Update Day 23, 312 Miles

February 2, 2008

It was a nice morning in Esteli and the temperature was hovering at a cool 68 degrees, perfect conditions for leaving Nicaragua. I was up a little before 7 so I could take advantage of the breakfast included with the room. I had what they call The Americano which is scrambled eggs with ham and toast. It is not great but it is more than enough to get me started for the day. I was on the road by 8 and heading for the border of Honduras. The whole way there I have been going over in my head all the things that can and probably will go wrong.

I arrive on the Nicaraguan side at 9 and I am through with that by 9:15. On to entering Honduras. This border on my way down was the quietest one that I dealt with and this time it was the same, I was the only person there. I walk up to the building and it is locked. I find out that they stepped out to get a bite to eat. I hang around for 5 minutes and he returns. I start of by saying “hello” and asking how he is doing this morning and he seems to be in a good mood. I handed him a copy of the old Honduras permit hoping he will just stamp that one and send me on my way. No such luck! He tells me I need to get a new one and he starts the paperwork. He asks for my Passport and then for the bike documentation. I hand him the cleanest color copy of my registration that I have and continue to talk to him to possibly distract him that it is not the title. 20 minutes later he takes my $30, shakes my hand and gives me the permit. I’d like to think it was my rugged good looks and my charismatic attitude that helped him along but I think he just did not want to be difficult or he did not know any better.

It’s now 10am and I am heading down the hill to Choluteca. As I descend the temperature is climbing fast. By the time I hit the valley floor it is 95 and windy. At that point I headed towards Tegucigalpa the capitol of Honduras. Lucky for me they put it up in the hills where it is much cooler. It is winding roads all the way and they like to pass much more aggressively here. I can not count how many times I came around a left hand turn only to find a semi truck in my lane and heading right at me. There were a couple close calls but I am sure they just felt a lot closer than they were.

I got a little bit lost when entering the city but stopping for directions has continued to work well for me. I even had a guy have me follow him for a few miles so he could make sure I found the right way. Most of the day was heavy traffic and passing many slow vehicles but the last 50 km was great with hardly anyone else on the road and great mountain scenery. I finally pulled into a town by the name of Santa Barbara. I found an OK hotel for the night but all I need is a bed so it will do. I did not take any pictures today but it was pretty the whole day. The first half was all mountain pine trees and then it turned a little bit more to tropical greenery. Tomorrow I think I am going to stop by the town of Copan and see some more ruins. From what I understand they are supposed to be the best around but I am sure I will say, you’ve seen one you’ve seen them all. After Copan I hope to cross the border into Guatemala.

Update Day 15, 275 Miles

January 25, 2008

Today was an early start. The night before I had spoke with a few of the guys who were planning on riding to Guatemala and then returning to Panama and I decided to tag along with them. We met for breakfast at 7 am in the local town square where we reintroduced ourselves. The ring leader of the group was Paul on a KLR 650, a resident of Panama for the last 15 years, I think. He is a transplant from the States who at one time was in San Diego and a desert racer. Next up was Norm he is originally from England and has been in Costa Rica and Panama for the last 6 years or so and he is riding a Honda Valkyrie 1500. Norm´s bike will play a neat roll in the days to follow. Then there was David who is on a BMW 1200GS who has been living in Panama for the last year and a half. Last but not least is Ken from Missouri. He has flown down to buy a 92 BMW 100GS from Paul and Paul has agreed to give him a tour of Central America as part of the deal. And now there is me as the fifth wheel.

After getting acquainted for a bit it is time to ride. It is a nice 30 minute ride over the mountains to the ocean. This is the same road that we did last night but it is much better when you can see the surroundings. Once we regroup at the Pacific we break off into three groups because we are going on a dirt road and the dust is bad. First to go is Norm. We gave him a bit of a head start because he is riding a cruiser bike which weights in excess of 800 lbs. Next are Paul and me. We went together because we would be riding at a faster pace and then it was David and Ken. The road was crowded with cars and trucks so there was a lot of passing to do but Paul and I had a good time anyway. At the other end we had planned to meet up at the gas station which we thought everyone knew. As it turns out Ken never got the info. We waited at the gas station for an hour before Paul went to find him. Of course soon after Paul leaves Ken pulls up. He said he had ridden past where we were two other times before he saw us or we saw him. Shortly after Paul arrives and we are all together again.

Now that everyone is refreshed we go on. We make it about 2 miles and we come to a bridge we have to cross. It is small so we have to wait for traffic coming the other way to go first. We cross with no problems and move on. Another mile down the road David is slowing down. As I get close to him I see his rear tire it flat. It turns out he had something puncture his tire when crossing the bridge. Lucky for us, or planned for them, there is a tire repair shop 100 feet from where we stopped. 10 minutes and $2 later we are rolling again. We stop once for lunch and then we make it to the Nicaraguan border with plenty of daylight to make it to our destination for the day, or so one would think. We all get through with ease except for Norm. He is having problems exiting Costa Rica and has to wait until 6 pm for the shift change to get some paperwork filled out. $60 later and at 6:10 he is in Nicaragua and the border is getting ready to shut down for the evening. He makes it thorough at 6:50 with 10 minutes to spare but it is now well after dark, again. When leaving the border area you have to show your paperwork to another person before leaving. Paul has done this many times and has found out that there are many things they charge you for with no authority. He tells us this when we go past the last inspection because they want you to pay a $1 local tax and will be waiving at you to stop but then tells us to keep on going. Sure enough as soon as we cross they are waiving us down and running in the streets trying to block us but we keep on moving and saved ourselves a whole dollar! Another 30 minutes goes by and it is 7:45, we are now at The Hotel California in San Jorge Nicaragua. The hotel is owned by another former US resident by the name of Frank, a nice guy who just got tired of the rat race and is living a nice quiet life running a hotel. We also met two Canadian brothers who have been traveling for a few months named Andy and Darryl.

Update Day 11, 188 Miles

January 21, 2008

Sorry for the long wait but believe it or not my first priority has not been to sit at a computer for two or three hours and get my updates done. There is actually more interesting things to do here.

This is actually take two on this update. I do not want to say where I was because I want to keep everyone in suspense. I spent 45 minutes doing the update at an Internet cafe´ and then the computer shut off. As it turns out at this particular cafe´ the computers are set up for a period of time and then it logs off. 45 minutes of work was lost and I walked out after yelling at the worker and not paying.

It was another early day for me. It started out by getting up at 6:30 a.m. and leaving the house at 7:00 a.m. with Felix and Gerardo. It was a half hour trip to a tour of their family coffee farm. Felix says that their farm is approximately 3,000 acres but it appears to be much larger than that. They employ about 150 people year round and during the height of the harvest season there can be as many as 900 people working there. It starts at about 3,500 ft where the rain forest starts and continues up to about 4,500 ft. The beginning of the tour was where they process the coffee beans after they are harvested and then a tour of a house that the family uses for special occasions and parties. After that it was on to a tour of the property. The scenery was simply amazing. It is all on mountain sides with very little flat land and all I kept telling them is I could make a great off-road motorcycle track. It is really pretty sad when all I can think about is using their land for motorcycle riding instead of growing coffee and employing a small city. After driving around for about an hour or so it was time for breakfast. Before leaving the house Felix grabbed some eggs and when we arrived at the farm Gerardo dropped them off at the kitchen that cooks three meals a day for the workers that live and work on the property. There are about ten men and women that work in the kitchen that took some time out of their schedule to cook our breakfast of rice, beans, cheese, eggs and homemade tortillas made on the huge comal that is heated by wood grown on the property. I even had my first cup of coffee in I don't know how many years. They said it was great coffee and I am sure they were right but I have no perspective to speak from so I will just say it was good and I enjoyed it thoroughly. After everything was said and done, I could see myself spending some nice quality quiet time there but it was time to move on. We headed back to the house, packed up the bike and I hit the road at 11:30.

I took a different route out of the mountains than I took in and the views were beautiful but the moment was tainted by the potholed road and a lot of traffic. It was about a 45 minute ride to the town of Matagalpa on tight twisty roads and then it opened up a little bit until I hit the valley floor in Sebaco where the temperature was hovering around 92 degrees. I started out at 65 degrees in Jinotega 1:15 minutes earlier. The road from Sebaco to The border of Costa Rica was hot, fast and straight with not much top mention of interest.

I did happen to have an encounter with the local police department that is worth mentioning. As I approached the town of Masaya the road came to a "T". The right lane was forced to turn right by ways of a median which directed it to the right and the left lane did the same to the left. As I pulled up to the stop sign to make my left turn I saw there were about six or seven police officers with people pulled over. I made sure I came to a complete stop, looked both ways and began my turn when it was clear. Before I had even rolled 10 feet they were waiving me over to the side. I pulled over and started practicing my acting lessons that I never took. They were telling me that I did not use my turn signal which they were correct but I could not let them know that. I had the Stupid American act in full affect. They were pointing at my turn signal and asking for my license which I gave them. Once again they did not like the international driver’s license. After a few minutes of them pointing, waiving my license and telling me I am going to get a ticket they finally just got frustrated because I apparently could not comprehend what they were saying and gave me my license back and sent me on my way. I think the best part of it all was in the end one of them asked me where I was going. I told him to Costa Rica, which he then gave me directions for in Spanish. I thanked him and continued along my merry way.

Stupid American 1
Cops 0

As I mentioned before the rest of the trip to the border was uneventful. I arrived at the border to Costa Rica at 3:13 and figured I would have plenty of time to get through and find a hotel before dark. As I pull up to the border I see that it is by far the busiest border I have seen yet. I end up hiring a helper to get me through. It cost me $10 to employ him and to bribe the workers to get me to the front of the lines which easily saved me an hour or so exiting Nicaragua. Past that hurdle I figure I am in the clear but as it turns out there are just as long of lines entering Costa Rica. I acquire another helper and pay him and the officials $20 to put me on the fast track through. After a bunch of back and forth I am waiting in my last line with my helper long gone and the sun going down pretty fast. I have about five people in front of me and the person processing the papers calls the next person in line. That guy tells him to take me first because I am on a motorcycle and he also notices the sun going down. It took another five minutes and I was on my way. Now it is almost dark and I need to find shelter for the night ASAP. I turn up the speed a little bit and make my way to the first town about 10 miles inside Costa Rica, La Cruz. I locate a hostel type hotel right on the beach and inquire about a room for the night. He tells me that they are booked up. I ask him out of curiosity how much the room is and he replies $10. It turns out that I missed the deal of the century because it is all of about a 30 second walk to the Pacific. As I throw a leg over the bike to continue the search he comes out and tells me he has one room left. Once again luck is on my side for no apparent reason. I check in, do a few days updates, find something to eat and turn in for the evening.

Update Day 10, 239 Miles

January 20, 2008

I am starting to get a little worried now. I do not want to be starting any bad habits here but it is another early day for me, 7:15. It is a quick 30 minute ride to the border of Honduras. And as it turns out that is about the only quick thing for today. I knew it was going to be a difficult crossing so I hired the services of a helper named Renee for $5. The problems started when he asked me for my title to the bike, which I do not have. To make a long story somewhat short, it takes about 2 hours and a $30 payoff to the boss to let me in without a title. On top of the $40 it normally costs to get the bike in; all this for 2 hours of riding through their country. The first half was hot and boring riding as the temperature is now hovering around 94 and at sea level. Then it climbs into the mountains for some more, you guessed it, great roads. I know it is getting old hearing about the roads but it has been that good. Anyway I will spare everyone the details and just say I had fun.

My next big thing to do is get into Nicaragua which turns out to be a breeze. I don't know why I had a feeling things were going to be down right difficult in Nicaragua but to my surprise they were not. Another thing that surprised the hell out of me and probably will you is that the women down here are just beautiful.

Once into Nicaragua I head to a family friends house of Sylvia in Jinotega. Most of the way to their house was good but hot. Then you start climbing into the mountains again. I turn onto the last road to the town and half way in it turns to dirt which I was not expecting. I stop, turn the ABS and Traction Control off and prepare for some fun in the dirt. It was about 15 miles of rocks and dodging dump trucks but fun. I arrived at the house at 3:45 and was greeted by Felix and his mom. She has a beautiful home with a great garden patio in the center of the house. I have dinner with Felix and his brother Gerardo then we go to his Aunt’s house next door and meet more of his family and have a few cocktails.

I am sorry to be redundant here but it was another good day.

Text Message Update 2008-01-20

I am at Felix's mom's house in Jinotega, Nicaragua with Felix. Another good day.