Nicaragua

We had to leave our place at 6am in order to make it to the boarder, San Juan del Sur in Nicaragua and get the car back in time.  The drive was off road-ing in a sedan but the GPS and the A/C made it bearable.   On the way there was a few unexpected traffic surprises, at one time there was about 40 cows trekking down the mountain which we had to drive through. The cows were looking at us as if we were in their way lol it was pretty funny. About an hour drive away from the border was only one lane of traffic because the other lane was cargo trucks awaiting entry and most of the drivers expected this type of delay so many of them attached hammocks to their trucks and chilled on the highway, I thought it was really smart actually.

There was a crazy process for crossing the border that even though I just went through it I don’t think I could accurately explain to another person how to do it. You first had to get in a line at one shop that would give you a stamp and fill out a form for exiting the country. While you were in this line people were flashing wads of cash  in your face wanting you to exchange money, while others were begging for anything you could give and the rest were pick pocketers grabbing at your stuff. After you got the stamp you had to actually find then walk or drive through this area on a dirt road where they checked your passport for the stamp, then you had to go through another stand and another line to fill out another form and get another stamp and pay 12$ American. Then you would yet again go through another gated road that would require you to show your new stamp and pay another dollar to them for crossing the actual boarder and still you had to follow them to get a receipt for the dollar you paid??????? If you had a hard time following this, believe me so did I lol. The worse thing about it was finding the right stand in a dirt road area with 100’s of large cargo trucks blocking areas and a lack of English speaking people or signs anywhere. Costa Rica is a very English speaking country, Nicaragua not so much. After all this we did make it through and though I was unsuccessful in finding a hostel with a pool when we got to the city, I booked a special resort hostel in the mountains with a pool for the next few nights.

My first evening here wasn’t bad, I browsed the shops and saw that the prices are a lot cheaper than Costa, which excited me because I am more than sick of my clothes and in desperate need of products but refuse to pay 13$ for a small bottle of sunscreen.  I did however argue in Spanish with the 7 year old that was working in the farmacia, she was reluctant to get someone else to help me so before I got in trouble for bulling a child I digressed. Though I still feel too sick to shop (I know I don’t think I say that very often) I managed to drag myself out to dinner with a few people I had met from Victoria. After dinner I decided to relax in the dorm and call it an early night to try and get healthy with sleep. This sleep was definitely interrupted though because at 3am there was a city wide power outage which is actually still out 7 hours later. This meant that the little fan in our room that keep you from overheating stopped working completely, so within 20 minutes everyone in the room woke up in heated dizziness of uncertainty. Dealing with the heat was hard enough to add there was a group of about 5 very loud guys at our hostel that decided to bring the party to the backyard at 4am and yell until 6am. Then there was the guy in the bathroom outside our room that was violently ill for an hour. Oh and for those of you who have never stayed in hostels before there is no sound proofing in the walls or floors, you can hear when a person coughs down the hall.  I also learned that Nicaragua’s water system is dependent on electricity as well so there was no water and no way to flush the toilets...yuk....So clearly my first 24 hours in Nicaragua  has not been exactly what I expected but swimming in the pool in this beautiful hostel/resort in the mountains later today should hopefully lift my spirits and help me recover from this terrible cold.