This is the house we stayed in our first night in Managua. Quite a class separation in Nicaragua. I found it odd that this house was in an 'upscale' community - all the homes were quite run down (including this one). Homes like this sell for around $150,000! You could buy a nicer home this size in fort collins colorado for less.
Our trusted driver 'Victor' brought us around Managua to run some errands. Very scary traffic, people drive as fast as they can with no turn signals and total disregard for one another it seems. Everybody wants to get there first and I must say Victor did quite a fine job of getting us around quickly! It didnt feel safe at all.... but hes a full time cabbie and he's never crashed. The roads are full of cabs - people - horse carts, old buses etc. Very chaotic.
This is the plane that brought us from Managua to Bluefields yesterday. Fun flight!
They have hired help here to do all our cooking and laundry. Pictured above is the washing machine. These ladies are cooking and cleaning for about 20-25 people,, very good food, 3 meals a day always followed by coffee. They also make fresh fruit juice every day.
We have 3 dogs here... the puppy is not shown.
This is in our neighborhood - some homes are better, some are worse. There are a couple of beautiful homes here actually!
Here's a nice power panel they're building for testing at their shop. They have 3 nice tower with two wind turbines currently flying at their shop. The shop is actually part of a sort of 'trade school' where they teach high school aged kids various trades. It seems as though blue energy is doing more for this school than they've seen in a long time. They have a lot of space, lots of kids learning neat stuff there. I had thought Blue Energy was mostly concerned with building systems in remote communities - now I realize that educating kids, and providing employment for local folks is one of their most important achievements.
Today we spent the whole day talking about wind power theory and ideas to improve the 12' turbines they've been building. Lots of fun!
Tomorrow is a big adventure, we take a 4 hour boat ride to a small village where well low a 12' machine (its burned out) - spend the night, and then 4 hour ride back the next day (sunday). So with a bit of luck Ill post about those adventures and show some other pics that I just dont have time to deal with now... monday or tues.
