First Full Day
Post date: Nov 2, 2013 6:32:33 PM
Of course the first thing we had to do was find coffee, since there was none at the house. In fact, there were no staples, not even salt. Last evening I had purchased some french pastry for breakfast at the Panadería Luna, a french bakery strategically located on La Calzada. We awoke at 5 am to gradual dawn and some street noises. So by 8:30 we were both feeling a bit deprived of caffeine.
We did find the "Coffee Boutique" about a block from our rental house. Good latte, and we purchased some freshly ground coffee for tomorrow morning. The have four coffees available in bulk and about four others packaged. Roaster is on premises. Quite nice. Look for it on my map. Probably the last entry on the left, or you can navigate from the central park, one block east (toward the lake) and 15 steps north. Lattes were US$1.50 each and coffee $7/pound. Most service organizations (restaurants) add a 'voluntary tip' ('propina voluntaria') of 10% before tax to the bill.
By the way, units of measure are mixed here: 'libra' is an English pound, kilogram is what it says, distances are sometimes in kilometers, sometimes in old Spanish measure. Confusing to me. But then, so is the mess in the US, with some metric measures, and some old English measure.
Our maid went to the public market for us this morning. She bought far more than we will probably eat, but we couldn't hold her back when we gave her our shopping list yesterday. I figure we will have a big breakfast, dinner maybe 2 or 3 pm, then snack on fruit in the evening. Carol and I went to the supermarket for seasonings, honey (for chai tea), soda, beer, eggs, rice, and beans. Total ran to about US$80. We were able to pay with our BECU ATM card, which claims not to charge for currency conversion or ATM fees. We'll see!
On the return we arranged with the taxi driver to pay an extra fare (C$10) for the groceries, so the trip cost us US$1.20. It was less than ten blocks, but worth it with the groceries and Carol's difficulty walking.
We do have internet here with WiFi wireless connection. Here is the result of my internet speed test:
A detailed image for this result can be found here:http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/i/676108458
Test Date: Nov 2, 2013 1:36 PM
Download: 1.79 Mbps
Upload: 0.94 Mbps
Ping: 55 ms
Connection Type: Wi-Fi
Server: Managua
External IP: 186.77.197.117
Internal IP: 192.168.0.10
Latitude: 11.9289
Longitude: -85.9505
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&q=11.928918,-85.950523
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