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Published: June 15th 2011
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We did, in fact, see Honduras. From Perquín there was an atmospheric drive through the mountains on a rickety bus – quiet, haphazard villages emerged out of a thick mist, hard working women and rugged blokes with hand tooled and decorated leather machete scabbards watched as we rolled past. The mist was so thick at times it flowed in through the cracks in the windows like smoke. Albeit chilly damp smoke.
The border crossing was painless – only a short wait while we waited for the driver to try his luck with a local girl who seemed to be just hanging around. We changed buses in the Honduran town of Copan with enough time to have a decent and cheap lunch. It seemed a little too difficult to go straight through to Nicaragua from there, so we made the call to stay a night in Tegucigalpa – reputedly one of the most dangerous cities in the Americas. Hopping off the bus at the Tica bus terminal, it certainly felt like it.
Hard eyed stares, razor wire and a particularly dodgy taxi driver were the order of the day. The lady in the hotel we eventually found was nice enough,
but she wouldn't even let us go outside to find something to eat. Instead, she called one of her friends who came and picked us up and drove us to a flash shopping centre. The bar across the road had bouncers. Nothing knew there, but these bouncers had shotguns, vests, and were patting down everyone.
And this hotel was in of the good areas.
There was a massive disconnect, though. The shopping centre we went to for something to eat was a place for the wealthy. It was a place you didn't go if you had nothing. There was clearly a huge gap between rich and poor here - more so than other places we have been.
Not to put too fine a point on it – Tegus was a shithole. We got a bus out of there the next morning. We were catching a Ticabus bus, and these go from capital to capital as a general rule. We had booked a place in Estelí, Nicaragua, as it sounded good, but it was on the road to Managua so we were reliably informed that we could ask the bus driver to stop and let us off on
the way. Once we arrived at the bus station I asked the guy at the counter to make sure our bus was going the right way – there's two options.
Of course not. It was going the other way, through León.
Crap, okay, well, change of plans. So, we had a bit of a look at León in the LP while at the bus station. It looked all right, definitely worth a visit, so the change of plans was of no real moment.
Once on the bus, of course, the conductor confirmed that yes, the bus will be able to let us off near Estelí. Right. Fine, change back, sit back, relax.
The border crossing was the easiest yet. The immigration guys actually got onto the bus to do the formalities – we didn't even have to stir from our seats. A relaxing trip, looking forward to the estancia at Estelí.
The first indication came when I was looking out the window at the big volcano – it was on the wrong side of the bus. Now, either they had moved the San Cristobal volcano or we were going the other way. Klaire told me
I was wrong (it has actually happened on occasion). When we pulled up a servo and the conductor came up to us and told us that we were to get off here – 7km from León – score one for Team Adam. Sure, we were in the wrong place, but that paled in comparison with being right. But, no mention from the conductor of his previous discussion of dropping us off near Estelí.
Whether it was the old world atmosphere of the colonial town and the easy going nature of Nicaraguans, or simply that no one could get to Estelí; León was full. We had the slightly nervous experience of trying 7 different hostels until we found a sympathetic hotelier willing to let the four of us stay in a triple room. The room actually had 2 double beds, so I'm not sure what the fuss was about. It was a bit more expensive that we had been prepared to pay, but in the grand scheme of things probably better than sleeping on the street.
Leon itself was well worth a visit. As one of the best preserved colonial cities in Latin America it had the ubiquitous UNESCO
World Heritage Listing – but this time it was deserved. With a relaxed, easy feel, it was pretty nice to simply wander the cobbled streets, look at the churches, admire the colonial architecture and ponder the lack of old stuff back home.
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