Monthly Archives: January, 2010

After not having been on the road much since arriving in Antigua, I had to get back into the swing of long days in the saddle.  I was on my way to El Salvador to meet another motorcyclist.  We made contact through www.advrider.com which has been a great resource for me.  Igor and I met at San Blas beach at the Backpackers Inn which was a beautiful little resort right on the beach.  I was tempted to suggest we stay a night here before getting back on the road, but Igor mentioned that he had heard of a possible way to skip the tedious border crossings at Honduras.  Some guys about a week before us had made the crossing by boat from El Salvador to Nicaragua at a town called La Union.  We figured we’d try and follow their tracks.
Just before the sun was going down we arrived in La Union.  Found a hotel, a Comfort Inn, which was very comfortable, and made plans to head down to the docks in the morning to try and find a boat.
The next morning we made it down to the docks and found a number launchas that looks sort of capable of taking a couple of motorcycles across 20 km of ocean.  We managed to find the same lady that took the other two across the previous week, but she was firm on the price of 300 dollars for the crossing.  Both Igor and I thought that this price was a little ridicules and decided that we’d go for the land crossing.
I’ve read some real horror stories about the border crossings at Honduras.  Waits of up to seven hours, constant confusion, and endless corrupt officials looking to extract as much money as they can.
We arrived at the El Salvador exit around 9 AM and were immediately jumped on by about ten money changers waving their fistfuls of papers at us. I politely told them to hang on a minute as I wanted to process my paper work first.  A second time, third, and fourth.  These guys don’t give up.  I then proceeded to lose my cool which kept them at bay for another five minutes.  And this was just on the fringe of Honduras.  I was not looking forward to crossing the next 300 meters.
Igor and I decided that it would be best to have one person deal with the paper work and the other watch the bikes and gear.  I watched the bike for the next 3 hours.  And we didn’t fare too badly I suppose.  We payed the official fee, about 40 dollars each and five bucks for our helper, the price he said he would take, and managed to avoid a bogus 22 dollar charge each that was written in our passports and called a “road tax.”  Our helper, after seeing that we likely wouldn’t be paying this, ran over to his buddy and a nearby cop who then attempted to persuade us of the need to pay this fee.  Igor held firm though and we didn’t pay a thing, got on our bikes, gassed up, and got on the road.
We crossed Honduras in about 2 hours and we only stopped once by the police who thankfully just looked at our documents and waved us through.  Both Igor and I were prepared for the corrupt police officers that we thought we would encounter, but I guess they had the day off thankfully.
Exiting Honduras was another ordeal.  I would be processing our paper work this time.  I didn’t want a helper and said no too several who offered and kept saying no until one who plainly could tell I was getting frustrated just said come on this way and the others backed off.  He said he only wanted a couple bucks which was fine especially since I was no longer being hassled.  After finally getting the paper work in order, I got back to my bike, found that my gloves had been stolen, cursed this place, and we were on our way to Nicaragua.
The Nicaragua border was much better. There were significantly less people hassling us.  Although one kid kept bugging me.  He wanted some money to watch our bikes, but since there were two of us we had no need.  He didn’t get the clue. “amigo,amigo, amigo (pointing to his eyes then back to the bikes) amigo, amigo.”  After a frustrating day I really wanted him to cool it so I knelt down looked him right the eyes, calmly put my finger in front of my lips, “SHHHHHHHHHH.”  He was immediately quiet, like nobody had ever done this before.  Thank God.
About an hour later we were on our way, the paper work having been processed quickly and easily.  What a relief.
Nicaragua was gorgeous, the land along the highway was incredibly lush and green, Full of bustling farms and activity.  Especially in contrast to the relatively quiet and dry landscape of Honduras, the people hear seemed busy. I saw three beautiful girls walking through the grass off to the side of the road and was compelled to wave to them.  When I looked back all three of them had turned around and were waving to me as if I had addressed each one of them individually.  This cheered me up significantly.
The frustration of the day now forgotten with a wave, I was really looking forward to out arrival in Leon and was pleasantly surprised.  The city was very beautiful and clean. It also has the largest cathedral in Central America.  It took over a hundred years to build, and what a sight it was.  We found a good hotel and had a great dinner of local cuisine.
The next day we went to Granada, another beautiful town ridge on Laco Nicaragua.  We made plans the next day to head up to El Rama.  From Granada it was a four hour ride through beautiful landscape and plenty of windy roads to play on.  Our plan was to catch a river boat from Rama to Bluefields.  There was one leaving right as we were arriving so we bought tickets and found parking for our bikes in a building right by the docks.  I was a little bit sketched out by our parking location because although the bikes would be locked up at night the doors would be open to the general public during the day.  We were also being rushed along because we were holding up the departure of our boat.  In my haste I got everything packed in my cases and forgot to pack my leather jacket.  Not wanting to go through the headache of packing it all again I hastily the jacket on the seat and threw my motorcycle cover on, locked my bike and got to the boat.  This would be a constant source of worry over the next day, as I really didn’t want to have my jacket stolen.
The boat ride was pretty exciting because this really was the boonies.  The river was lined with banana and mango farms and all kinds of cool ramshackle huts.  Although it was a bit uncomfortable sitting in a boat crammed with people on rough water for two hours it wasn’t that bad.
Bluefields was a major change from anything I had seen so far.  It was a true Caribbean town. Lots of life, noisy, dirty, and disorganized.  There were characters of all kinds roaming the streets. Igor and I found a hotel for the evening and a decent meal.  We made plans to get to the airport the next morning to catch a plane to the Corn Islands.  However, that nights it poured all night and when we woke up it was still miserable.  A quick look at the forecast told us that the weather would not be any better on the islands. It wouldn’t be worth the expense and being stuck on an island if the weather wasn’t gonna be sunny and warm.  We took a boat back to Rama the next day and got back on the road.  Myself heading to the Pacific coast and Igor to Granada for another night and then to Costa Rica.
We definitely made a good choice coming back when we did.  Right now the winds are gusting at like 50mph on the pacific coast and I’m told its pretty much the same throughout Nicaragua right now.  I’m staying at a wikid little hostel in San Juan Del Sur right on the beach.  Everybody has been pretty much trapped in doors all day because of the wind.  Its supposed to die down later in the week to a mild to medium offshore breeze.  And with a great swell forecast for later in the week it should make for some good surfing.

Until next time,

Kent

Just want to thank Igor For sharing a few of his photos with me.