Isletas de Granada

Granada is known for its hundreds of tiny islands, called isletas, protruding into Lake Nicaragua. This body of water is the largest in Central America at 3,191 square miles and was the original proposed site for the Panama Canal. We take a boat through all of the little islands, finally arriving to one of the outlying ones. The owner of Hotel La Bocona owns a house here and we spend a few hours relaxing, with our feet dangling in the water. We're not much for sedentary vacations, so we're quickly ready for more action! We head back to the hotel and grab a quick lunch. In the afternoon, we drive to Masaya Volcano. This is a super active volcano - the park guards give us hard hats to wear as we enter and hand us a pamphlet on how to park the car so as to ensure the promptness of our escape route! Ian is a geologist, so the volcanoes of Nicaragua entice him. He's fascinated as we peer through the sulfuric steam clouds into the crater. We're offered a night hike down into some caves and we readily accept. There are bats and all sorts of wonderful creatures in the caves. We hike out at sunset for some beautiful views from the top of the volcano. We're back to the hotel late and out on the town. Granada's not terribly rowdy and it has a nice mellow bar scene. We walk back to the hotel around midnight and about a block from La Bocona hear a familiar refrain, "karma, karma, karma, karma, karma chameleon ..." Could it be? Did we just stumble upon a Nicaraguan karaoke joint? Yes we did! We LOVE karaoke and the woman singing Karma Chameleon is perfectly on pitch and rocking it. On the choruses she is joined by 30 other people in the bar. Needless to say, we pop on in and stay a few hours. We sing Angel From Montgomery, one of the few songs we know on the playlist. We suddenly feel very endeared to the country.