Emotions were mixed for us. It was our plan all along to go to Costa Rica but, quite frankly, we had kinda fallen in love with Nicaragua. The people in Merida and all the cool stuff on Ometepe were still tugging at our hearts and minds. Our little cabin in San Juan del Sur was already feeling homey, even after just 12 days. We had a routine, by golly - breakfast, hit the market for the days groceries, lunch, swim in the ocean, drink, dinner, drink, games or computers, sleep - repeat. Why mess with that?!
Except we knew we needed to do this. It's like going into the beer aisle at Freddy's. Sure you can buy the first 6-pack you come across and it would probably be fine. But look at the selection! So much to choose from! Mind boggling, really. The same is true here in Central America. Not the beer selection - it's pretty horrible. I'm talking about the people and places, the towns, the beaches and mountains. We've seen bits of Honduras and Guatemala; now Nicaragua. All have been gorgeous and wonderful places to be, each in their own way. Could we settle in Copan or Tela or Antigua or Merida or San Juan del Sur? Sure! But adventure and excitement await! Confident that Costa Rica would not disappoint, we were packed and ready for this next leg of our adventure.
Bex! had called our taxi-driving new amigo, Pedro, the day before to set up the ride to the Tica Bus station in Rivas. We had purchased our bus tickets six weeks prior, during our first visit to SJdS. Carmen had told us that the holiday season was a big travel week in Central America. People go where the work is which means families often split up, Mom and Dad living in different towns, even different countries, kids living wherever they were needed most. We were told that Tica Bus runs as many buses as necessary to handle the holiday increase but that we would be advised to reserve in advance. We did.
When Pedro had brought us from the port to SJdS, he pointed out the Tica Bus office in Rivas as we passed it, so we knew he knew where we needed to go. He's a great guy. And he was early picking us up! Shocked the hell out of us. We had built in a little slush time, knowing how Nica time works - no such thing as 'on time'. Early? What the hell? So we finished breakfast dishes, made the sweep through the cabin to make sure we hadn't left anything and then hauled bags down to his car. Goodbye LoboLira! We'll be back!
The ticket office is on the east side of the road, the southbound bus stop on the west. Pedro dropped us and our bags right at the bus stop. And by 'bus stop' I mean 'the side of the road'. I stayed with the stuff while Bex! walked across the road to the office to see if we needed to check in or show ID or ??? Nope, we had tickets so we were good to go! We stood waiting for the bus, admiring the other gringo travelers with their one backpack. (Sigh.)
Yep, the Clampett's were a'headin' to Costa Rica!!
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| For this picture we cleverly posed two suitcases to completely hide one. |
The Nicaragua-Costa Rica border is only about 20k south of Rivas, so we knew it wouldn't be long before we needed to start dealing with the border crossing. We were happy to see that a guy from Tica Bus came down the aisle to pick up passports and the 100 cordoba ($4) exit fee. He would bring everyone's passports and the cash into the Nicaragua immigration office to speed up this end of things. Nice!
Except that it wasn't all that fast. No biggie. Since it was the holiday season, there were a lot of buses which meant a lot of people lined up entering and leaving Nicaragua/Costa Rica. Even processing documents and stamping passports assembly line-style, it was going to take some time. So we hung out and watched life at the border crossing. We were required to exit the bus while the gentleman took our docs into the office. It was very warm and humid, with rain clouds threatening to make the crossing even more interesting. But it never rained, which was a relief.
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| Black clouds couldn't keep her away! |
Vendors of all types - food, drinks, shoes, clothes, jewelry, purses, bags, watches - set up at the border and hawk their goods to their captive audience - namely, us. There are busloads of people all milling around waiting for their respective bus drivers to get their docs processed, so it's a great opportunity to sell. Smart business folks.
In fact, one of the vendors found a customer in Bex! Sometime last summer, after one of the events in The 50@50 Project she lost her watch. We think it may have been sometime around the Earth Day Run in April but we're not sure. We didn't find it while packing for this move nor was it in the car when I cleaned it out when I sold it to my good friend, George. If you work out at all, you know how important a watch can be - tracking time, pace, setting alarms to remind you to take in water/nutrition, etc. Rather than replace the watch, Bex! kept hoping it would turn up. Never did.
So, here in the void between two Central American countries, waiting for approval to leave one country and enter another, was an eager customer just hankering to make eye contact with the guy selling watches. Sure enough, he saw her and came over. After checking out the wares and deciding on a timepiece, it was haggling time. A brief back-and-forth later, and Bex! was the proud owner of a brand new 180 cordoba (~$7) sports watch. Ah, commerce. I almost got in on the act, too. Bex! paid the guy for the watch with a 500 cordoba bill, for which he had to go find change. As a show of good faith, he left all of his watches with me. I almost sold one to an Australian couple! I wonder if I would have gotten commission...
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| Just a small portion of the chaos that is the border. |
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| In and out stamps for Nicaragua, on the right! |
Because Costa Rica has been very popular with tourists for quite some time and because a lot of those tourists have just decided to stay to take up space and use resources in the country, Costa Rica has tightened up its visa policies. While most countries have some sort of 'proof of onward travel' requirement (meaning you have to show that you're leaving the country at some point by possessing a return plane ticket or bus ticket out) most don't enforce it or ask for proof. However, Costa Rica does. Before they'll let you in, you have to show that you're leaving!
We knew this, so had purchased Tica Bus tickets for about 85 days out, sometime in March. Armed with the tickets to show we were 'visitors, not stayers', we breezed through the immigration part, got our passports stamped and collected our bags. Once outside, we had to run all of our luggage through a scanner, I guess to see how much Flor de Caña we were bringing into the country. We gathered up our belongings, brought them to the waiting bus where they were reloaded underneath and got back to our seats. Now the long part of the bus ride commenced.
We dozed a little; stared out the window as Costa Rica rolled by; watched a Kevin James movie that was actually shown in English. We tried to catch the names of the towns we passed through but weren't very successful. We had stocked up on granola bars, so we snacked periodically, too. It was a good 4-5 hours to San Jose but the time seemed to pass quickly. Probably the excitement of traveling on this next leg of our honeymoon!
We could tell we were getting close to San Jose when we noticed the urban sprawl and the increased (i.e. 'slow') traffic. Now we were really excited, sitting up to take it all in. Of course, we really had no idea where the hell we were, but we saw signs with names we were familiar with - Alajuela, Escazu, Cartago, Heredia - all familiar because we had studied the maps prior to leaving the states.
We arrived in downtown San Jose at the Tica Bus station and immediately saw a crowd of taxi drivers waiting to pick up fares. Imagine being at, say, Portland International Airport where the taxi drivers all wait in their cabs to be called forward one at a time by a concierge keeping it all calm, safe and organized. Okay, got that image? Good. Now picture that same scene except with cabs parked every which way on the street and all the drivers pushed against the door so they can be the first one to yell 'Taxi!' any time the door opened even a little bit, all pushing and shoving each other to get the best place in the crowd. Um... yeah.
We got off da bus and entered the terminal. I've mentioned before that 'waiting in line' is not a concept down here. Once the bus stopped, there is no orderly fashion to disembarking. People push to the front, trying to slide by you in the aisle. Then, inside the bus terminal where we waited for our bags, people just push to the front, jostling each other for the best position. It's a little chaotic. Bex! waited with the stuff while I claimed our bags. They brought them in a few at a time on a hand truck, so it took a while.
Once we had everything, I waited while Bex! stuck her head out the door, into the taxi driver mob, to see if she could find our driver. Yes, once again, we had been hooked up with a driver. Andres and Gloriana, the couple from whom we were renting the apartment for our stay in San Jose, had a friend who was a taxi driver. Of course. So they had arranged for Alvaro to meet us at the terminal. Now, when we pulled up to the terminal and saw the the crowd of drivers, one guy stood out. A little taller than most, long white hair, a long white goatee. He looked awesome, like a latino Gandalf! I remember thinking to myself "Man, I hope that dude is our driver! He looks like a guy I'd want to drink a beer with!"
And, lo and behold, this guy was Alvaro, our driver! We were smiling as we made our way to his car. We couldn't quite get the bags into his car in a way that allowed for all the hatches to close, so we ended up driving out to the suburb of Escazu with the trunk open! Meh. We were very grateful that Alvaro knew the way to the place. We had directions but relaying those to a driver in the heavy traffic would have been brutal. We took in the sights while we talked with Alvaro. Soon enough, we pulled up to the driveway, Alvaro called Andres, and the gate slid open. Andres met us downstairs, we paid Alvaro and then lugged our bags upstairs to our new home.
Andres and Gloriana are wonderful people. He's from Argentina, she's from Costa Rica. They're both architects/designers and the apartment reflects that. They gave us the rundown on the place, showed us where everything was located, told us about the neighborhood, gave us general directions to the closest stores and restaurants. It was great talking with them! Two people we'd like to drink with - with these two, probably wine.
The only thing they inadvertently left out was how to turn on the hot water to the shower! So for two days we took the coldest showers we had yet endured in the two+ months we'd been in Central America. I'm talking 'ice cold, take your breath away, jump in and out to rinse off' temperature of water. OMG. I shed tears of joy when Bex! got an email from Andres with 'Oh, yes. I forgot to tell you how to turn the hot water on!' Seriously, you have no idea how good a warm shower feels until you haven't had one in a while.
After our very long travel day, we were too tired to do anything but wander down the road to Rosti Pollos for dinner. We walked back 'home', hand in hand, taking in all that we had accomplished on this day. Sure, people do it every day but considering everything that can go wrong, we felt pretty good about ourselves! So there! Let us have our moment, thank you.
Back home, we sat up and watched some TV. Bex! went to bed; I was feeling a little wired, so sat up and watched The Amazing Spiderman and The Dark Knight Rises. I'm a sucker for super hero movies. And they remind me of my son.
Enough for now!
Adios, Nicaragua!
Hola, Costa Rica!
Stamps collected!
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