It comes as no great suprise to me that the return of Natxo marked the end in what would have been semi-regular updating of the blog.
I left off in the days following xmas and the whole trauma of sexual harassment.
We crossed over to Nicaragua and spend a night in Leon and a few days of delirium in the beautiful Granada where we met some really funky people, including a couple of great colombian engineers (finally some brains ;)), called Santiago & Daniel and the great Bernardo.
The friendly locals welcome us to Nicaragua
Bernardo is a 70 something year old spanish man that fleed Spain during the dictatorship and has spent most of his life sailing around the world from which he has gained a knowledge of... well, pretty much everything. He lives in a small room in a Hostel in Granada and has been there for the last 3 years. His hobby is to paint horseshoes with the flags of countries, which he does at the amazing rate of 1 a day. This is somewhat suprising since from the amount of paintdrop that end up on his belly you'd guess he was ravishing a canvass with incredible intensity and speed.
Bernardo has been elevated to the man of the trip so far, due to his prodigous memory. There is not one place he has not been to or does not know about. Upon telling him that I was from Genova he started telling about a bar in Via Pre that was owned by a Mr.Arturo in 1976 who's son called Stefano was probably now running it, all this concluded with his signature word "amigo!".
All you had to do was name something, like a tiny town in chile and this is what he would say:
"In 1687 that town was founded by a Sr.Marquez Velasquez del Rio Gomez who sailed from Sevilla in 1686 leaving behind a wife called Sr.a Filippa Castillo Suarez, a daughter called Nadia and a dog called Roberto. This man was actually looking for land for his cocoa plantation and discovered instead that the soil, due to its high content in phosphorous, was perfectly suited for the cultivation of the rare Turkish springroot, which we grew there and sold for 2 doblons per pount until he returned to Spain a rich man and was killed in Vico del Colon in Murcia by Don Sergio Gimenez de Gotardo who was sleeping with his wife, amigo!"
After saying all that in one breath, he'd get up, walk out the door, and come back to sit down 5 minutes later after ensuring that nothing was happening in the roads outside.
He found a place in our hearts by naming Roque "il Basko", David "il Moro" and myself "Genoves".
Two of Colombia's finest on he right and The Great Bernardo on the left
We spent the following days partying in the town, with a highlight on the second night when we picked up some random friends in a bar and decided to hit a late night bar on the beach. Once we discovered that the price was fixed no matter how many people we managed to fit 9 people into a normal 5 person taxi, including a very large man from el Salvador, David, a 1.80m+ Dutch guy, Roque, also 1.80+ and myself at 1.97. We hit the bar and watched the sun come up over the lake while happily chatting and laughing till 8am.
We headed out the next day for a devastating New Year's followed by some incredibly relaxing days along the south coast and San Juan del Sur. The town itself is a little packed with tourists but there are some of the most amazing beaches I have ever seen, just a few miles north and south, particularly Playa de la Flor and Playa del Coco.
Playa del Coco, what a sight!
We decided to spend New Year´s in the town and it was a blast. We ended up staying in the house of the most boring man in the planet, sleeping on a double bed which seemed to be made out of steel and hatred.
In good European tradition David, Roque, The Naughty and I headed out to San Juan to plan and enjoy the end of year meal. We parked the Naughty on the side of the road in the middle of the town, turned up the funky music and decide that there is no better end of year meal than one that leaves more time for drinking and the rhum started flowing.
We met up with an Argentinian girl and her boyfriend. The girl is the sister of a guy that was living in with Natcho in Genevra, and we ignored the official coundown as we decided that the coming of the new year should be officially based on the time given by the Naughty´s clock.
Looking smashing for the ladies on new year's night, also featuring the lovely Naughty + Violetta & boyfriend
As midnight struck we all toasted and shared some of the rhum around by getting the parking official drunk, a guy that was just walking by and by spraying the front of the Naughty with a water gun specially filled for the occasion with Nicaragua´s finest rhum.
The rest of the evening was an inebriated laugh of music on the beach which lead to very sleepy faces the next day and a horrible hangover for what would be an even more horrible trip.
We decided to go to playa Madeira, a surfer´s paradise, but the road to get there was a 10 mile strech of hidious stones and potholes that would put the moon´s craters to shame.
Fine sewing in Playa Madeira
We finally arrived however, we parked the van facing the ocean, pulled up the roof and settled down for 4 days of surfing, eating with a fire on the beach and simply not showering.
When the sun sets at 5:30 on an isolated beach there s not much to do, and after three days of cooking pasta on a fire in sea water, I was tired of cooking and wanted to be served, so we head down along the beach looking for some kind of hostel that allegedly was there and served food and drinks.
When we arrived we found that owner to be the biggest rascist-prick in the world, and the hostel to be in complete darkness and packed with surfer dudes that were wondering how to extend a bbq made for 8 people to 15. Now surfer dudes are wierd creates, almost completely unable to talk and walk fully erect in their natural condition, when their environment becomes polluted by alcohol, their vocabulary shrinks from the full 50 words to a simple "dude", "yeah!" "rocks" and "surf". They also tend to venerate the biggest idiot of the bunch, probably because he's sense of balance has developed sufficiently to allow him to stand up on a moving plank of wood...
Anyway the Dicklord (aka the owner) told us that he was pissed and couldn t be bothered cooking so if we wanted food we d have to make it, oh and we´d have to pay full price.
We thought of leaving initially, but then we realised that we could simply cook, eat and walk out afterwards considering how drunk the idiot was. So I ended up cooking again, only this time, when the guys saw that I was making pasta, everyone wanted some, so I ended up making pasta for 15 people, and this is how you do it:
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Pasta a la Paul for 15 drunk stupid surfers
You will need:
1.4 Kgs of pasta
300 gr bacon
2 onions
1 garlic
4 tomatos
15 drunken stupid surfers
Cook as follows:
Chop & fry the bacon
Chop and fry the garlic and onion
Chop and fry the garlic and onion
Add the bacon to the onions and let it cook with the chopped tomatoes for a while until you have a decent sauce. Add pepper (non was available), any kind of seasoning and salt.
Once the sauce is ready let it cool and HIDE 1/3 of the sauce.
Cook the pasta in a pot the size of a house which takes 45 minutes to boil.
Serve as follows:
Take the pasta, mix it in with 2/3 of the sauce and tell the drunk sufers that there weren´t enough ingredients to feed everyone and tha pasta is a little tasteless.
Pinch some bbq before they get to it, fill your plate with pasta and add the hidden sauce, without being seen by the surfers, repeat for your friends.
Listen to the owner thank you and tell you that you eat for free and that the pasta tastes great, pay for 2 people, stick 3 bottles of beer in you pockets, leave the den of perdition.
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