Hey everyone!

There are a plethora of ways to describe how today went. Exciting, wonderful, fantastic… all would be adequate words to use. Yet out of all the choices available to us, we’ll go with this: swimmingly.

Our day started off like any other. We woke up at 7 and, after nearly an hour of preparation, walked off to Imabite for breakfast. Today was different from the other days in that everyone made the bold decision to sit with people they didn’t speak with as often. And if I remember correctly, we had a delectable meal which consisted of eggs, sausage, and bread.

After our first meal of the day, the group prepared to leave for an exciting tour of Isla Juan Venado. To be brief, it was a hectic affair (shoutout to everyone for those wonderful head counts). Fortunately, everyone made it inside of the bus on time, off to what would become the site of a wonderful day. The ride there was interesting: different music choices clashing together, all competing to keep us entertained. One song clearly won- don’t know the name of it, only that Brayan told us that it was in Portuguese. All of us will forever have the lyrics stuck in our head, even if we can’t understand them.

When we finally exited the bus, Jahred and I did our jobs, making sure that no one was absent and that everyone had water. Kirsten and Brian proceeded to split us up into three groups for the tour. This was followed by a pleasant stroll on the beach. IMG_1910Some of the things we saw include, emaciated dogs, fish carcasses, and amorous children selling trinkets. The tour itself was awesome. Our tour guides were paragons at their duties: they explained everything we came across, stopped when something interesting popped up, and gave interesting facts about the island. One thing we learned was that the island was named after an apex hunter. When the tour concluded, we got off our boats and went to have some fun at a nearly deserted beach. IMG_1919Though not the beach where the bulk of our fun was had, both Jahred and I won’t be forgetting it anytime soon (if only for making it sadly obvious what a pain it is when you forget to bring sandals to a beach).

After returning from our tour of the island we all gathered up from our boats and rode the bus to La Playa Roca, a renowned beachfront restaurant. IMG_1923We all gorged ourselves with a big plate of pasta with a side  of salad and pomegranate juice. We also enjoyed our first dessert in Nicaragua, which was their special version of flan. Very scrumptious. After our lunch and Leadership meeting with Derek and Kirsten we all walked down to the beach and enjoyed different activities such as searching for seashells and fighting in the water. Sand was everywhere yet we all bonded and had an amazing time. At around 4 o’clock we returned back to the Hostel and had about an hour to shower. At 5:30 we had a program seminar which also went swimmingly talking about the next days activity of “Living Like A Local”.

At 6  we ate dinner at Imabite and were treated to a nice plate of meat and salad with plantains and sweet tea. Upon returning from dinner, we started our nightly meeting, and we all expressed an enormous amount of positive feelings about the day.  A lot of us experienced bonding like no other day has given us, and Reginald and I both believe that with this newfound friendship, the Glimpsers will be able to stride further in thinking of new ways to help the community in Leon.

On a final note… I am “King of the Beach!”
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