Utila and granada Nicaragua

Spent the last week and a half on Utila in the bay islands, partly because of a little bit more bad luck, and partly because it's so so nice. Jenny woke up the day before we were supposed to start diving looking like a robot, because she couldn't turn her head separately from her body due to a really sore neck. Had to have another trip to the local doctor which was fun. Turns out that she also had a parasitic bug in her stomach as well which is nice. Anyway, we had to put off the diving for a few days until the injections and pills that she was given worked.

Eventually we managed to get in the water with the diving gear on, having spent a lot of time reading the theory behind diving. The place where we signed up was amazing though. Very cheap, good rooms, its own jetty&pier, big courtyard with hammocks hanging from the trees. Very nice. They also had a cross eyed dog called Alejandra who spent the entire day fetching plastic bottles from the sea, which was quite funny. She got a bit confused if you through stones in instead of bottles cos she couldn't find them, so I preferred to throw stones.

We got taught the diving along with another couple of candians and Swedish girls. our instructor was a local islander and looked and sounded like a pirate. He was very good, apart from the fact that he called me several different names a day....caleb, caylum, calvin, team scotland. The diving itself was absolutely amazing. We are both now PADI qualified divers to 18m. Both of us enjoyed it so much that we considered taking the advanced course. have to move on though. May try and do this in Asia. Saw all sorts of amazing stuff in the sea, including a creature called the 'thing', which was a big 4foot long centipede, moray eel, queen angel fish, loads of weird things. I was a bit rubbish on the first dive and sucked all the air out of my tank in about 20 mins but got a lot more relaxed the more we did it. we also had a huge pod of dolphins jumping about at the front of the boat that we were diving off which was incredible. We met up with a couple of Brummies who were a good laugh, and went out drinking with them on the last night. There was a big party and barbq on the last night which was good fun.......until we had to get on the boat back to the mainland the next day. Felt very very rough.

We've travelled quite far since then, over the last 2 days, to get to Granada in Nicaragua where we are now. Did an all day bus journey on a Ticabus yesterday. Was freeezing. Air conditioning worked too well, and neither of us were dressed for it. Much warmer here in Nicaragua. A lot poorer than anywhere that we've been so far. We just had lunch in the main square, and two children sat down with us asking for money. There was a three legged dog with no fur, and when we'd finished as much of the yuka and pork scratchings that we were eating a little skinny guy asked us if he could take the remains of our meal and scooped them up with his hand and ran off. Not great.

Looking to travel on to an island with a volcano on it tomorrow, with a candian guy that we met who speaks very good spanish.