The New York Post reports:

"The Giants may be America's Super Bowl champs, but there will still be one place in the world where the Patriots' sorry dreams of a perfect season live on: Nicaragua. Thousands and thousands of unsold caps and T-shirts printed with '19-0' and 'Patriots Super Bowl Champions' have been donated to a charity that will ship them next week to the impoverished Central American country. As soon as the gear arrives, poor children across Nicaragua will be transformed into unwitting members of Patriots Nation."

I just came back from Nicaragua and am happy to report that, as always, the Land of Lakes and Volcanoes continues to deliver a sensory bombardment that is as pleasant as it is exhausting. I visited Granada's airy new colonial hotels, went water-skiing in Lake Cocibolca, trekked the shores of Laguna de Apoyo, meandered the Municipal Market in Masaya, attended a rowdy baseball game (San Fernando v. León) on the malecón, played guitar and sang at Bar Chango in Managua, peered into an active volcano crater with old friends, and climbed bell towers with new ones. In short, every waking moment was an unpredictable, vibrant experience, especially since the country was exploding with virgin fever—and I mean that literally, with bombas and fireworks bursting through every early morning, day, and night that I was there—as Nicaraguans celebrated the Immaculate Conception with procession after procession. Entonces my fellow Nicaphiles, I'd like to share a few pinolero-posts from my personal travel blog, The Tranquilo Traveler. You are invited to browse Fair Trade gift ideas from Building New Hope, watch a sunset bell-ringing from a tower above Granada, and check out these slide shows of Masaya and Granada. Enjoy!

Moon was recently selected as Booklist’s Best Travel Series of the Year!

The judges said: “Moon guides these days have such an easy feel in the hand: they open well, and the pages are just the right size, with lots of information presented in uncrowded fashion. And the information is full but precise, evaluative but not pompous. Such good spirit arises from the pages of a Moon guide that the reader can’t help but want to board a plane and make every trip a soulful experience.”

Here's an interesting BBC article and audio interview about Renate Diallo, a teacher at Kings Castle Montessori Nursery in England, and her efforts to establish a new kind of school in Nicaragua. I'm curious to find out exactly where in the country the new school is located. From the article:

"Montessori schools allow children to learn through activities that they choose for themselves... Renate and her son are about to embark on the trip half way around the world to take [the Montessori] method of teaching to a tiny school in Nicaragua... The classroom has just been built by sixth formers from Bristol. The pre-school currently has 20 pupils but Renate is hoping they’ll attract more to the Montessori system." 

Last week, a major hurricane slammed into the northeast corner of Nicaragua. The Bilwi (or Puerto Cabezas) region is the most remote, least developed population center in the country, where a large percentage of people live alongside rivers, swamps, or the Caribbean, all of which were whipped into a fury when an 18-foot storm surge struck the coast amid 160-mph winds. Now incessant rains are raising the rivers and threatening new damage. As the daily body counts continue to rise, a few other numbers are being thrown around: "17,000 homes have been destroyed or damaged," President Ortega said, and an estimated 50,000 people have lost everything they owned.

Read the latest Headlines on the story in the news feed at the bottom of this page, or click "read more" to find out how to help...