This past week (the 5th week of our trip to Ometepe, Nicaragua) we’ve been enjoying a balance of resting and adventures. I’m going to try to keep this post to the main points of what we’ve been up to, to catch up and spend less time going into details, so I can go to on further resting and adventuring. If there’s any questions, please feel free to drop a comment at the end of the post or send me an email or message and I’ll be happy to chat more about any of the below happenings.
Saturday started with the usual outing: heading to the Saturday Market in Santa Cruz, perusing the vendors and eating yummy local food. This time we opted for the delicious chicken rice bowls (for 50 cordoba each – just under $2 CAD). We also tried some coconut bread (so yummy) and Z reloaded our supply of rose and fruit chocolate.
After the market we went up to see a 4-day-old donkey that had been born to our hosts’ family. It was insanely cute (and soft!), and we enjoyed watching it prance around trying to figuring out it’s new legs.
Sunday was fairly relaxing. Z caught up on some school and went to play at a friend’s house, and Garrett and I walked into Balgue to gather some fruits for breakfast and vegetables to make a pasta salad. While I made the dinner, he ran up to get Z and came back with her and her friend, who wanted to come with us to the cafe (Pan de Mama) where we have been enjoying Salsa dancing classes on when they happen there. We danced while the kiddos played games and with the kittens, and then had their own dance, too.
Monday I got out for an early morning run, then stayed home for the majority of the day, catching up on work emails, playing my guitalele, and editing some of our trip photos (check out this post with howler monkeys on my photography website’s blog). Garrett went to meet with a man at Finca Magdalena to connect about their coffee and a potential touring of the plantations. Finca Magdalena was a serious highlight of our short trip to Ometepe last year, and we wanted to go back to see more and create a better connection with the families that own and run this cooperative, which has ties to our home of Salt Spring Island. Ometepe Coffee is an organization that sells the coffee from this finca (farm) at our own Saturday Market and elsewhere, sending back any profits to support the local community there. G has connected with the organization and been coordinating volunteering with them this year.
In the afternoon we had a meeting with an organization that approached us regarding hosting various travel retreats, which we will continue discussions with. Organizing and hosting eco-conscious, off-the-beaten-path retreats for families and travelers who want to experience travel in a thoughtful way that gives back to the communities visited and allows people to feel supported in traveling together with others who share similar values and interests in learning and growing through travels is something we’ve had in the back of our minds for several years now. Would you be interested in traveling with us in this way? Drop me an email or join my email list, if so, and I’ll be sure to let you know if we put together any future group trips.
For dinner we went to Bustavo, a Middle Eastern restaurant. We had plates of hummus and falafel, salads and babaganoush, and some little hand pies that I can’t remember the name of, but Z found delicious. The gelato was equally delicious, with flavours of pitaya (dragonfruit), mango, salted peanut, and chocolate.
On Tuesday we all woke up early to meet the gentleman from Finca Magdalena that Garrett had met with the day before, for a coffee plantation tour. It was a different plantation than we had visited last year, and we got to know a lot more about their methods and plants and experiences. We very much enjoyed connecting with the farmers in this way about their processes, challenges, strengths and how we can be helpful to them in their support of the local community and families who cooperatively own and run the farm. It further enhanced the draw we feel to be involved with how we can support their community in our own ways, here and back home in Canada.
For dinner, we had been given the heads up that Tuesdays were the days Nacatamales were available starting at 5pm from a house next door to the entrance to Zopilote. Garrett went in to town to see if he could find them, and after knocking on a couple doors, found the right house and bought a few to bring home for us. This traditional Nicaraguan food is a delicious dish of corn meal, chicken, rice, spices, tomato, onion, and what I think was green peppers, all wrapped up in a banana leaf. We heartily enjoyed them.
Wednesday Z had been invited to spend the day at another family’s home that we’ve gotten to know, with a group of children she’s been enjoying playing with. They had what sounds like a fun time making art and dressing up, putting on drama scenes, and other fun stuff, while G and I went to explore some jungle trails with a man who owns a large property and led us around exploring, pointing out all the plants on his permaculture project.
On Thursday there was another playful dance event at El Pital. You can read about this experience last week in a previous post here. It was, again, soul-filling and beautiful to be a part of the experience in self-expression, play, and freedom of movement. After dancing, a lake swim was in order.
Seeing a post that had been popped up on social media put us onto knowing about a woman’s stand where she sells empanadas and donuts. We were hungry, and the donuts were enticing, so off we went to find her, driving on the road towards Playa Mangos. Maybe 5 minutes from the Y intersection we found saw a stand on the left hand side of the road and sure enough, that was it. We purchased the last empanada and four donuts, and sat to eat, chatting in Spanish with the woman about her sons, who she was clearly proud of for their educational achievements and goals.
Still hungry, we stopped at Maiz for chicken tacos and papusas, which are delicious stuffed tortillas, our favourite being the cheese and chaya, a local kind of green like spinach. The food there is very tasty, and the atmosphere has been welcoming whenever we stop by. Z eagerly watched at the counter to see how the food was prepared.
Now, we have been seeing and hearing a lot about “The Gathering”, a yearly event on Ometepe held on the property at Zopilote, that happens to be running this weekend while we are here. With our friends attending and sharing about it with us, we decided we wanted to check it out, too. So that’s where we headed early on Friday, bringing along one of Z’s friends who had been before and showed us the way, staying until late in the evening.
Being an intimate event that encourages conscious connection and personal growth through the workshops, activities, and ban on phones/cameras/cash, I don’t have any photos to share from the many beautiful things that happened there. In fact, I’m not going to go into too much detail about what even went on there except to say that we all enjoyed playing with and meeting new faces, connecting in interesting ways with others through various activities. We enjoyed it so much we decided to spend the day Saturday there again, learning about joy, energy, sensation, connection, conflict, creating, and so on.
It has been a beautiful week, that I (and I’m sure all three of us) will treasure for a lifetime. I’m so thankful for these experiences, and can’t wait to see what comes next.
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