Nacatamales, 4th of July at Chele's, and Keys to our Castle

We finally experienced the mystical "nacatamal."  We've been hearing about this Nicaraguan culinary delight since our arrival and have been dying to get our hands on one, but for some reason, they never appear on restaurant menus.  We've seen them in the Rivas park centro, but I've been pretty weary of street food since our recent bout with pupseando and my vivid memories of reoccurring sickness in Peru.  So, when Juana asked us yesterday if we've ever had nacatamales and we said no, the following morning on her way to iglesia, she stopped by with these.  Two tightly wrapped food gifts looking just like Hawaiian laulau.  What a lady, that Juana!  She is my Nicaraguan mother and she's only a year older than me.

Mmmm - pork, rice, tomato, onion and corn - steamed to perfection.

Two days ago, we got the phone call from Arial saying that our house was finished - the moment we've been waiting for!  We headed over the next day to take a look and it's so beautiful with the floors varnished and the walls painted white and the bamboo trim along the edge of the ceiling.  The beds and oven are being delivered as I write this and we're headed up to Masatepe to buy some furniture this week.  Two hammocks on the front porch have been deemed mandatory.  Here are some pics of the finished product.

  

outdoor shower

our first keyed entrance

solar setup - four marine batteries, inverter

view from the loft

Yesterday was the Fourth of July, and as I mentioned in the previous post, Chele Palmado's got it together in their hectic week of moving, to put on a richter celebration.  Homemade corndogs personally sealed the deal for me and after a couple of those badboys, a cheeseburger, and some jungle juice, my insatiable appetite was finally satisfied.  In the late afternoon, I ran up to the house to grab the dogs and half a pan of brownies with a drizzled peanut-butter topping that I had made the night before.  (Thanks to Rachel for teaching me that brownie baking trick!)  The sweets went over well and mother nature shortly there after, provided yet another beautiful Nicaraguan sunset.  Thanks for the party boys!

Arial, mixing up the jungle juice

Steve

Macho, my fav Nica dog

Puna going for a sunset swim

And a couple of randoms .....

Nicaraguan traffic jam