3 hours into the Nica mountains

The other day I got to go on my first solar panel installation trip. I kind of thought that I knew what I was getting into but, as with all Nicaraguan adventures, you can never plan for everything. I got the opportunity to fill in because one of the other volunteers that normally go wasn’t going to make it so I was all over it. I was told to show up at the solar work shop at 5 am en punto, which is the Nica way of saying don’t be late. I don’t know about you but 5 am is pretty early, even by Nica campo dwellers’ standards. I got all ready the night before, got to bed by 8:30 pm and woke up well before the crack of dawn at 4:15, about 45 minutes before the crack of dawn to be exact! I showed up so ready that you could swear I was a boy scout—but I wasn’t. I had my backpack with a water bottle full of agua pura, I made up a peanut butter and guayaba jelly sandwich, I did the Colavito thing of packing a million snacks for the trip, I had my wind up flashlight, my rough and tumble jeans, my mountain hiking sneaks and even remembered sunscreen and bug spray- just for you Mom!

I was told it was just a day trip, so no big deal, we will be back by mid afternoon and in plenty of time for dinner. Well, the day started off slow, but this is Nicaragua so no surprise. I got to the workshop at 4:55 am and the whole area was completely dark with not a creature stirring. A minute later I saw Marcos, the head dog of the solar panels, creeping through the darkness to the latrine. I was reaffirmed that the truck would be here any minute to take us and our freshly assembled solar panel to the installation sight. The truck showed up at 6:30, we were on the road by 7:15 am. I didn’t feel too bad because the other volunteer, Julio, was waiting at the bus stop for us since 5:15. We drove to Ocotal, about 20 minutes away, and we stopped at the house of the truck driver for some unknown reason. After 10 minutes of waiting a taxi showed up and I was informed that one of the guys was taking it back to Sabana Grande to get the compact fluorescent bulbs that were forgotten. So they estimated he would be back in 30 min, he was back in 50. We finally got on the road for real at 8:40am—why did I wake up so early?!

The fun started once we got on the road. It was a beautiful sunny day, like it is just about every day here, and there were 5 of us riding in the back of the pickup truck with all the solar system equipment. Pretty much standing room only going about 50 mph down the highway because that was as fast as the truck could handle. So about 45 minutes down the road and we make a sharp left onto a really narrow, REALLY bumpy, dirt mountain road, then we drove on it for nearly 3 more hours. It was actually pretty cool. The weather was just gorgeous, sunny, breezy and getting cooler as we drove deeper into the mountains. We would drive for 30 minutes and see maybe one house with nothing more than mountains and farmland, then we would pass through a small town, lasting about 30 yards, and it seemed like every single person that lived there was on the side of the road staring at us like we were from mars. A big smile and an “adios” would crack the stone looks and I would receive an equally large smile and “adios” in return. We probably passed through 5 or so towns like this. Another cool thing is that the whole way along the road was mostly farm land and all along the sides were many different kinds of fruit trees like jokote (ho-coat-ay), orange, coffee bushes, guayaba, lime, banana, plantain, and probably a bunch more that I just didn’t recognize. You can bet that everyone standing in the back of the pick up truck was leaning and grabbing fresh fruit right off the trees anytime the driver got close enough. It was pretty neat, I don’t really eat fruit and all but I tried a jokote—they are really sour and bitter and taste like crap so tossed it after the first bite, at least I tried it. I think its kind of an acquired taste because the locals love them.

We had been driving for a while, and as far as my mental map of Nica goes I was thinking that Ocotal is only about an hour from the northern border with Honduras and I didn’t think it was possible for us to be driving for another hour an a half after leaving the highway and still be in Nicaragua. I was a little worried because I didn’t have my passport or anything so I sure as heck was hoping that we weren’t crossing any borders. I asked one of the other guys and he said we were still in Nica and then pointed out at the next peak we reached how a few mountain peaks away you could actually see Honduras—cool. So maybe about 30 minutes after I was worrying about crossing the border we come across two guys dressed in full army fatigues and heavily armed with what looked like semi-automatic AK-47’s. They were standing on opposite sides of the road and signaled for us to stop—sh*%! My heart instantly began racing. One of them leaned over to the passenger side window and spoke to Marcos while the other one eyed us up. The conversation took about 20 seconds and then they gave us the big Nica smile, waved us on and said “Que se vayan bien”, which means good travels.

We continued on our ridiculously bumpy path, I just can’t call it a road, and were blessed with some of the most breath-taking country mountain views, which I tried to take pictures of largely unsuccessfully. You should check out our walmart pictures link again to see a bunch of new photos. Another little surprise we had was as we passed around a long curve in the road that dipped down really low we came upon a small stream that we crossed and I looked off to the right to find two women huddled together covering themselves who appeared to be bathing in the stream. No, I did not take a picture; I actually turned away out of respect, and was impressed to see that all the other guys did the same.

We finally got to our destination, which was a small town with a paved road and we stopped in front of a pretty nice looking office; then I realized it wasn’t our destination, we were just there to pick up a couple of people that I think were associated with some group that was helping to pay for the system. So then we had 7 people in the back of the truck with all our equipment and standing room only and got back onto the even bumpier dirt path. We drove for another 10 minutes and coincidentally passed by the guy whose house we were headed to walking with his son. What did we do? Pick ‘em up of course! We then had 9 people in the back of our pick up with 2 in the front, all the equipment and standing room only. We arrived at the house a few minutes later and were greeted by what looked like a whole neighborhood of kids, but I think were all his. I really don’t know how many there were, but I think it was somewhere between 7 and 12. The only reason that I don’t doubt that they all belonged to the owner and his wife is that they all looked just like him.
Edwin estimated that the installation would take about 2 hours, we spent 4. Its nica time baby! We put up one 75 watt PV panel on the back of the house, installed a single deep discharge battery, a charge controller and 4 independent compact fluorescent lights. It was a pretty sweet little system that put a bulb in nearly every room of their house and is now giving night time light to a family for the first time in their lives. I actually thought that 4 hours wasn’t bad considering we assembled the mounting system, put up the panel, mounted the charge controller and wired up for lights throughout the house and had everything hooked up to the system and working before we left. It was a pretty rewarding experience and when we were finishing up and testing the system the little kids were running around yelling “Tenemos luz! Tenemos luz!” (We have light!)

The ride home wasn’t nearly as fun as the ride out to the site. Less than 10 minutes after we left it started down pouring. We found a large sheet of dirty, stinky, black plastic full of holes in the back of the truck and unfolded it and draped it over all of us to minimize the soaking. The rain continued for about an hour, and then finally let up. After it rains in the mountains it’s really cold. It’s also even colder once the sun goes down, and it was pitch black out before the rain even stopped. I didn’t even think about bringing a jacket because, hey, its nica we have temperatures in the mid 80’s every day. We all froze for 3 hours in the back of the truck driving home and the worst part was the 45 minutes on the highway at the end. Just think 50 mph in the back of a pick up truck, 65 degrees out and nothing on but a damp t-shirt and jeans—not cool. I finally got home around 9pm and I wore a sweatshirt to bed all night just to get the cold out of my bones. That was one heck of a one day business trip. I thought Printpack sent me on some boondoggles. I tell you one thing though; I’d do it again in a heartbeat. Only next time I’ll bring my rain jacket.