Mombacho Revealed!!!

Royalti. Yesterday the Take Flight group and I woke up with excitement because Sunday was the day we were going up the Mombacho volcano to take a hike around the crater and canopy in the trees (zip line)!!!!!!! Before we set on our journey, the owner of the hotel told us about some legends about the jungle. There was a village of indigenous people who lived on the mountain, but there was a cave in that killed many of them. And the legend is if we took pictures in a certain cave in the volcano, images of people who weren’t in our group would appear. There was another where it says if we tried to take fruit or animals out of the jungle, we would get lost and never find out way out!  On our way up the mountain we stopped by a coffee shop where Tr. Kate explained to us that it was actually a coffee plantation nearby so that was probably the best coffee we were going to get in Managua. Naturally all the boys sprung to get some.  During the hike around the crater we saw lots of greenery and even more bugs. A very interesting thing happened on this hike of ours. Tr. Anthony and MyKyah strayed from the group, later we find out that a friendly monkey tackled MyKyah and Tr. Anthony was freaking out while she remained very calm. I guess it had something to do with the monkey socks she was wearing that day...

MyKyah's Monkey

Sabine: The most exciting event of the day was the cloud forest tour.  There was a course of seven zip lines that we had an amazing time riding.  We were between twenty-five and thirteen meters in the air for each line.  Some of the line were horizontal and we rode the line from platform to platform.  Another was more of a swing that we were strapped to and swung across.  That particular one was a surprise because the tour guide pushed us off of the platform as he was speaking so that we were shocked when we were suddenly dangling in mid air.  The grand finale was a thirteen meter repel down the side of the tree.  We trusted our lives to our tour guide named Eric.  Thank you Eric for not letting us die.  We appreciate that.  

Ziplining (or telephone pole repairing) here we come!

Ahmirah: While we were swinging around in the jungle, we saw a huge variety of plants, trees, and insects.  The bugs were so loud we could barely hear each other speak!  We saw epiphytes.  Epiphytes are plants that take root on the branches of trees.  There was a beautiful garden on the ground AND in the air.  When our peers were swinging and sliding in the air to the next platform, we each cheered them on and supported them. We had heavy gear on and wore hard helmets, which Tr. Lacey proved can still be pulled off. While we were getting ready to jump off for each zipline, the instructors just threw us all off expecting us to fend for ourselves. But overall, the zipline was fun and a great experience for everyone.

 
Charles: After the adventures on the mountain we went to a restaurant called Mi Viejo Ranchito. There we all had a Nicaraguan dish called Quesillos with plantains. The Quesillos were basically tortillas with cheese on top of it with some type of sauce on it. Sadly nobody really liked it, but the dessert was amazing. We had tres leche and flan de coco. The tres leche was a slice of cake soaked in milk with some sort of topping, and the flan de coco was like coconut custard.

***P.S. Tr. Rich, even though you are so many miles away it’s crazy how I still miss your crazy and sometimes mean comments. I miss not being able to mess with you inside and outside of class, and even not seeing your face and your bald head. And Royalti and Eamon say “hi” (Eamon says he’s kidding)

Sabine:  How are the Littlest Pet Shops behaving?***


Mystery During our last meeting we were trying to solve each other’s murder mysteries so I, Royalti, thought I’d share one mystery with you.

There was an old lady who started a diet against the recommendation of all her friends and family. She made pet owners in her neighborhood very nervous. No one knows why she ate the first one but she died by the time she ate the last one. What did she eat?