Travelojos

Travelojos: Does it taste just like home? Blame globalization.

My wife and I were having dinner at a restaurant in Monteverde, Costa Rica that looked like it was offering just the sort of experience we were looking for.  It wasn’t a typical restaurant –it was more like a tree house–because it was suspended by a huge Ficus tree. Our table on the second floor (or branch) was next to the tree’s  enormous trunk.

I know I sound like a 10-year old describing his last trip to Disney World. But this wasn’t Disney. That’s what made the experience so special.

It Wasn’t Disney, the Tree Was Real. The Ficus tree was real. From our table we watched people walking out of the church across the street. A family of three came out of the church and squeezed onto a motorcycle to ride home on Monteverde’s hilly dirt roads.

But our reverie was cut short by a group of Americans sitting at the table next to us. They were talking so loudly that it became impossible to feel that we weren’t part of the conversation.

Even more irritating was what they were discussing:  their commute to Washington, D.C. from Maryland’s outlying suburbs. Exactly the same conversation we hear at home almost every day.

My cousin told me he experienced something similar while he was visiting a somewhat remote region of India.

Experiences like this represent one of the negative aspects of globalizaton. “Globalization” is the close integration of economies, countries, and technologies. The term was popularized at the beginning of the decade by Pulitzer prize winning New York Times columnist and author Tom Friedman.

Harder to Escape from Home. Travel is easier and more economical than ever before, but it’s increasingly difficult to escape from U.S. culture.

The most obvious example of this is the proliferation of McDonalds and Starbucks around the world. Also, it’s getting harder to find places that aren’t within driving distance of a Wal-Mart.

Globalization also undermines regional distinctions in less noticeable ways. It’s easy to spot U.S.-based mega stores or fast food franchises. But what about the variety of corn a street vendor uses to make tortillas?

It’s in the Corn. As authentic as those hand-made tortillas look, chances are the corn used to make them is not the variety of the plant that evolved for thousands of years in Mexico. Rather, its probably a patented hybrid version of corn that is sold by a multinational agricultural conglomerate.

Some food experts say this agro-industrial version of corn lacks the flavor of the indigenous plant that was a basic ingredient of food that has been prepared for thousands of years.

The issue of food and where it comes from came to my attention last winter after reading the books Omnivore’s Dilemma and Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. Both books analyzed the way in which food is grown, processed, and eaten in the U.S.

Knowing Where Your Food Comes From. The main message of each of them is that we’re better off knowing where our food comes from. Omnivore’s Dilemma traces how ingredients in several different meals were grown, processed, and distributed. Animal, Vegetable, Miracle is about one Virginia family’s year of eating only locally grown ingredients.

Thinking about where food comes from is equally important for tourists visiting another country. Opting to eat at McDonalds instead of a local restaurant can have important implications for an area’s and restaurants and farms.

This begins a series of posts on the globalization of food and responses to it.

Have a story about something too close to home crashing in our your adventure in a far off place? Leave a comment and share it.

Photo by Brave Sir Robin

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When I e-mailed author Johnny Rico last year for a review copy of his book Border Crosser, he declined my request.

His story about his experience sneaking across the U.S./Mexico border just as a Mexican immigrant would was more about immigration and took place mostly in the U.S.—there was no travelogue aspect with Mexico, he explained.

I persisted. Anyone whose traveled in Latin America would be interested in your experience, I said. When I was in Mexico a few months ago, nearly every cab driver I had spoken with told me about their plans to go back to the U.S., I told him.

Rico changed his mind and sent me a copy of his book. Border Crosser offers a first-hand account of the risks and hardships that illegal immigrants are bound to face.

While much of Rico’s story is about hassles from law enforcement officials and vigilante groups, his life does seem to be seriously threatened at one point in Mexico as prepares to enter the U.S. But in the end, his is a story of a gringo making an illegal entry into the U.S.

What’s missing is the back story about the individuals who are willing to risk their lives by walking across the desert to the U.S.

In his award-winning book Devil’s Highway, Luis Alberto Urrea, provides a compelling account of the human affects of the U.S. border policy. He does this by recounting the journey of a group of 26 immigrants in which 14 died in the desert.

Urrea steers clear of one-dimensional stereotypes. Everyone in this sad story has at least one redeeming quality. The immigrants have families at home they want to support. The border patrol officers will go to great lengths to save the very people they are charged to guard against. Even the men who choose to work as coyotes ended up that way because of a lack of other choices.

As a result of tighter border enforcement in less forbidding stretches of the desert, the group is forced to enter the U.S. through what’s known as the Devil’s Highway or the Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge in southwestern Arizona.

This is Tim Cahill’s description of this area in National Geographic Adventure:

The refuge, the third largest in the lower 48, is an entirely unpopulated, Rhode Island-size sea of cactuses and sand. Ninety-two percent of its 860,010 acres (34,804 hectares) were declared wilderness in 1990, and its southern edge is a 56-mile (90-kilometer) boundary with Mexico. On my map there are seven mountain ranges but only two roads, both of them unpaved. The one that most visitors drive is El Camino del Diablo, or the Devil’s Highway.

In Devil’s Highway, Urrea depicts in graphic detail the toll that this unforgiving landscape can exact from a person. With temperatures routinely reaching the triple digits, there is a constant threat of hyperthermia or “heat death.” Urea breaks this down into six stages: Heat Stress, Heat Fatigue, Heat Syncope (fever), Heat Cramps, Heat Exhaustion, and Heat Stroke.

Urrea describes how an immigrant who has long since run out of water, languishes in the sun as the heat absorbed from his black pants cooks his legs.

The ordeal ends with the rescue of 12 of the 26.

But Urrea continues on with his story. The coyote is arrested, the immigrants find work in the U.S., and the dead take their first plane ride to Mexico.

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The circa 1970s anti-litter commercial showed an American Indian kayaking through a polluted lake and then walking up to a trash-strewn highway.

A driver tosses his unfinished fast-food meal out of his car window. It lands at the Indian’s feet. The commercial concludes with a close up showing a tear running down the Indian’s cheek.

In the 1970s litter was more of a problem in the U.S. It wasn’t until nearly the end of the decade that it became widely frowned upon.

To be sure, litter is still a problem in the U.S., but there tends to be less of it in tourist areas.

If someone saw me toss an empty soda can on the sidewalk at the Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, or some other national park in the U.S., chances are I’d be on the receiving end of a stern lecture–and potentially a hefty fine as well.

Unfortunately, much of Latin America has not adopted the same attitude about littering. When I was in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico with my family last year, we went on a nature hike through an community-owned property called an “ejido.” We saw many of the locals cooling off in the river that flowed into Banderas Bay.

We also noticed that there were plastic bottles and other types of trash just about everywhere we looked. As we moved further along the trail there was less trash, but that was probably only because fewer people took the trouble to venture that far.

I noticed the same problem when I was hiking in Guatemala earlier this year.

There are some promising signs though. It seems more travelers are pointing out this problem and, hopefully, making tourism boards painfully aware of it.

Last year, Mexico City became one of the largest metro areas to ban plastic bags.

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In Mexico, at least, the phrase “ni modo” roughly translates to “it can’t be helped” or “nothing can be done.” The phrase is usually uttered after confronting one of life’s harsh realities.

A dog is dying in the street. “Ni modo” —this is a terrible sight, but there are countless stray dogs roaming the streets and it’s impossible to even begin to care for them all.

To an outsider, “ni modo” seems tinged with fatalism.  A Canuck in Cancun posits that a little less “ni modo” when it comes to confronting problems such as government corruption would probably do Mexico some good.

She notes as well that a little more ni modo in the U.S. might help cut down on silly lawsuits.

But recognizing that life isn’t fair and that some things can’t be helped is strangely fortifying. In Dale Carnegie’s self help bible How to Stop Worrying and Start Living he recommends meeting circumstances that are beyond your power with the phrase: “it is so, it cannot be otherwise.”  Carnegie refers to this as “cooperating with the inevitable.”

In Tony Cohan’s On Mexican Time, he notes that “ni modo” exists in other cultures as well. Both the Japanese and Arabs have phrases that convey the idea that “fate is ultimately larger than human will.”  One of the people in Cohan’s book says

There’s a Mayan poem that begins: ‘The day set out from east to west and started walking.’  The day is on a journey. We’re woven into the design of the day, though we’re not inventing it.

Maybe the answer to striking the right balance between resignation and the willingness to work for change can be found in the “Serenity Prayer.” In which the faithful ask God to:

grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.

Intrepid traveler David Dudar is back. This time with the details of his solo trip to Antigua, Guatemala. His photos and account of his time there make a good case for why the former capital city is one of the most picturesque in the Americas.

And a good deal too. David says if he could do it again, he’d skip the night he spent in Guatemala City to give himself more time to soak up Antigua’s beauty.

By David Dudar

WHO: Just me.

Photo by David Dudar

WHY: A ridiculously low fare on Spirit Airlines–$38 each way plus tax—to/from Ft. Lauderdale prompted the trip to Guatemala.  With all the tour books suggesting that Guatemala City be merely a transit stop, I arranged to have a taxi meet me immediately upon my landing at La Aurora airport, and went directly to Antigua.  Antigua is Guatemala’s old capital—thus the name—and the Spanish colonial jewel of the country, as compared to traffic choked, oft-dangerous Guatemala City.

WHEN: Mid September

GETTING THERE: Quite simple—flight to Guatemala City’s La Aurora airport, and a taxi to the hotel in Antigua, a little more than an hour later.  I booked a pick-up through the hotel, and found that I could have paid half of that had I just grabbed a taxi at the airport.  Plan to have your arrival with plenty of daylight, as road travel is not suggested after dark.    La Aurora airport is delightfully modern, and well appointed.

I WAS REALLY SURPRISED: As I arrived in front of my hotel in Antigua, there was a crowd of youth in uniforms making a great deal of noise.  Makes sense, actually—there is a Catholic Girls’ school across from La Quinta de Las Flores, and it was recess.

I KNEW I’D LOVE ANTIGUA WHEN: I left the hotel to take a walk around.  Antigua is, quite simply, one of the most picturesque destinations in the Americas.  Cobblestone streets, colorful stone buildings, interesting courtyards. . .each block is unique and packed with things to see.  As a result of considerable seismic activity—an earthquake centuries ago prompted the move of the capital from Antigua to Guatemala City—most buildings are only one story tall, and a few have a second story.  The effect is a sort of squat, muscular colonial architecture—a tour guide called it “Earthquake Baroque”—whose low rise profile enables great views to surrounding hillsides and the volcano.  The center is eminently walkable.

ACCOMMODATIONS: Hotel Quinta de Las Flores was a real find.  Visitors to Antigua will find a number of very, very nice boutique hotels, as well as two larger hotels—Hotel Casa Santo Domingo and Porta Hotel Antigua—of high standard and low rates.  Quinta de Las Flores appeared to be the best value, though, even in a place where the level of hospitality is high.   Perhaps it is because Quinta is on the edge and not the center of the historic center—but that is a small difference in a city that is 12 blocks by 12 blocks.

What you do get by being on the edge is more room—the hotel is built around lovely mountain gardens and a swimming pool.  The standard rooms are likely to be fine, but spring for the patio garden room—still less than $100 a night, including the 22% tax.  These open onto the hotel’s lush plantings and feature a porch outside the bedroom.  Inside, there is a fireplace, beamed ceilings, authentic tile floors, and a bathroom with skylights.  The swimming pool is close at hand, and the volcano on the outskirts of Antigua towers over the garden.

Photo by David Dudar

THE COOLEST ATTRACTIONS WERE: Start in the center of town, on the plaza.  The Cathedral is Antigua’s leading landmark, and the buildings that surround it along the plaza are just lovely.  The iconic arch isn’t far away, and the two hotels it connects were once convent and seminary—a windowless bridge so nunnery occupants wouldn’t have to be exposed walking between the two facilities. Take a walking tour with Elizabeth Bell—all the hotels have information—she is a source of great insights about Antigua.

Hike up the hill to see the cross—but meet up at the tourist police kiosk, and have an escort walk with your group (a group assembles twice a day) to prevent any robberies that can afflict solo hikers there.  I enjoyed walking to see many of the boutique inns—mostly historic buildings now restored, usually wrapped around a lovely courtyard.  Elizabeth Bell’s tour includes admission into the museum and recreations at the Hotel Casa Santo Domingo—so wait to see this if you are taking her tour.

Antigua’s restaurants are surprisingly good and numerous.  Particularly liked the setting and food at Meson Panza Verde—dining al fresco at poolside—but there are many other fine choices.

IF I HAD TO DO IT OVER AGAIN: I’d have skipped my one overnight in Guatemala City.  With the right flight schedules, you can go directly to Antigua on both sides of your trip without having to deal with the capital’s congestion and crime.

I’d have stayed longer in Antigua.  In fact, staying in Antigua and using the city as a base for day trips works quite well.  There are inexpensive buses to take you to surrounding markets (Chichicastengo and Solola are popular) and other nearby destinations.  And Guatemala is so inexpensive, staying longer isn’t really too bad on your budget.  Do stay at Lake Atitlan, though, as opposed to doing the lake in a day trip from Antigua.

SOME PARTING ADVICE: If you are going to visit Chichicastengo or Guatemala City, you will find handicrafts, etc. much less expensive than they are at Antigua.

Because of its altitude, Antigua is cooler than you might think.  Something with long sleeves and a light jacket might be a good thing to pack for evenings.

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The masses of oil left behind in the wake of the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, will most likely move in the opposite direction of the Yucatan peninsula as a result of the so-called “Loop Current.”

Loop Current July 21, 2010

“Loop Current” is defined by Wikipedia as:

Part of the Gulf Stream, the Loop Current is a warm ocean current in the Gulf of Mexico that flows northward between Cuba and the Yucatán peninsula, moves north into the Gulf of Mexico, loops west and south before exiting to the east through the Florida Straits.

The picture at the top right corner of this post and this animation illustrates how the oil is expected to move into to the Atlantic and then up the eastern seaboard of the U.S.

Oil spill “trackers” provided by the New York Times and other sites show the effects of the oil spill to be largely confined to Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, and Texas.

While it appears Mexico might come 0ut of the oil spill unscathed, it looks like some of the wildlife that the country is known for will suffer the consequences of the oil spill. This article describes the negative effects that the oil spill will likely have on the nurse sharks that migrate to the Yucatan peninsula each year.

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As we walked from the movie theater to the mall, my friend and I decided to cut through the alley. As soon as we made the hard right into the passageway, I knew we had made a mistake.

From either direction a taller and stronger male was sauntering toward us. When I should have bolted, I overrode the adrenaline surge by telling myself to stop being so paranoid.

That was just before they forced us against the wall and demanded all of our money. I gave them the $20 bill in my wallet, all my loose change, and it was over.

No weapons. No gratuitous punch in the face or stomach. Just a quick and painless transaction. We’re bigger than you and you’re in a place where there’s no help—checkmate.

That was the only time I was ever robbed. I was about 16 and it happened at the Roosevelt Field Mall in Long Island, New York. It was strange to have been robbed in a place that seemed so safe and familiar.

Since then I’ve made countless forays into New York City, spent time in Costa Rica and Mexico, and have taken hours long chicken bus rides in Guatemala. I’ve never been robbed or have had anything stolen from me in any of these places.

But I know that it’s always a possibility, especially in Latin America. I hedge my bets by hiding money and credit cards in my shoes, carrying a photocopy of my passport, and stashing any extra cash or credit cards in a hiding place in my hotel.

Today, Ayngelina–the woman behind the wonderfully named Bacon Is Magic blog–described how she was robbed recently in San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua. The three men who robbed her and her friend had a knife. But she said it was pretty clear they just wanted some money from tourists.

Fortunately, it ended soon after she handed over her camera and the few dollars she had. It turns out there were seven other people staying at her hostel who had experienced the same thing.

Another blogger–Libby in Ecuador–shares how a man tried to grab her camera from her last week in Quito.

As I was looking up into the viewfinder, he came up behind me and yanked my camera out of my hands. He didn’t get very far, though, because the strap was wrapped around my wrist. Instead, the camera just kind of slingshot-ed out of his hand and hit me directly in the face. Ouch.

Her assailant ran away after she began yelling at him in English.

Neither Ayngelina nor Libby said they were particularly scared by their experience. After it was over, Ayngelina returned to her hostel and slept soundly. Libby said she wasn’t scarred at all by the attempted robbery. For her it was just another reminder not to stray too far from the pack.

In a op-ed piece last year entitled “Cum Laude in Evading Bandits“, New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristoff explained why college students shouldn’t let the possibility of being victimized deter them from visiting the developing world.  He says:

The risks are minimal compared with the wonders of spending time in a small village. So take a gap year, or volunteer in a village or a slum. And even if everything goes wrong and you are robbed and catch malaria, shrug it off — those are precisely the kinds of authentic interactions with local cultures that, in retrospect, enrich a journey and life itself.

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Two different travel websites today listed Travelojos as being among the top 10 Latin America travel blogs.

Traveling Greener, one of the most visited travel blogs on the web, listed Travelojos first among “10 Latin America Travel Blogs You’ll Love.”

The second website giving Travelojos honors was Go! Overseas Travel, which included Travelojos among “The Top Blogs in South America.”

Being recognized as one of the best is terrific, especially when the honors are shared with some of my favorite bloggers—many of whom are contributing to the Latin America E-Book Project.

Other Latin America E-Book contributors cited by Traveling Greener are:

• Unpaved South America,
• Collazo Projects,
• The Future Is Red,
• Going Local Travel,
• The Jungle Princess,
• Medellin Living, and
• Seashells and Sunflowers.

The Go! Overseas website, listed Travelojos second after Nicholas Gill’s New World Review.

Being runner-up to Nick’s terrific blog is fine with me. Besides being a nice guy, Nick is also a contributor to the Latin America E-Book project.

What are some things that I think are a hassle?

When traveling, it’s is going through immigration at Houston Airport and making it to a connecting flight.

At home, it’s taking a day off from work to renew my driver’s license at MVA.

In Spanish, the phrase for hassle is “Que lio.”

Of course, some hassles are worse than others.

For instance, if your the singer played by Marc Anthony in the movie El Cantante, it’s a hassle if the woman you want to marry is your friend’s girlfriend. ¡Que lio!

Here is the YouTube Video of the song.

Photo by David Dudar

In this Intrepid Traveler Dispatch, independent travel consultant Dave Dudar tells us how he immersed himself into the language, culture and beauty of Granada, Nicaragua.

He finds out, among other things, that the people there park their car in their living room.

In sharp contrast to the pleasures of Granada were the depressing conditions he witnessed in Managua, which he says is probably one of the least attractive capitals in the Americas.

By Dave Dudar

THE TRIP: The focus of the trip was a six day immersion Spanish course in Granada, Nicaragua, preceded by a night in Managua upon my evening’s arrival, and two nights in San Juan del Sur—a beach town on the Pacific.

WHO: Just me.

WHY: Was fascinated by doing a Spanish Immersion course in Central America—had been to Guatemala the year before, and such instruction is quite popular in Antigua there.  But wanted to

Photo by David Dudar

try a new place, and found that Nicaragua also had a number of language schools.  Casa Xalteva was specifically recommended by Budget Travel.com, and a little more research on my part showed that Granada was a nice base from which to explore this part of Nicaragua.  As well, the costs were so low—a week’s tuition with my own private tutor was $120, with the homestay for a week, including three meals a day, an extra $77.  (The costs have gone up some, but still quite reasonable–$150 for a week of classes now, and $90 a week for the homestay, per person)

WHEN: Late November

GETTING THERE: My flight from Atlanta to Managua arrived at night, and owing to safety issues and road conditions, I had to spend the night in the Nicaraguan capital and catch a shuttle by day.  While my flight from ATL, and my cab ride were uneventful—in fact, Delta upgraded me—my arrival at the hotel was noteworthy as a riot was occurring outside my hotel, so the cab driver had to bring me into the InterContinental through the hotel’s loading dock.  The gates at the hotel were all raised.

A shuttle came the next afternoon to drive me to San Juan del Sur.

Photo by David Dudar

I WAS REALLY SURPRISED. . .by how depressing Managua is.  Much of the city hasn’t been repaired since the 1972 earthquake, and most of the capital’s streets have no names.  Granted, a small riot had occurred outside my hotel the

Photo by David Dudar

night before—even so, the streets surrounding the InterContinental were garbage-strewn and poorly maintained.  I found a cab driver who spoke English, and asked him to drive me around for an hour and a half so I could see the city—we drove up a hill to survey Managua and the lake beyond.

Next stop was the new cathedral—a modern concrete structure with some brightly colored accents.  A drive to the center of town revealed the original cathedral still a hulking ruin from the 1972 earthquake damage, and a lakefront rank with the fumes of the polluted lake—Nicaraguans refer to it as an “inodoro”, or toilet.  Near the national legislative building, an entire block is given over to squatters who are otherwise homeless when pesticides on the fields they worked prompted hideous health issues.  On the balance, I have never been more gratified to get back to comfortable confines of my hotel.  If you can, plan for a daytime arrival in Managua so you can go directly to your destination and avoid the overnight in the capital.

I KNEW I’D LOVE GRANADA WHEN. . .I took a walk shortly after arrival.  Granada is one of the best preserved Spanish colonial cities in the Americas.  Block after block of row houses, painted in colors more indicative of Baskin-Robbins than Sherwin-Williams, with the center a lovely plaza punctuated by the huge, mango sherbet washed cathedral—its dome the highest point in the city. Calle Calzada slopes from the plaza to the lake, and along the way, the sidewalks are lined with cafes that spill toward the street.  Charming under any circumstances, but when an ice cold beer sets a café sitter back less than a $1, such a neighborhood is delicious as well.

Photo by David Dudar

ACCOMMODATIONS. . .after a night at the Managua InterContinental, and two nights at Pelican Eyes—San Juan del Sur’s luxury hillside resort—staying in the host home  in Granada is a change.  The home is emblematic of other houses in Granada’s core, long and thin, with a few central courtyards.  Interestingly, they park the family car in the living room.  My bedroom is toward the back of the house, and we share a bathroom.  Not having air conditioning is balanced by not having hot water in the shower—I grow accustomed to both.

The host family has two young boys, with their father being a professional artist of surrealist paintings—Maria is a homemaker.  The meals are heavy on rice, with a little meat for good measure.  The first evening, we make pizza together, but on subsequent evenings, they have dinner waiting for me, and they dine in front of the TV, which rarely gets a break.  A bit odd for me to sit alone at the dinner table while they watch TV in a different part of the house.    Soon, I am just sleeping, eating, and doing my homework at the house—and getting out as much as I can.  Casa Xalteva is just a few blocks away, and the rest of colonial Granada is an easy walk.

Photo by David Dudar

THE COOLEST ATTRACTIONS WERE. . .outside my door.  The structure of the classes were four hours a day, 8-12, with a 15 minute break at 10a.  So I got up early, explored in the morning, met my tutor, fumbled through way too many irregular verbs in the subjunctive, and then escaped for 15 minutes.  All of Granada’s center is a treasure trove of photo opportunities, so would often lean on a corner and just wait for something interesting to happen—a funeral procession, a woman with a basket balanced atop her head, etc.  Would return, and then spend nearly two hours more figuring out how much high school Spanish I’d forgotten.  Then would head home for lunch and a nap.

Casa Xalteva employed another guy, Andres, as a guide, so each afternoon, we’d meet up, and go someplace nearby with him and sometimes other students.  The idea was to speak Spanish the whole time, and Andres was an accredited guide

Photo by David Dudar

We did an afternoon at the nearby lagoon in the shadow of the volcano, another trip up Mombacho to visit a coffee plantation and go ziplining, and yet another trip through Las Isletas—an archipelago of 365 islands in the lake just beyond the core.  In the last instance, we bicycled to the lakefront, but to get to Mombacho, we took a local bus—crowded, with chickens, kids, and every other Central American image you could conjure.

When I wasn’t enjoying one of these excursions, Granada was wonderful to stroll around—discovering another interesting archway or courtyard, enjoying yet another color I’d never seen in residential architecture, or cooling off with a cold Victoria beer at a sidewalk café.

IF I HAD TO DO IT OVER AGAIN. . .I’d have passed on the homestay.  Glad I did it, once.  But Granada has some lovely (and inexpensive) hotels in restored colonial buildings.  I like my privacy too much, I guess.  As it turns out, I ate all my breakfasts, and a dinner or two, out anyway.

Photo by David Dudar

As well, I’d have stayed a few more days—places like Ometepe look to be so interesting, but transportation and sporadic schedules don’t always make day trips practical.  So take more time than you think you will need.

A FEW PIECES OF PARTING ADVICE: Unlike other destinations, Nicaragua just didn’t have that much to buy—Guatemala, for example, had far more in the way of weavings and carvings to bring home.  That said, the duty free shopping at the Managua Airport had some of the best liquor prices I’ve seen—particularly on the local rum.  Had I known, I’d have made far more room in my carry-on (and brought bubble wrap, if you have to check it at some point) for some bottles home.

Photo by David Dudar

Avoid staying the night in Managua if you can—it is not the worst place on the planet, but may be the least attractive capital in the Americas.

Steel yourself for the poverty—after Haiti, Nicaragua is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, where 79% of the population lives on less than $2 a day.  And Granada is a relatively prosperous area of the country.  Still, Nicaragua feels safe, and the people are lovely.  Your visit will be an eyeopener, and your spending money in such a place is so helpful for the local economy.