January 15, 2009
Welcome to Gringo Costa Rica

I left Granada early, as usual, and figured it would take me about two hours to get to the border.

Leaving Granada

Flat. Hot. Agricultural. the wind started to pick up.

And now it was a steady force to be reckoned with…

I passed swanky Nicarauga…the whole area “felt” rich…rich grassland, rich ranches, etc. I had not seen too much “rich” in the countryside of anywhere in Nicaragua.

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I filled up my gas tank with my last colones and rolled to the border.

After dodging a bunch of “helpers” and paying a $1 “exit fee”, I now needed to get into this line… was it a line? Not so much.

Migracion:

oofa. That was going to take some time. So I got OUT of line, and decided to exit the bike before exiting ME from Nicaragua, hoping that the line would go down.

Ha!

So I figured out what building to do the bike paperwork in, and stood in line. Get tot he window, the lady tells me I have to have my little slip of paper stamped. Where? “Afuera.” (outside) Who? “Afuera.” (outside) Where? “Afuera.” (outside) Who? “Afuera.” (outside) Finally a trucker in line behind me told me I had to find a guy with a blue shirt to stamp and sign the papelito. Outside,  I find an official-looking man in a blue shirt. NO, the other type of blue shirt.

Dios Mio.

I go all over the place looking for another type of blue shirt, find him, and he tells me that I have to have the other guy in the blue shirt stamp and sign it as well.

OK, I figure it’s the FIRST guy I talked to, so I find him in a different location, chat him up, get my stamp, and go back to wait in line to deal with the bitchy lady in the booth.

By the time they are done exiting my bike from Nicaragua, I have 7 stamps and signatures on my little piece of paper, AND NOT ONE OF THESE PEOPLE HAS SEEN MY BIKE! No VIN checks, no visual, NOTHING! All these double checks…DOUBLE CHECKING NOTHING!!!!

So I get back into the migracion line that has not slimmed down at all.

Oh and by the way, there are these guys and gals coming around offering up the papers that you need to have filled out when you reach the window. I ak the lady in line behind me if I need the paper, she says yes, and that they expect a “tip”. I say I will not get one, now the paper guy is pissed, the lady behind me is pissed (because it means she will have to wait longer), but I hold my ground.

I look behind me, and I see this big sweaty guy. Tall, about a head over everyone else, so I figure he’s a gringo like me. I cock my head, look at his pants, and smile. Boots, too. BIKER! he smiles, I smile broader, he jumps the line and comes up with me. he is JP, also en route to Tierra del Fuego (wherever travelers like us ultimately end up).

JP holds the place in line while I cut ahead to the window, get us two papelitos, and we chat in line and the line (seems) to move quickly.

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We ride together to the Costa Rican side, and see a line even longer than the one on the Nica side…so big, it stretches in a serpentine around the parking lot, in the hot sun, for about 100+ people. And as JP holds the place in line so I can pee, I see another “mirror” line to migracion out the OTHER side of the buildiing!!

After about an hour in line we finally get to migracion, where the guy stamps my passport SO FAST that I think he has not done it and I argue!

well, shoot, still not done, now we have to import the bikes into Costa Rica.

After they do all the paperwork, no, we re not done yet, we have to ride to yet another building to get the official stamps officially stamped.

NOW we can leave.

Here are the poor truckers trying to get IN to Nica…the line extended for about 4 miles…

It’s fun to see someone else in my rearview mirror…
(the cord is my camera lanyard so I do not loose the camera)

We consult each others plans (I have none) so I follow him to the Coast.

Playas los Gringos Cocos

Well we divide and search for hotel rooms..Me? $150 shared room with no bike parking. But JP has the touch…Private room with private bath AND bike parking $20 each. BEACHFRONT! Sold. I end up spending two nights there…

[January 13-14-15: Nicaragua]
[yes, I am going back in time trying to get caught up on the blog]

I was hot. I’d ridden through some invisible curtain and the temps soared while the humidity rose. Dang, it’s just plain UNCOMFORTABLE in a full-on riding suit.

So I was irritable, my memory wasn’t helping me to find the really cool place Karina and I had found two years ago, and I was just going to leave Granada and go out to the Monkey Hut on Laguna de Apoyo. I stopped and asked the guard at the Western union office how to get to the Laguna, and was headed out of town. Out of the corner of my eye I spotted a hostel that looked like I could enter with the bike.

As I backpaddled the bike the wrong way down the narrow one-way street, a fellow came out of the hostel and asked if he could help. I asked the price, (dorm=FIVE dollars!) amenities (free coffee and WiFi and use of kitchen) and my #1 question??? Secure parking for the bike? (YES!)

The folks were friendly,  the Wifi signal was pretty strong, there was a super restaurant right next door, and for four days I kept saying “one more day”. Every night I would tell them I was leaving in the morning and every morning I would tell them I was staying another night. Part of my thinking was that I’d just had parts shipped to me in Panama and now I had to take my time getting there, so I’d relax a bit and catch up on the blogs.

Granada is Nicaragua’s 4th largest city, but even saying so it “seems” a manageable size to me. Seems quite small , actually.

When I arrived at the Viajero Clandestino (clandestine traveler) this cute kid, Brian, 8 years old, was recharging his ample batteries for more visit with the tourists (his mother is one of the cooks in the restaurant attached to the hostel)

Che, the national hero.

Breakfast my first morning. Rice, scrambled eggs, and fried bananas. YUM!

The next dayBrian kept hanging around and asking me questions and I w as trying to work. I finally told him that if he left me alone I’d ask hs Mom if he could go with me when I took some pictures around town.

A TOUR OF GRANADA

Here’s Brian posing with the Bocadito on the corner–the hostel is just down the street on the right, the green building.

The church in the earlier post–again I chose not to pay the $2 to climb the belfrey.

There were kids playing soccer in the courtyard of the church, and riding skateboards. The church is at the crossroads of two neighborhoods t seems, so there is lots of traffic and lots of people hanging about.

Donuts, Nicaraguan style.

City street scene.

Street scene.

The cathedral of Granada, just off the main park.

One of the most popular ways to see the city.

The Parque Central.

Statue in the center of the park.

Brian seemed enchanted by fountains.  Since he is a poor Nicaraguan boy, there are many places such as the nice hotels where they have lovely fountains and gardens…I entered some so he could see the fountains.

The main pedestrian area, where all the foreigners hang out. I do not care for crowds of gringos so I just walked through.

Dog in a windowsill.

My tourguide / companion

Brian wanted to see this fountain again now that it was lit up

Dinner. Yum.

The next  day I asked Brian’s Mom if I could give him a gift. I do not carry much, but the nice owner of the saloon in Honduras had given me this hat…brian was ENORMOUSLY pleased and proud of himself.

He brought his brother  byt to show me / the hat off

The next day a picture of the market as I walked to 25 stores looking for a Nicaragua sticker for my bike

Dinner! YUM!

January 28, 2010

It’s weird…I really miss my bike.

She’s all bound up and ready to fly to Bogota. My flight is at 11:00 today (Thurs 1/18/10).

Bye, sweetie, see you on the other side…

Dan Bard just had an article published in the “Motorcycle Times” on my trip…

It’s a PDF

Motorcycle times article on Alisa (MotoAdventureGal)

Tuesday January 12th
[Well, I just spent an hour on this post and realized I am repeating myself...I will leave it because it represents a LOT of work!]

Luckily this border crossing into Nicaragua was pretty straightforward.

I got pestered by the “helpers” at the gas station before the border, and they continued to follow me to the border. A couple of kids sitting next to where I parked my bike told me they’d “watch” it…and I told them everything was locked up so I didn’t need their help, thanks.

The picture is of the Nicaraguan side.

Of course there is a picture of Che painted right on the wall at the border crossing.

The roads after the border were pretty flat…and the land was agricultural. Yes, folks, these are cows along the Pan American Highway.

Then it started to get more interesting.

I rolled through the mountain town of Esteli. I remembered being here a couple years ago on my “trial” Central American trip as a backpacker. Esteli is known for being the hub of the tobacco region in Northern Nicaragua.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estel%C3%AD

I stopped to take a picture of the mural on the wall of the bus station.

I wear a lanyard around my neck and have attached my little point 7 shoot camera to it. I do not recommend taking pictures while riding, as I do. I have lots of practice (offroad this summer) and sometimes I think these pictrues are mor interesting than the “posed”  or “composed” ones. Here you see the type of traffic I get to pass. I never ceaase to be amazed at the number of people that pile into the backs of pickups.

I learned in Guatemala that there s a whole industry around it–people not wanting to pay the (already cheap) prices for the buses  stand roadside and flag down these pickups. When I first saw it in Mexico I kept thinking “wow, so many people just loitering”. But no, they are on their way somewhere. I guess that’s part of the reason for “Latin time”… how can you be on time if you don’t know when the bus or the pickup wil come by and collect you?

Lunch! Enter my world of fried bananas…

Out of the mountains again. Riding to the North side of Lago Nicaragua, trying to avoid managua.

Flat. hot.

yes, a horse drawn cart of the Pan American Highway (Panamericana)

Passing a chicken bus…

Yes, a free range HORSE grazing on the panamericana

Finally I reach Granada, and stop to collect myself, get a  drink, and look at the Lonely Planet Book to try and jog my memory about the town and look for a place t o stay.

This is the old hospital

With my usual aplomb, I wend up in the center of the daily market yet again.

An old church in Granada. For $2 you can climb up into the belfrey and get a pretty good look at the city. Two years ago Alex, Karina and I went up there (and we rand the bell )

We rode in, we rode out, we had an excellent adventure. More details to follow…

Today (January 223, 2010) I rode all the way across Panama and met up with Igor Shen here in Panama City and tomorrow we’ll ride together into the Darien…

On the way out of Honduras I had the chance to stay with the lovely Bron family…the Dutch/Belgian family with their 3 active boys gave me some great insights into what it is like to be foreigners in a foreign land…and yet another point of view of Honduras, which I was grateful for. The ride into and out of te capital city of Tegucigalpa was effortless thanks to Willem’s guidance.

I crossed the border at Los Manos, and it was pretty painless compared to Honduras.

I headed straight to Granada, where I spent 4 days at a new hostel. It was a comfortable enough place, an easy-to-navigate town, the bike was safely parked, any my bike parts were just shipped to Panama (thanks Jim!) and so I was no longer in a hurry to get to Panama City.

I ended up spending 4 days in Granada.

Random shots crossing Nicaragua:

Frontera (Border)

Mural on the entrance to the bus station in Esteli

Lunch, $2.50

Yes, yummy fried bananas and chicken.

Lots of stuff being burnt: the air was thick with smoke

Yup, that’s right, folks, a horse & cart on the Panamerican Highway!

yes, that’s right, folks. A loose horse on the Pan American Highway.

Rolling into Granada, the old hospital.

And once again I manage to roll right into the middle of the market

Enjoy!

http://rumbum.com/689-the-perfect-trip