You now know we came back to Nicaragua to volunteer for the year in Merida…
And you know why we decided to do this… (see 'Fast Forward' blog post)
You know we have had the privilege of working with some great volunteers already… ( see 'All-Star Volunteers')
We've shared a bit of the cultural we experienced at the rodeo… (see 'The Rodeo is in Town!')
We've mentioned we have our own place.. (Casa de Profesors, Playa Gringo)
You've heard mention of the kids at the Ometepe Bilingual School as well as the adults we're teaching… (my little buddy, Kenneth, for example)
Let's go back to the end of January, shall we? Do a little catch up work in this post.
Friday 24 January 2014 - Escazu, Costa Rica:
Our cab-drivin' buddy, Alvaro, picked us up bright and early to get us to downtown San Jose and the Tica Bus station. Even though we had pre-purchased our tickets, we stood in line to make sure we were good to go, then checked our enormous number of suitcases and bags. We were seated in the very first row, which was nice. It's the perk you have when you buy your tickets in advance! We were sitting right behind the driver so we entertained ourselves looking over his shoulder and shouting 'LOOK OUT!' every now and then. Just kidding.
We were prepared for this trip, with much snackage at hand - granola bars, mostly. It's a five hour trip, so having food was important, especially since Bex! gets 'hangry' (hungry + angry) and, similar to the Incredible Hulk, you won't like her when she's hangry. We passed the time talking about our 'plan', napping, taking in the countryside. I think we were both feeling excited and nervous about this decision. Was it too late to head back to the relative comfort of San Jose and gringo-fied grocery stores?!? Nah, we knew where we wanted to be.
Merida.
After many hours, we reached Peñas Blancas, the veritable No Man's Land of a border crossing between Costa Rica and Nicaragua. As I mentioned in our post 'Collecting Stamps' there is an ongoing debate over which country's vendors have priority here, who controls it, etc. Meh - we're just passing through.
Back in December when we went south to CR, it was a fairly orderly and official process: As we approached the border the Tica Bus guy came down the aisle, collected passports and exit fees; we got off the bus, he brought our docs into the Nicaragua immigration office, stamp, stamp, stamp; reload, drive the 100 meters or so to the Costa Rica office and unload again, claiming all of our luggage off the bus; queue up, wait in line for more stamps; run all the baggage through an airport-like security X-ray machine thingy; reload and back on the road.
Coming back into Nicaragua on this trip:
Hit the border, unload, stand in line to get stamped out of Costa Rica, back on the bus; drive the 100 meters to the parking area, handed over passports and entry fees (they get you coming and going!), unload all baggage… then it got different. Nicaragua has no fancy scanners or uniformed immigration officers or official roped off lines. They have makeshift tables, constructed of plywood and 2x4's that are, inconveniently, up on a loading dock. So all the bags were hefted up onto the dock, then we climbed up the stairs and put our bags on the plywood tables; everyone unzips their luggage so it can be inspected.
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| Heads up - that big black suitcase on the right is going home with our first visitors! |
We waited a while, then the Immigration and Customs guy came by, looked at us, waved us on without even looking in our suitcases full of
We picked a likely looking guy and he helped us schlep our bags down off the dock and back to the bus. Since we were on the Nicaragua side of the border crossing, we tipped him in cordobas. He looked at the bills, frowned and asked if we had Costa Rican colones instead! Ha! Nope, we had spent them all.
It was hot and humid, so we sat in the shade watching life at the border and the chaos of the vendors, buses, travelers. Eventually, the Tica Bus guy came back with all the passports. Everyone crowded around waiting for their name to be called to retrieve passports and reboard the bus. It was official: we were back in Nicaragua!
A short time later, we were unloading at the Tica Bus station on the Pan American Highway in Rivas. There was a taxi waiting for the bus to arrive (smart driver) and we snagged him immediately. Again, perks of being up front! He got us and our numerous bags in his small four-door sedan and off we went to Hotel La Mision. We love love love this hotel. No website - the link above takes you to their Trip Advisor page. The rooms are clean and comfortable, with AC and cable, they have wifi, the food is good (breakfast is included in room price) and the staff are wonderful and friendly. Excellent place to stay, should anyone be passing through Central America.
Rivas is not a 'destination' at all. Travelers getting to Rivas are almost always immediately going west to San Juan del Sur and the beaches of the Pacific Ocean or to Isla de Ometepe. Or they are on the Pan American going north/south in Central America. I would guess that most travelers just pass through. Unfortunate for said travelers because we found Rivas to be quite charming, if not a little rough around the edges. It is a really neat town and once you get off the main road with gas stations, the (WalMart owned) MaxiPali, a few hotels and restaurants, Rivas is pure Nica.
Rivas is much larger than what you see from the highway. It's a lot like my home town of Moses Lake, WA and what you see of it if you just drive I-90 - glimpses of the businesses located near the freeway but there is so much more if you drive into town. Rivas offers two gorgeous old churches, a nice parque central, some really great restaurants and a street market scene that will make your head spin. In contrast, Moses Lake offers Chico's Pizza, the Sportsman Tavern, Ripple chicken and Harry's Taco Shop. In fact, I think Rivas and Moses Lake should be sister cities. Speaking of pizza, taverns, chicken and tacos, after checking into the hotel and relaxing for a bit, it was time to find some food. The proprietor at the hotel, Allain, suggested we go to a place called Mango's for dinner.
Speaking perfect English (having grown up in Miami), he gave us rough directions - "I think it's 3 or 4 blocks that way (pointing), then go left and it's 2-3 blocks that way (again, pointing left of where he originally pointed), I think". Being the adventurous types we figured we'd find it. And we did! No website but they have a lot of "me gusta's" on their Facebook page. I'd link to that but I can't get it to work, so you'll just have to trust me. The food was really good and the atmosphere was… lonely. We were the only ones in the place. And it's a big space. The Latin music that was playing was great and would have been just fine. But because we were obviously from out of town, they turned the TV on to the British CNN feed, turned the volume up (because apparently all tourists are hard of hearing), then also turned the volume for the music up. We enjoyed our meals, talking loudly to one another. The best part was that we had Toña again. Beers in Costa Rica were okay but we really like Toña. Ahhhh.
After dinner we walked back to the hotel, showered and turned on the AC. We watched some TV and were soon fast asleep, our long travel day over!
Saturday 25 January 2014 - Rivas, Nicaragua:
Shopping day!! We would be in Rivas for two days and had a lot of items to pick up - a detailed list of supplies for teaching and another list for household goods we would need once our place in Merida was ready. The list had been reviewed and revised many times, so we were confident we had it down to a manageable agenda for the weekend. Our results proved that to be correct! Much success as we wandered Rivas looking for a printer, printer paper, markers, whiteboards, scissors, etc. The big purchase was the printer. We shopped that around at several locations, finally buying from a store that specialized in office equipment and gadgetry.
Hell, by lunch time we had a large chunk of our list crossed off. Time for food! Marta at the hotel suggested we try Chop Suey. As you can guess by the name, it was a Chinese food joint and a very good one at that. Bex! had pork fried rice and I had chicken chow mein. Delish. After lunch, we hit the stores and the street market again.
One thing we had trouble finding was a power strip surge protector. Man, the way the electricity comes and goes down here, it's a necessity, almost. Back home we know where to go to find a power strip. Down here items aren't always categorized in the same way. We eventually found one at a ferreteria (hardware store, basically). While good ol' Ace Hardware is a place we'd look back home, ferreteria's here are typically more metal and fasteners, concrete and brick, hand and power tool oriented. After asking at a few places, we were directed to a nearby ferreteria in the mercado (market) district.
Between the two of us we know enough Spanish to handle most situations. Bex! certainly speaks the language better than I do and we both know a lot of vocabulary. 'Power strip' is not in the repertoire for either of us, however. In fact, a lot of the specialty items we had been looking for took a mixture of some Spanish, gestures, pointing, etc. to gain the understanding of the ever-patient Nica's we encountered. So, we walked up to the counter and, in pretty broken Spanish, described as best we could what we were looking for. It took a bit and the guy waited patiently for us to finish. When we had exhausted every word and hand gesture we could conjure to explain 'power strip', he looked at us then pointed right over our heads. Had we looked two feet above us, they had three styles and he asked (in Spanish) which one we wanted. Yep, patience. Humbled, we crossed 'power strip' off the list.
While walking around Rivas, we were approached by this group of people, students from the English school in Rivas. They were excited to see some actual non-Nicas on which to try their new language skills. We had a great conversation with them and when they found out we were heading to Ometepe to teach English, they asked if we could come to Rivas once a week to teach. In fact, Allain asked the same thing, even offering up a space in which we could hold classes. Like I said, people here want to learn! These students were awesome and we wish them the best of luck!!
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| A little English + a little Spanish = new friends |
We also hit the farmacia (pharmacy) for cheap drugs. Seriously, when you see how much meds cost here, it's no mystery why health care costs in the US are so effed up. I got my blood pressure medicine for about 28¢ per pill. Back home the same exact pill runs over $3. Ridiculous. Bex! takes Prilosec daily and we found this pill for super cheap, too. She said something like 'I got more than a three month supply for what I would have paid for a month's supply back home.' Indeed, it's a hard pill to swallow. Sorry - couldn't resist.
By the end of the day, we were able to find everything we needed and finished up Saturday with dinner at Vila's Rosti Pizza. I liked this place; Bex! thought it was passable. To me, pizza is like sex - even when it's bad, it's still pretty great. Hahaha! (ahem) Anyway, I liked it and we had a nice time, sitting street side right across from the parque central, watching Saturday night go by. Allain, from the hotel, happened by and sat with us for a bit. We talked more about what we were doing in Nicaragua. He was impressed and made it clear that if we ever needed anything while on the island, to just let him know and he would arrange to get it on the ferry. Amazing the network one can build when doing good things.
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| Saturday was mission accomplished! |
This was the day we returned to the island! I was excited and also distracted, as it was also my son's 30th birthday. I miss him so much and think of him every day - especially on this special day. I could only hope he was proud of what I was embarking upon, and that got me through the day. Happy birthday, son!!
We arranged for a taxi to pick us up at the hotel to bring us to Puerto San Jorge, which is basically Rivas. This time we were heading across the lake to Puerto San José del Sur, not the larger port of Moyogalpa we had traveled through on our other trips. Our driver even arranged a ride for us on the island, with a friend of his who could meet us in San José del Sur. Awesome! As it turned out, it actually was un-awesome. Silly us. More on that later.
Considering all the stuff we bought, we managed to pack it into our bags with only the printer in its box as an extra piece of luggage.
We celebrated this major achievement by having beers at 9:30 in the morning on the ferry ride to the island. It seemed appropriate.
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| Victoria's slogan: "When You Can't Get Toña… Drink Victoria" |
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| This is a light load; usually the deck is crammed full! |
The ride our mainland guy had arranged was there waiting when the ferry docked. Problem was it wasn't the direct ride we had been told but rather a collectivo - a big van with multiple passengers going to different locations. Oy. We were beat from our long weekend of travel and shopping, and just wanted to get to Merida. We got in the van and were a little confused when another couple got in. Nice folks from Canada. As we chatted with them, they told us they were just on a day trip and were getting a lightning tour of the sights on Ometepe. It dawned on our tired brains that we were stuck in the van with them and that the driver was going to stop at every tourist attraction between the port and Merida. No bueno.
We eventually worked it out with the driver and his partner. It held us up for an hour and a half or so. The first stop we made was at Charco Verde. (I'm pretty sure the English you'll see on the link is a direct result of unedited Google Translate. Enjoy!) The delay wasn't too bad and, heck, it's Central America, so ya go with the flow. Or we tried, anyway. We waited at the gate while the driver took the Canadians on a whirlwind tour of the nature preserve.
Bex! napped…
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| "That cloud looks like a gringo laying on a bench." |
…and I took pictures of some very cool, very old stone carvings on site…
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| The monkey was waiting for a taxi, too |
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| My, what big teeth you have! |
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