Dropping the Bomb

Hello Nicaragua, Goodbye Costa Rica!

That´s it, I´m gonna have to do it: After being in Costa Rica for a month, I got sick and tired of the lazy tourists and the super safe reputation that makes Costa Rica a haven for fat Americans and other bad tourists. The locals are jaded to the tourism and lack any desire to interact with people on the road of life. This is a particularly difficult situation for me, because interaction with locals in Spanish speaking countries is the spice of my life. So this is what it´s come down to. The moment I crossed the Nicaraguan border, I knew how I felt. It was then and there that I first dropped the F-Bomb on Costa Rica. I could tell that I was back to my roots, where the food is cheap and delicious, the houses are made of corrugated tin, and the streets are brown and filled with potholes--Exactly the way I like it.

Making my way into San Juan del Sur with Simon, a Kiwi friend, I knew I was going to love the place. It´s like an outback Costa Rica, and even reminds me a bit of Cuba. Beautiful people and wonderful hosts. We made our way down a forty-five minute dirt track. The road is a chiropractor´s wet dream, compressing the spinal column with ease as rural houses and water wells passed us by. It´s exactly my kind of place, rustic and amazing, even though the electricity gets shut off for three hours a day to conserve energy for the rest of the nation.

Our home for the next week was to be the Casa Blanca, a beautiufl multi-story house, gated in brown woods and created with excuisite taste. In a country as poor as Nicaragua, it´s no shock that this is a place where a retired Sandanista government minister has made a home for himself on the beach. The fat bastard sits outside most days, drinks two medium sized bottles of rum, smokes three packs of cigarrettes, and orders his workers around the house. On a good day, he might pee himself, and then attempt some sort of conversation with Simon and I. Most days though, he just pees himself.

The surf has been decent, though on most days I roll around in the swell, and get tossed by more waves than I catch. It´s fun most days, and if I end up riding the faces of a few decent sized waves I can call it a good day. Simon always says that the best surfer is the one having the most fun out there. Anyway it´s defined, I´m nowhere near the best. In a place as famous as San Juan del Sur, it´s no wonder heaps of professional surfers call this their home break.

Isla Ometepe

After a bit of a ferry ride, I found myself in the middle of Lake Nicaragua (the largest lake in Central America) on Ometepe Island. Two volcanoes and not much more. The island has one paved road, but, not surprisingly, everything worth visiting is off that road. Anyhow, I hung out for a few days and got to know the locals. It seems to me that there can´t be too many things wrong with a place where bartering still exists for many, and where I can buy rice and beans directly from the farmers who are drying them in the front yards. Not too much at all. Wait, wait. I´ll be honest, avocados and mangos were hard to come by, but that´s about it.

North to Granada

I found myself a bit confused. It seemed as if I had fallen asleep and dreamt myself in this situation: I was on an American Blue Bird school bus, made in Fort Valley, Georgia, but with Arizona registration. The men sitting around me were wearing baseball caps, all of them Nike, Lacoste, SF Giants (that guy doesn´t have good taste, obviously), Addidas. It was crazy, like I was back at home riding the middle school bus to catch an 8:00 AM class. Then I looked outside and all I saw were wooden houses with palm roofs. I realized I wasn´t dreaming, this is Central America. No wonder.

I guess some crazy hurricane is coming this way. Nobody seems to fussed around here; it´s just business as usual. Around these parts it just seems that sometimes it rains, and sometimes it rains really hard. They don´t really worry too much, either way.

Sorry it´s been a while since I´ve updated this thing. I was working in Costa Rica for a while, which was a blast, but since moving on I haven´t been too close to the internet often. It´s been nice. Additionally, I don´t have a camera, since I never expected to be in Nicaragua when I packed my bag and left home for Australia in late June. The road is long and curvy, and I just couldn´t see that far ahead. So the few photos that I do have are courtesy of Simon McDonald, my Kiwi pal. I´m not even looking at the camera in many of the shots, but hell, beggers can´t be choosers, right? I will post more photos on this blog as other travel friends email them.

One Love.

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