Wonder Works Museum

Devin and I went to Wonder Works today in Orlando. I have wanted to go ever since I drove past and saw the upside downbuilding. The entire place has different exhibits and games that are science related. It reminds me of a bigger, fancier, and more mainstream version of SciTech (museum in Aurora, IL that I went to as a kid).

We played a virtual reality game, put our hands in water that was the same temperature as the water Titanic passengers were plunged into, experienced a 5.3 earthquake, stood in hurricane winds, saw how fast we could throw a baseball (Devin is much, much better at this than I am), played virtual air hockey, played mind ball (the person with the calmer brain waves moves a ball toward the other person - you want to push the ball all the way over to them), laid on a bed of nails, played a giant sized piano, made shadows on the wall, put ourselves in giant bubbles, rode in a virtual roller coaster, and climbed through a three story ropes course. The ropes course was my favorite part. I stayed up there running through the different obstacles while Devin took pictures of me. There was an arcade under the ropes course and we played a couple games of ski ball and wack-a-mole. It was a fun day.

We had planned to do some letter boxes in Orlando but we couldn't find a place to park and the last ride at Wonder Works had made me motion sick so we went home instead.

Shooting off rockets

Devin and I went to the Viera Recreational Center soccer fields today to launch rockets. The weather was really nice although there was a slight breeze. Devin just finished a new rocket that he wanted to try out. While Devin got our launch site set up I wandered down to the water to see what animals were around (I brought my SLR and telephoto lens). I was getting close to the water when I spotted an alligator. I'm still not used to not being able to wander up the edge of ponds and lakes to look for frogs. There were also a lot of egrets around the lake. Devin had one successful launch but the second time he used a bigger engine and we lost the rocket. We launched some of the other rockets before doing a final search for his rocket.

Before and after launching rockets we went shopping and picked up more supplies for the wedding. I'm getting very tired of wedding shopping. So far we have bought our sand ceremony bottles and sand, materials for making the bouquets and boutonnières, materials for bridesmaid gifts, water balloons, and some other things.

New rodent friends

My friend Julie's sister bought two female rats for her daughter. After they brought them home BOTH rats had babies so they had over 20 rats. Some of the rats were donated as food but the others they gave to friends as pets. They had a couple of rats left that they needed to find a home for and of course I folded and now I have rats. The boy is very friendly and his name is Tubbers; I had tried to name him Rizzo but he's such a fat little rat that I just kept calling him Tubbers and decided that must be his name. The female is fairly anti-social and I am planning on donating her to the Wildlife Hospital to be a breeder so I named her Preggers. I was hoping they would have babies and I could keep one of the boys to keep Tubbers company. It seems like he would be lonely if he was on his own. Grant really likes them and always comes over when I have them out. Twice he has brought a toy over to them; poor Grant doesn't understand that the rats can't play with him. At first I had put them in a 10 gallon tank that I had in the attic but they looked so crowded in there that I ended up making a trip to the pet store and bought them a nice big cage. They seem happy now and come to the cage door whenever I open it so that they can get their treats.

No scuba but a nice beach walk

Today we were supposed to drive down to Jupiter for a 9:00am scuba trip, however, hurricane Earl is making large waves so the dive boats aren't running. Instead, Devin and I went to the beach to see if the big waves had washed up pretty shells or anything interesting. Mostly we picked up garbage but we did find some sea beans along the way as well. It was a beautiful day.

Kayaking Lake Nicaragua

We were up early this morning to meet our guide outside our hotel. He drove us to the boat landing where there were sit-on kayaks. Unfortunately I didn't feel confident enough in their stability to use my good camera so it stayed in the dry-bag the entire time. It was very quiet and relaxing on the lake and the kayaks cut smoothly across the calm surface of the water. We saw beautiful large flowers blooming on trees hanging over the water, lots of birds (Ringed Kingfisher, Bare-throated Tiger Heron, Green Heron, Northern Jacana, Cormorant, Turkey Vultures, Osprey, White-ringed Flycatcher, Great-tailed Grackle, and White-throated Magpie-jay), and two types of water lilies.

Tomorrow we get picked up at 4:30am to go to the airport for our flight home. It's been a wonderful vacation but both Devin and I are ready to head back home.

Masaya Volcano, pottery, and handicraft market

We started today with some "leisurely" volcano hiking. We visited the Masaya volcano (active volcano) and hiked around the San Fernando crater (extinct crater). Unlike Cerro Negro, this volcano was covered in verdant vegetation, some of which was responsible for the scratches on Devin and my legs. From the top of the crater we had a beautiful view of the surrounding valleys including the Masaya lagoon that we visited before. A couple of parts had some difficult climbing, mostly because the lava rock is very sharp.

After hiking we got to visit the Handicraft

Market in Masaya City. We didn't really get much since most of the vendors had the same exact items and they were more expensive that what we could get from the stands set up in central park. By the time we were done shopping we were both starving and we had lunch at Mirador de Catarina, a nice restaurant overlooking Granada, a lake, and the islands of Mombacho. I had to order something special because there was a beef, pork, chicken, or fish option and what I got was the worst spaghetti I have ever had. It was mushy noodles drenched in butter with chunks of garlic. I recommend staying away from Italian food if you ever visit Nicaragua. Devin said his meal (pork option) was good.

After lunch we visited the "white towns"(thus named because all of the buildings used to be white - Eduardo thinks that the government should by cheap white paint in mass quantities and

supply it to the villagers for free so that they would still be all white), typical villages that produce all kinds of handicrafts. One of the locals showed us the process for making pottery. First, they have to haul the mud from a certain location and then they have to stomp on it to soften it up. They now use a manual pottery wheel, although back in the day it was made without a wheel. They do the initial shaping, then refine the shape. Then they polish it by scraping a rock over it, then by scrapping a certain seed over it, next they carve in a design such as turtles, butterflies, or geometric patterns. After that they apply color alternating with polishing, more color, more polishing, etc. Eventually they finally get to the step where they put in in the kiln and add a final polish of wax to make it shine. This whole process takes months and months. All this work and it cost me $9 for two pots. After the pottery demonstration we visited a couple of different pottery stops to see the different styles and levels of quality. Devin and I were shopped out and we went to bed early.

Zip lining and boat ride on Lake Nicaragua

Devin and I both felt well in the morning and excited to go zip lining through the canopy. We drove up to the canopy of the Mombacho volcano where the zip lines were set up. Devin and I were in our own group and we had three guides helping us through a total of eight zip lines and three suspension bridges. The highest of the platforms was 40 meters high and the longest ride was 300 meters. These zip lines were shorter and faster than the ones I did in Peru; they were also more of a ride and less of sight seeing. I got to do one superman style (or super-chicka style as they called it) and another one upside down. On one of the middle ones I actually got to fly past a butterfly. The last zip line they bounced us up and down as we descended to the ground. Both Devin and I had a lot of fun; I wish I could go zip lining every day. After our canopy adventure, we stopped at a local cafe for some shade grown coffee samples. I thought it was pretty good but Devin didn't try it since he doesn't like coffee. They had the three stages of beans shown there; from the whole bean and shell to the bean without the shell and finally to the roasted and ground stages.

We spent some time touring Granada and stopped at a chocolate museum where we got to sample tea made from the leaves of the cocoa plant as well as some dark chocolate. They may grow the cocoa plant but I think I'll stick to Belgium for consumable chocolate. We also stopped at a potter

y museum where we saw the different pottery styles of each time period. My favorites were the ones that had animal depictions included in the designs. After the museum we stopped for lunch at a cute local restaurant.

After lunch we headed to Lake Nicaragua for a boat ride. We got to see a

some of the 356 islands that were formed by an eruption of the Mombacho volcano, some which had locals with simple with houses

and others that had huge mansions on them (including the house of the richest person in Nicaragua). There was also an island that had non-native spider monkeys. We saw lots of tropical birds including king fishers, fly catchers, cormorants, green herons, a tiger heron, and other birds. My favorite was the tiger her

on which I spotted. The rain held out just long enough for us to finish our boat ride.

We waited out the rain in our hotel and then wandered around central market when the weather cleared. It was mostly clothes, lots and lots of shoes, and thrift type stores. Devin got a watch for $6 since I lost mine and we thought it would be nice to be able to tell the time without turning the TV on. There were also a number of food vendors selling bread, cheese, fresh fruit, and other edibles. I got some mango which in retrospect was probably a bad idea since it gave me a tummy ache but I wanted to see how good the mango tasted. The vendors started packing up their shops so we grabbed a burger for Devin in central park and headed into the hotel for the night.