Greetings from Cowboy country

You know what is delicious? Quesillo, it is this wonderful melty cheese stuff that is kind of like mozarella but you eat it on a tortilla and sometimes there is rice and beans on top of it and sometimes you have bananas too.

Ok, enough about my food obsessions. I am currently staying in Villa Sandino (near Santo Tomas if you actually want to find something on a map) in Chontales with Colin Miller, a lovely amigo de universidad that is currently doing peace corps here.

So far Nicaragua is one of the most laid back place I´ve ever been. Very little hustling on the street, even at taxi stand and bus stops. There is also more open space here then you could believe. Part of that is because I am in cow country, and pastoralism necessarily requires lots of space. There are hills and mountains covered in green as far as the eye can see, and in the next few days I plan on going up there to see some coffee plantations (and yes, I am actually going to drink coffee, I started working on developing a taste for it while I was in Seattle).

Things here run really slow. Sunday everything was closed, except a few shops and restuarants and the church, but even in the open shops things were running at a slow pace. Colin and I spent most of the day going around to see the folks he knew around town and just hung out at his house, enjoying some quiet time. The visiting was good for me to work a little on my spanish skills. My comprehension is pretty good, but I still let Colin do most of the talking for me. I know recognize "does she speak any spanish" though and can answer the appropriate pocito (very little). I also spent a lot of time playing with Colin´s adoraple cat, Miko, who is the tiniest thing I have every seen.

Yesterday was another take it easy day, but this time because the power was out virtually all day due to some serious wind. Colin and I hitched a ride up into the hills to see the petroglyphs. The local tourism people are working on developing the area for eco/agro- tourism and this will be the main part of that. They were very cool and swirly with lots of what looked like dancing animals/people/gods. There´s not a lot in the way of explanatory/interpretive signage up yet, but it was still a fun walk around with a beautiful view of the hills. The main project they are working on right now for the park is to fence things off so that the cows will stop wandering in and pooping all over their nice concrete path and also the petroglyphs. Certainly did seem to be a problem.

We also had delicious food at a very rural house near the petroglyphs. Egg over easy, plaintains, beans and rice, warm fresh milk with sugar in it. While we waited on a little patio type thing the girl cooked over an open fire in a house with dirt floors while a cat, dog, piglets and chicken wandered in and out of the house, patio, yard. I also got to see what a traditional style wood oven in this area looks like. They are basically just a big dome type thing mad of concrete with one opening in front. Apparently a lot of peace corp volunteers work on helping people to build more efficient ones that both use less wood and don´t send smoke right into the chefs face. I really appreciated having lunch there, not just becuase it was delicious because it gave me a better idea of what the really rural houses in the area look like (dirt floors, no electricity, made of scrap wood, open to animals and the elements) since most of the houses I´d seen in Villa Sandino are pretty nice (all cement construction, most with tile floors, electricity, bars on windows and nice wooden doors that lock up front).

On the ride to and from the petroglyphs I also got to look at what the countryside looks like. All was a patchwork of slash/burn pastureland with some tall trees and banana trees scattered around. There also was an interesting mosaic of plots that obviously had not been grazed in a long time, which suggested to me that there was some sort of rotational grazing being practiced, but Colin said that he didn´t feel like that was really the case, or at least that it was not a formal consistent thing. It did still seem very pleasant and well managed, with very little bare rock or soil showing (most severe signs of overgrazing). Most of the cows here seem to be kept primarily for dairy and we passed a lot of milk trucks on our way to the petroglyphs. Every morning the vacaros will milk their cows into metal milk pails and then those will be emptied into large plastic barrels on the back of trucks which then take the milk to the villages and any that isn´t sold there to a dairy processing plant in the nearby area, all so quick and fresh that no refrigeration is needed.

Today I am hoping to get some real cowboy boots made and then it is off to Matagalpa tomorrow.

Just as a quick preview, I´ll be staying three nights at Montaña Selva Negra, an organic farm and coffee plantation started and still owned by a German family (I know, random). Then it is on to Finca Esperanza Verde, another organic shade grown coffee farm and nature reserve for January 16-18. After that it will be off to the Miraflor Nature Reserve near Esteli, a privately owned coooperatively managed reserve, almost entirely self funded by associations of small scale producers (mostly coffee) (and yes, I did just copy that almost word for word from my guidebook). While there I´ll be staying at Finca Lindos Ojos another organic coffee farm! From there I´m finally going to head down south to stay on Isla de Ometepe.

Now must go.

Paz
Alice