Sur last Sunday and made our way down a nonexistant road through a river to the beautiful Playa Madaras and Parque Madaras. Parque Madaras was absolutely amazing, whatever any of us had been expecting, this was not it! Our rooms all had ocean views and we were served the best food of our entire trip here. We each even had our own double beds! The first few days we learned about permaculture and sustainable living and all the work that Tyler, the owner of Parque Madaras, had put into this project. We spent most of our afternoons playing at the beach or trying our hands at surfing. The waves there were incredible. On Wednesday, we started building two solar ovens. It was really interesting to see how they work and how these ovens were made. We all had a wonderful week and were very sad to leave on Saturday.

Saturday, we took a charter bus across the border into Costa Rica. It was around an eight hour drive, but totally worth it in the air conditioning. We got to our hostel, Costa Rica Backpackers, around ten and then spent the day Sunday exploring San Jose and shopping in all the markets. Later tonight we are going to go and watch the new James Bond movie.

Tomorrow we leave for our turtle project on the cost and will be out of contact for the week. After the project we will be spending the following week at Punta Mona, a spirital and meditation retreat place.

We all also have agreed on going to Panama for our week of free travel. We will be heading to Boca del Torro in the North of Panama on the Caribbean side.

I hope everyone is having a wonderful November!!

Melanie

One month left...

It´s November! We are in Granada in Nicaragua, on our last night here for Day of the Dead. In preparation they painted the cemetary with a fresh coat of white and there are traditional yellow flowers sold everywhere in the street. Granada is a beautiful, colonial-era city on Lake Nicaragua which we boated on Wednesday afternoon. It was a little stormy but we landed at an old fortress, and from the cannon tower we could see all of the city and the surrounding volcano called Mombacho. We spent our mornings this week in language school at One to One Tutoring, a great experience. They were very helpful and good teachers, and brought us around the city one day as well. We explored an abandoned hospital, a former government prison, and saw many churches. There is a huge yellow cathedral in the square, the pride of Granada. Our afternoons we had free and we could just walk around the city, there is a lot to see and do. Tomorrow we leave for Parque Maderas, on the beach outside the city San Juan del Sur, to do volunteer projects and surf for the week. Everyone is looking forward to this!
By Jessa