Nearly vacant a decade ago and site of several brutal confrontations during Nicaragua's civil war, the Pantasma valley has grown rapidly to become a major source of bananas and sweet oranges for national consumption, and a treasure trove of war stories and old ghosts.
If you don't let the rainy season intimidate you, an old German vehicle like the IFA above will carry you through the valley and north into the mountains of Nicaragua.
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The dry season means even the rivers go dry, and the cattle grow boney-looking and meager. This shot is of the Coco River during the dry season, when the meandering waters change course from day to day.
The edge of the area that looks scraped clean by the water indicates how high the flood waters reached, and with what force they flowed, during Hurricane Mitch. The Río Coco tore straight through the mountain town of Wiwili. The two separate halves of Wiwili subsequently decided to go their own ways: one side now belongs to the department (administrative unit) of Madriz and one to Jinotega.
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August, 1993:For weeks I'd traveled eastward across Java, Bali, and the Lesser Sunda Islands. But it was time to head back to Java to begin work and an adventure of a different sort. Evaluating my choices from rural, remote Larantuka, Flores, my options were stark: the next Pelni ship wouldn't reach Surabaya until far too late, and getting there sooner meant retracing my steps across dozens of long bus rides. Wandering around the port town I made a friend in a young Flores teenager interested in practicing his English with me, and as I described to him in Bahasa my predicament, he proposed what was soon to become one of my best adventures ever, unsurpassed on three continents. "Because we are friends," he explained, "and I want you to be alright."
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Our daily routine was lovely, and changed little over the year: the classes we taught started in mid- and late-afternoon, and therefore sometime after a casual morning of reading, preparing lessons, or running errands and exploring, it was time to make the commute to school.
That meant saddling up our bikes and riding the sandy, back roads from Pogung Baru on the outer limits of "urban" Yogyakarta down through the villages and rice paddies of Central Java to school. It was one hell of a ride, and before long we knew the longest route possible that permitted us to avoid the hectic and slightly dangerous traffic of Jalan Kaliurang. When we rejoined the highway and turned our bikes eastward towards central Yoyyakarta, it was when we'd reached the Selokang.
No other feature on our route was as much a topic of conversation.
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We used to say I don't care anymore if I never have money. As long as I have my sweet honey, and a shack in the woodland.
-- Greg Brown, "Who Woulda Thunk It?"
In the golden sun of January, winter afternoon
Among the evanescent wreckage of a time that passed too soon
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