Day 7: Our first full day in Leon we spent mostly just wandering around and taking it all in. We both have been really liking the vibe of this city - tons of local shops and lots of people walking around with very few tourists. At the same time it feels very safe and you're definitely not getting harassed by anyone. We stumbled across a bunch of local markets, which were just awesome. We ate some yuka from the market and then went to a pretty cool art museum that only cost $1.00. In the afternoon we at lunch at a great restaurant called Azul. Might have been the best chimichuri sauce outside of Argentina we've ever had.
In the late afternoon we met a local guide to take us an hour and a half away to the active volcano Telica. The road up to the volcano was crazy bumpy (I guess they just widened a walking path around a year ago). After we got to the base of the volcano we "hiked" for around 30 minutes to the top of the edge of the crater where we could stare down at the lava. The path up was pretty difficult with all the loose rock, but when we got to the top we were the only people there looking down at the lava. They really should charge an entrance fee and assemble a better path, but it was still amazing to spend the last day of the year climbing a volcano.
That night we ate some street food before going on a search for a discoteca (club) to celebrate the New Years. We were the only gringos in the whole place and I think it had to be our cheapest New Years ever. We drank a ton of whiskey, danced to reggaeton and salsa, made friends with a guy at the bar, and counted down the New Years in Spanish. Feliz Año Nuevo!
Day 8: First day of 2015
After sleeping in, the family that runs the small hotel we are staying in offered to make us "part of their family" and take us to the beach. I guess it is a tradition for a lot of Nicaraguan families to head to the beach on New Years day. Their family was super cute and it was fun to see a lot of locals out enjoying the beach. We also had a ridiculously delicious whole fish for lunch - definitely some of the best fish we've ever had. It is a local fresh fish they called corvina (we can't find the translation in English). If anyone knows the name of it in English - definitely let us know because we want to order it again.
