I proposed to my wife in the south of Holland on a 420 called Goliath (port tack). Not only did she do me the favor of saying yes, but after we had moved from Europe to Nicaragua (leaving family and 420 behind), she bought me a Force Five. A pre-1993 model, pale yellow hull, it belonged to a departing German who drove a hard bargain, and was presented to me on my 30th birthday.
We sail on Lake Nicaragua, where 400 years ago the Welsh pirate Henry Morgan also sailed. Morgan came to sack Granada, a lake side town that was one of the jewels in Spain’s imperial crown. Like us, he probably had the water pretty much to himself. 
And like us, he might have marveled at his surroundings: the jagged teeth of Mombacho Volcano 3000 ft above, draped in virgin rainforest; the maze of 200 intricate islands created by Mombacho’s eruptions; the twin volcanoes on the island of Ometepe, the largest island in a freshwater lake in the world; the green parrots; the fish eagles; and the freshwater sharks.
Granada still stands today, despite the best efforts of Morgan and others (including an unscrupulous American called William Walker who tried to burn the place down in the 1850s). It’s still a delightful town, if a touch shabby these days. But, hey, this is Nicaragua, annual per capita income $500, the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere after Haiti and best known for its wars, revolutions, earthquakes and hurricanes. But scrape away the media image and you find Nicaragua is in fact beautiful, friendly and relatively safe. Oh, and the sailing is pretty good too.
Lake Nicaragua enjoys strong and fairly steady east winds from November through to April. The prevailing wind direction is convenient because it has allowed the Force Five and us to get acquainted with each other in a large and well protected natural harbor. No need to venture out onto the notoriously choppy waters of the main lake. Now that we’ve learned that it is better to head up wind rather than off wind in big gusts – contrary to what my father used to tell me (sorry Dad if you’re reading this) – we manage to remain upright most of the time. We’ve certainly had the odd dunking, but so far the freshwater sharks have failed to show any interest.
We’ve yet to set eyes on another dinghy (never mind another Force Five). The nearest you get is a couple of heavy wooden rowing boats with improvised sackcloth sails that only work going down wind. We kick ass, although the competition isn’t exactly fair. 
Sometimes my competitive side hankers after a proper race. Perhaps in another life we’d solve the problem by bringing several Force Fives into the country and investing our savings in the establishment of Nicaragua’s first ever sailing school.
Spare parts are a problem. We’ve been off the water since New Year's Day, with a broken fitting on the upper mast piece. We order new stuff over the web from Sail-One-Design in Florida, but it has to go on a roundabout route via Belgium and arrives in Nicaragua as diplomatic mail. Sent directly, spare parts arrive in the hands of Nicaraguan customs officers, who demand more in duty than the value of the goods. The enforced lay-off has at least given us a few weekends to touch up the woodwork, and by the end of February we should be kings of the water once again. And once back we’d better make the most of it, because life won’t be like this forever – we’re expecting a baby for September…
