Day 1 in Nicaragua

I spent the day today with Alicia from the Nehemiah Center. She picked me up early and I attended devotions at the Center. It was a very nice way to start my day. We were outside, there was a lovely breeze, and I could follow along pretty well with everything that was going on in Spanish. Then she showed me around the center and took time to explain all the different things that are going on there. Wow! It is a lot. I am so glad I had time to learn more about this work.

Then we went to lunch and she took me to see some sights in Managua. The city has not rebuilt after the earthquake in 1972, which destroyed almost everything in the city center. Where one would expect the business district to be, there is very little.

This is the cathedral that was severely damaged by the earthquake. It is unsafe, so you can only look at it from the outside now.

This is a view looking down on the city toward the lake. Lots of trees and green growing things have filled in the areas where the buildings used to be. The large white building did survive the earthquake as did the brown tower on the right side in the back of the picture.

Then we went to see the volcano area just south of the city. The volcano was not producing much smoke and ash so you could see a long ways down. Alicia said that this was the clearest view she had ever seen and she has been here many times.

It was a little windy up there, but check out the short sleeves and the water bottle. It was in the 90's today.

Some great geology here!

This is a crater over a nearby inactive volcano.

This ridge is between two craters over the active volcano. The picture of me above is from the observation area on the top of this ridge.