MOTORBIKES, COWBOYS, CANYONS, AND KITTENS

YOU CAN'T GET LOST IN A PLACE YOU DON'T KNOW - that's what I have to say!

Finally on Saturday morning around 11 we set off for the 'city' of Somoto, which we would soon find out was a very quiet town with a lot of horses and cowboys... It was my second time out on the Pan American highway with my motorbike... and I can't describe the feeling I get when I'm driving on the paved road. It's incredible. We were surrounded by green green (rain season has just ended) mountains the entire way and the sun was shining throughout the day. Karine took some cool shots along the way...
We stopped in Condega (about half way) for lunch and finally arrived in Somoto around 2pm.
We felt a little confused by Somoto as we were hoping to find something exciting to do for the day... See me, above, sitting on the street beside my motorbike with the lonely planet guide thinking ..... hmm, nope, hmmmm nope..... none of this sounds very exciting! After driving 'squares' around the town long enough for every local to know about the new visitors (us) we stopped to have a Tona (the local beer) in a small, very pink bar at about 4pm.
Even though the streets of Somoto felt lonely with only the sound of horse hooves on the street, it was definetely beautiful. This is something that the northern highlands of Nicaragua are famous for... and a reason why I love living in Esteli so much. Above is a picture of the main street in Somoto. I could have taken a picture from every direction and the view would still have been the same. I don't know what it is - but the air in the Northern Highlands reminds me of when I was a kid and I got my bike out for the first time each spring... it smells exactly the same and I think of that every time I step outside in the morning.
While sipping a delicious tona in the very pink bar of Somoto, we though... what can we do to fit in more??? Of course, we bought 'ranchera' hats... I thought about trading my motorbike in for a horse too but I don't really like horses all that much, and I'm sure we would still be on the highway on our way back to Esteli right now - so I decided against it :) :) :)
We ended up sleeping at 8:30 that night... turns out that driving a motorbike is tiring. And hard on the butt - neither of us had any feeling once we arrived! But it was well worth the sleep because we woke up complete energized for our SOMOTO CANYON adventure the next day.Next time I go on adventure I'll follow the guide book more closely. Somehow we turned off the Pan American early and too an... interesting... path to the canyon. But, it all turned out ok in the long run after we found our ten year old guide! As we drove through a little village of mud or stone houses, chickens, cows, and donkey's we were flagged down by all of the children that knew we were lost travellers trying to find the canyon. They all wanted to be our tour guide (of course) and offerred that I leave my motorbike with their parents while they showed us the way. As crazy as it sounds, this is what we ended up doing. We picked a nice 10 year old girl named Danya to be our tour guide while her father allowed us to leave the bike in the chicken pen (these stories are becoming far too normal for me these days).

So, with Danya, we hiked and hiked and hiked...

And the views were beautiful...

Until finally we arrived at the entrance of the SOMOTO CANYON; where we met this man who brought the three of us on a tour. We asked Danya to come with us and she was so excited that she'd get to enjoy the excursion with us. It cost us each 15 cordobas for the 'tour' which is less than $1.

Danya - she's cute (and a great tour guide)!!!

Yes, I'm still wearing the pink hat. It became a law... the pink hats could not be removed until we were free of Somoto city limits.

The views inside of the canyon were definetely something spectacular. We didn't take the inner tubes through the 3km of winding river but I'll definetely go back just to do that. Finally it was time to head back to Esteli on the motorbike. Driving is very tiring so after a morning of waking up at 6am and hiking the canyon I thought for sure I'm going to go STRAIGHT to bed when we get to Esteli...

But no... When we got back our friend called to say he was going to take us to a lookout in his truck. Even though I couldn't hold my headup I somehow said yes... and was glad I did! This will be my new private get away when life in Esteli seems too crazy and I need to clear my mind. About half of the Esteli gang that packed into the truck to get here...Incredible views.... found about 5 km from my house! And an awesome motorbike ride too (that's in the near future!). Told you I was surrounded by moutains!Some friends and a pic of me :)

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(Don't kill me mom!)

Yes, it's true. Karine and I have 2 Nicaraguan kittens! Our friend Cristia gave them to us, and we're not totally sure what will happen to them in February - but we've got lots of good offers from people to take them. It's like they hare 'special celebrity cats' now just because they were living with Gringas... I'm not sure how that works exactly but it's good for them!