Originally we had planed to bring our 3rd group of artists to Cuba this January but with plans falling through the cracks;  I decided to take a little time away from the store and work remotely.

A couple of months in painting in Nicaragua should do the trick, and then I will head south to Panama before meeting my art group in Lima ( March 6th ) for another art tour of Peru.   Roxanne and I arrived in Managua December 23rd, with our daughter Dominique and our 5 year old Chocolate Lab “Charlie”  for an adventure we have always dreamed about.  We were a little hesitant about subjecting our only boy to the long flight from Seattle in a kennel,  but as it turns out he got better service than we did.   Thank goodness everything went smoothly and Charlie did not have to endure the 3 day adventure Niki’s two university friends suffered with delays in Houston due to bad weather.  After 24 hours at the airport in Houston they caught the first plane out they could to Honduras, overnight in Honduras before a 10 hour bus ride to Managua, where we had a car waiting for them to come and meet us in San Juan del Sur (more about that later).

Our trip started in Granada, a forty minute drive from Managua.  Getting through customs with Charlie was relatively easy,  easier than we thought as we had quite the wait for our driver, but having Charlie with us was reward enough and we were all smiles waiting in the blistering heat.  Charlie obviously ecstatic to be with us again .. what’s a little sun stroke!!!

Granada is 40 minutes from the airport and sits on the shores of Lake Nicaragua.  It’s home to multiple spanish colonial landmarks that have survived pirate invasions, civil war, bankruptcy and the recent recession. The city’s main plaza, central park, is dominated by the colorful, neoclassical facade of the Cathedral of Granada, originally dating to 1583.  The Centro Cultural Convento San Francisco nearby is famed for its displays of pre-Columbian statues.

Although I did not get much painting done here over the Christmas holiday I did manage to capture some of the activity in front of the cathedral in this, my first watercolour of our trip.  I am a little out of painting shape but there are parts of this I don’t hate.