Rocky Roads and Rain

Us at the random Israel restaurant on Day 1.

Day 3! A success of course.... Katie again, guest blogging. :)

This morning we got up (somewhat early) around 8, made breakfast and checked out of our little hostel. The kitchen of our little hostel was cute and doubled as the kitchen for a family that lived behind the hostel... Last night, after inquiring as to what she was making the Mom gave us a taste of what she was cooking.... The concotion consisted of chopped Tiliapia, onions, tomatoes, lemon juice, soda water, sugar and salt. We were wary because of the raw fish but eaten with bread the mixture was not bad! (Still not sick so far either. Haha).

Barber and I on our Canope tour.

So we departed this morning and headed for the National Park near the Volcano. For a $10 entrance fee we got a 2 hour 3 mile hike around the jungle and volcano. At one point we saw some wild lemurs (? no idea what they were other than not monkey's....) Haha. We left the park pretty sweaty and gross and headed for the town of Santa Elena... I think we may have taken a wrong turn somewhere along the way though... After a nice paved road for about an hour we got to a road that was made up of cobblestone, rock, mud, and gravel. I don't happen to be the most comfortable driving on this sort of terrain but the locals seemed to not mind at all and continously passed me at seemingly high speeds throughout the day. :)

Us facing the volcano with our backs to the lake during our hike.

Despite a few minor detours including a caterpillar (piece of machinery blocking traffic across a bridge for ten minutes), a wrong turn and a dog that wouldn't move out of my way, we made it to Santa Elena safely. We checked into a neat hostel that was highly recommended by our guide book and got a private room with bath for $25 dollars. Nice!

One funny story I forgot to mention previously.... Two nights ago Barber and I woke up really thirsty. I'm talking, dry mouth just need some water thirsty. Well unfortunatley, due to bad planning on our part we were without water. Bad deal. We debated about whether or not it would be safe to drink the tap water, consulted the guide book and could not decide on anything certain. And being that it's 2 am at the time walking to a "super" (grocery store) is out of the question.... So we resort to the next best thing we have. A semi frozen bottle of Coke Zero that we had put in our tiny regrigerator. Haha. We sucked down what we could and were ok until morning. Moral= Always have enough water to last you through the night!!

Thus I digress.... Tonight we bought a pineapple for a $1.25 and a mexican avacodo both which turned out to be dissapointing. :( Fortunately our hostel sells tacos for about a dollar! We plan on enjoying the town tonight and heading South to the beach tomorrow. We'll see what happens...