Granada! Granada! Granada!!

Yesterday my research well dried up, I think. I have to request all the materials I want to look at and when I turned in the batch that I had already worked through and requested more, I was told I couldn't. Not really sure what happened. So I guess its time to explore a little.

I grabbed a bus from the bus area (can't really call it a station) and headed to Granada

The buses don't ever really stop, there is a dude that yells out the window the destination and then if people need that one they run up to the door as the bus slows down and they hop on. It was pretty funny when the driver would speed away and people weren't in their seats yet.

I got a quick shot of the Masaya Volcano (center right) as we were speeding by, it was smoking pretty good though its hard to see with all the other clouds in the sky. It has rained a little everyday, not hard usually, but a pretty constant spitting of rain comes down; today was no exception.

Granada was a welcome change from Managua; its a much brighter city, almost Mediterranean in the colors of its buildings. I jumped off the bus in a crowded street market, hoping to find a painting or something cool to bring back, but all that was for sale was underwear, shirts, shoes and music. Its an old Spanish colonial city and some of that it still very clear, like La Iglesia de Guadelupe:

and this newer church that I couldn't find the name of:

This kid and I had a good conversation about baseball, he agreed that the Cubs were the best team in the world; smart kid:

I grabbed something to eat and then headed back to Managua. There is a corner where some people sell cashews and mangoes everyday; the mangoes are awesome, today was the first I had one. As I was walking over there I saw this sick stencil of Sandino. There seems to be a lot of protest against President Ortega today, I'm not sure what its all about, but its pretty clear that he is no longer the Sandinista he once was.