All the way south

We left Caraz at 8 with the plan of going to see some of the lagoons in the mountains. Caraz is very high in the Andes (yeah, like the mints). The region is beautiful but we were having ugly weather prohibiting us from seeing any of the high peaks. You know the paramount logo? Well, it is in the Andes about an hour off-road from Caraz. The map has a star noting it as “The most beautiful mountain in the world”.

The plan to see the lagoons was interrupted by me having some issues with my chain oiler. I thought that it was just out of oil but it was clogged and I had to disconnect everything to get it working again. Since it took me a couple of hours to fix it at the gas station we didn’t really have the time to go up the pass.

Instead, we just hit the road and started heading to Lima. The road was paved but there were TONS of potholes and road constrution making the progress slow going. I just loaded up some music in the iPod and was having a nice relaxing ridef through the twisties of the Andes.

This lasted for a few hours until the afternoon storms started rolling in a little early at 11. We stopped before the sun was completely blocked with black thunderclouds to put on rain gear. Because it was so cold and the sky was blocked with rain, I went full force:
* Rain liner inside riding jacket
* Rain jacket over riding jacket
* Rain pants over riding pants
* Rain shoe covers over boots
* Rain 3 fingered lobster gloves over riding gloves

I felt like a snowman. With all that gear on, it is a little hard to move and a little hard to control the bike so I very rarely put it ALL on unless I know it is going to rain hard and it is going to be a very cold rain. I think a torrential storm in the Peruvian Andes was the perfect time.

Just as the rain started coming in we started climbing a pass to break through the Andes and start heading over to the coast towards Lima. This was one of the most difficult riding I’ve ever done — We weren’t driving through hard slamming rain exactly, more through clouds that would produce such rain. The air was thick with water. We could only see a few feet in front of us. Under normal circumstances we would stop, but there were no safe places to pull over because the visibility was so poor and there were so many convoys of big trucks on the road. To make this worse the pass was under construction. There were paving crews reducing the road to one lane alternating with huge strips of non-paved highway. This was the double-black diamond run of the Andes.

We kept the speed low but made continuous progress and eventually descended through the clouds onto a desert mountianscape. There was almost no plant life as all the mountains were textured by only exposed rocks.

It was still cool, but atleast the rain was over. We then continued towards Lima.

One of the things that the area north of Lima is famous for in the South American motorcycling community is the corrupt police. I’ve read about it many times on Horizons and spoke to people personally who have had problems with them. There are police checkpoints on the side of the road where there is a big police SUV and a cop standing there with an orange lightsaber looking traffic guiding device. When he sees you, he either waves you by or waves you to stop.

We have already been stopped once north of Chimbote, but managed to talk our way out of any problems by redirecting the conversation to us asking him for directions.

Our stategy is to keep the speed up and hopefully not give the cop the chance to think to stop us or to ride in the wake of a big truck so that he doesn’t see us until we’re passing him.

So we were enacting this technique but were unable to find a truck to ride behind and a cop starts to wave us down.

At the exact moment it was happening, it was unclear if he was waving us through or to pull over. Both our reaction was exactly the same: Wave back!

Anyway, he walks to the drivers side of the car and I start to run the various chase scenerios through my head. It is now clear that he wanted us to pull over and we didn’t. There are checkpoints every few miles and he was now radioing to his collegues to REALLY stop us next time.

Our solution: Find a hotel.

It was already getting late and that is to the police’s advantage. Usually when you get stopped, it is a waiting game. They hold your documents and you just sit there. They want you to be in a hurry and to just “pay the fine on the stop” regardless of if you did anything wrong.

There was a turn off to a small town on the beach called Vegueta. We asked a collictivo (multiperson taxi) driver if there were hotels in town and he spouted a bunch of spanish that sounded like yes.

We headed towards to coast and came upon a sandy beach town. The main road was paved, but the rest of the city of probably 10,000 people were sand roads.

First we stopped at the tourist office. As Theo went into the tourist office, I saw a hotel and went inside to see if they had rooms and parking for the bikes.

I enter the hotel and start with my DaveSpan and explain that we would like a room with two beds. The old Peruvian woman, who I can barely understand, says yes. I think.

Then we start talking about the parking situation and she starts pointing to across the street where all the tuktuks (3 wheels motorcycle taxis) park and says that it is secure. I then ask if we can park inside the lobby area because the bikes should be able to fit. She keeps talking about the tuktuk parking and I decided to break out the big guns.

In my best DaveSpan, I start into a speech I’ve used many times about how my motorcycle is novia (girlfriend) and that I don’t want to park her on the street with all the other men. That I want her to be close to me so I can look after her. My novia is beautiful and everyone likes to put their hands on her, so I like to keep her in very private parking.

She stops pointing and then takes a good look at the bike. With a huge grin, she says I can park my novia right in front of the room.

After all this is going on with me for 5 minutes inside the hotel, Theo is having his own experience. While I’m not sure what that it, the result was him talking in even worse spanish than my own to a group of 10 very curious people.

Everyone is smiling and laughing. It looks like the one english speaker of the town came out and with his very basic english starts to ask questions for the group and translate answers.

I manage to grab a second with Theo from the crowd and we start to move the bikes inside the hotel lobby.

The enthusiastic crowd follows.

Theo and I were now trying to move the bikes into the lobby’s new “Big Bike Parking Area”. There was one guy who had a tape measure and measured the door frame for us, another guy who moved the furniture out of the way, and then the crowd of people who were squeezed into the door frame watching the whole thing transpire.

Once we get the bikes parked they realize I speak a little spanish and start asking me all sorts of questions.

Where are you from?
Where have you been?
Where next?
How much time?
and the final question was: How did you choose our small town of Vegueta?

I of course did not mention anything about avoiding the police.

Middle of the Earth Park
I’ve been in South America for a while, but FINALLY I will be in the Southern Hemisphere upon entering Quito.

Just north of Quito is the park that celebrates the equator “Mitad del Mundo”. They have this big monument and an actual line that is supposed to be the equator.



Bathrooms on the middle of the earth.

I’m using SUPPOSED to, because according to GPS, it isn’t. I don’t know who is right, but I know that my GPS (actually, both my garmin AND my spot) say that the middle of the earth is actually just north of the park and runs along the side of a dusty road.

I understand that the dusty road isn’t as fun as the lavishly landscaped park filled with tourist shops (No stickers, btw), but hey, if I’m going to celebrate the equator in ecuador, lets atleast use the real one. Not some line paved on a piece of land that the cousin of some government park official owns.

Of course I had to visit Alberto’s Turtle Head Scottish Pub in Quito. HI ALBERT. After many-a-shots and a very good but drunken conversation with an Ecuadorian I eventually made it back to my hostel. If you’re in Quito, you have to go to The Turtle’s Head. It wasn’t until after quito did a scottish guy explain the vulgarity of a turtle head. I knew it had to be something vulgar, I just wasn’t sure what it was…

Take your sheep for a walk!

The elusive cuy.

Gotta get the good photo!

I miss my doggle

…..

Highlanders

Wear great hats…

I could live here. All the men wear shorts

But I need to enlighten them about the sandals thing.

Typical town square

This is near Vilcabamba where I partied way too late 2 nights in a row. Man I’m getting old… Strangely I have no photos from that night

Why walk your horse when you can lead it while in your car!!!

We rode from Medellin to the Ecuadorian border in 4 or 5 days (which was WAY TOO FAST).  Unfortunately, I’m running out of time to make it all the way south (.com) and don’t want to have to add the subdomain almost.allthewaysouth.com.  So now, I’m in making time mode.

More views

This is Mike and his hostel Casa Blanca in Cali

Theo on the corners

We met a guy from London who gave us some good tips as he’s heading north.

Trying to get the bike out of the hotel

More…

Colombia recycles!!!

Tough view

Colombia

Colombia breakfast

She Cooked the breakfast

Colombia view

We found this in our soup at another restaurant.

Our reaction.

Panam

This was one of the landmarks that I wanted to see on the trip.  Here we met two bikers that had passed us the day before.  They’re on a suzuki and are from Bogota.

The Church from the mirador where we first met the Colombian Bikers.

Colombian bike theif

Here’s the couple again, with their bike

More head balancing.  I hadn’t seen this since Guatemala.

Theo!

This is what we do

Ask for directions and ignore what they say and just head the direction they point.

Gas is $1.50 a gallon in Ecuador

This graffiti is in support of che “We are realising Che”

“Paramilitaries get out of our country and city!” I’m starting a collection of Che graffiti.

Colombia is the country that I wanted to visit the most as well as the country that many of my friends and family said I should avoid.

To the people who said not to go: Stop watching movies and TV stories about Colombia and experience it yourself.

Colombia is my favorite country that I’ve visited. The people are the highlight. Not only are they exceptionally good looking, but they’re incredibly friendly. We were sitting on the bikes and an older lady walked up to us and said “Welcome to Colombia” followed by the warmest smile. I’ve never been welcomed to another country before.

I also talked to more locals and made real contacts per day than in any other place in my trip. The people of Colombia are incredibly welcoming and open to speaking to foreigners. What is also nice is that people not only want to hear our stories and why we’re here but also share thiers. Conversations like that are really the highpoint of traveling. It is worth the 3 months it took to drive to here.

Upon arriving, we met Albert from the Turtles Head. Yes, in Colombia, not Ecuador. He’s apparently been charmed by Medellin and is going to open up a new bar as well as other business endevers in Colombia. The first night we tried to find accommodations and didn’t find anything good so Alberto let us crash at his apartment. Albert is a good guy who really contributes significantly to the international moto travelers scene, despite the crazy things he posts over on Horizons =] .

On Saturday AM, we went to pick up the bikes from the Airport. They were surprisingly at the warehouse as Copa promised and were in perfect condition. Well, they were in the same scratched and dented condition as we delivered them.

There we met the most helpful (and very beautiful, I must add) customs girl. She went out of her way to help us get the bikes Saturday even though she could have easily pushed us back to Monday. Also Theo was invited to a party by “La Bandita”, aka the bad girl of the Copa Warehouse. Unfortunately, the party was really far from where we were staying.

The next day we stayed at Casa Kiwi Hostel, near Parque Llenas, in South Medellin. This hostel is ran by Paul, an American from Seattle who decided not to leave Colombia after visiting it. This actually seems to be a common thing, as I met a couple of people with the same situation. (HI MIKE IN CALI)

Since Casa Kiwi is ran by a biker and has very good parking in a private garage on site, it is a regular haunt for motorcycle travelers. There we met a swiss/spanish couple and a german woman traveling solo. Corola, the german girl traveling on her 1990 XT has a website that you should visit here.

We were supposed to spend a two days in Medellin, but we ended up spending a week. I would have spent more if I didn’t have to go back to work in January. I really like that place and plan to go back some day.

Carola

Gotta watch out for those FARC reading the Google book.  Colombia is clearly 3rd world.

Ok, well they do have heaps of chinese motos.  There is also a v-strom factory there so there are TONS of Vees and Wees.  What medellin needs is a good biker bar.

They have an elevated train.

Modern cities

And securty guards who must be hunting something with those long rifles.

This guy made a rain cover for the 3 of our tank bags

See how nice they are at only a couple of bucks a pop.  Not only a good price, but he said they would be ready in one afternoon.. AND THEY WERE!

Vespa skoot

Panama!
I’ve finally crossed the Panama Canal. I don’t know if that means that I am on another continent, but crossing the Canal for the first time driving to Panama City did feel like a major milestone on my trip. There are several bridges that cross the canal, but the one that connects the PanAmerican highway with Panama City is a HUGE suspension bridge. Unfortunately there was tons of traffic and we were unable to pull over and get a picture.

Panama City is a cosmopolitan city. We had sushi 3 times (yeah, I missed sushi). I’m not sure what typical Panamanian food is, but I’m sure you can find it in Panama City as you can find anything you want there.

We stayed at Hostal Mamallena. It moved recently and was a pleasure to stay there as everything was new and the people running it really had their act together. Plus we met lots of cool people there. I still don’t have my head around what the backpacker experience is like, so it is nice to stay at a hostel and learn about their perspective.

The majority of the time we spent in Panama was spent trying to find a boat. We talked to most of the hostiles in the area and were unable to find a boat that would be able to carry two bikes safely. There were a couple of boats that _could_ take two bikes, but we would have to lay them down flat on the deck. That sounds like a Really Bad Idea.

Our only choice was to wait for a couple weeks for the Melody, so we ended up going to the airport to find an air shipper.

We checked out Girag, DHL, and Copa. DHL was unable to ship directly and we would have to crate the bike and use a frieght forwarder, so that option was out.

Girag made us wait for an hour to give us disappointing news: $1000 to ship EACH bike. That was just unaaccecptable. For that price I would spend two weeks in Panama waiting for a boat.

Copa, on the other hand, was very professional and prompt with their good news: $700 to ship the bike to Cali, Medellin, or Bogota.

Theo and I decided to ship the bikes to Medellin and we were able to drop off the bike the next day and catch a flight two days later (Friday). The total cost was about $1000, $700 for the bike and $300 for the person.

Between the time of dropping off the bikes and catching the flight, we had a chance to actually visit the Canal.

I talked to some people and it was completely uninteresting to them, but it was really amazing to me. We spent a couple of hours just watching ships. Water level up.. boat floats in.. water level lowers.. locks open.. boat floats out. It really is amazing that people were able to cut a waterway through so much land.

Between David and Panama City

I got a flat tire while driving around Panama City.  Not a problem because we eventually found a tire shop and once I removed the wheel, they fixed the tire for $5.

Thanks man!  I told you I’d put you on the internet

Your shop too

Current level of flare.

Panama City skyline.

I will be flying over this ^^^

?????

I’m starting a photo series on bathroom signs.

Next stop Colombia

Costa Rica, like entering, was very easy to exit.  I entered the border zone and was shuttled into a packing space by the different but non-unique border helpers.  There we stepped up to the first window nearest the parking space and canceled the migration stamp in our passport.  Thirty seconds later we walked to the left to Aduanas.  Sixty seconds later the bike permit was canceled.

Thanks CR!

Panama:

We were being herded by helpers to park towards the front of the covered area of the main border building.  You actually want to park in two different places, towards the front, where Migration is.. then towards the rear by Aduanas.

Documents:

Standard Title, DL, Passport.  I think we needed 2 copies of each here.  I don’t remember.  Just always have TONS of copies with you of everything.  It makes things so much easier and faster.  They have a copyshop on site though for $.10 or $.02.  Really cheap.

Fees:

$2 gringo fee, IF and ONLY IF you are from the United States of America

Otherwise, I’m prety sure we spent no money.

Process:

Towards the front of the building is the Migration windows.  This was very easy for Teo because he’s German, but required two steps for me.  I had to first start the paperwork, then go to the bank next to Aduanas to pay for my gringo entry fee of $2.

Once you get the proof of payment, you hand it to a lady walking around who gives you a sticker for your passport.

Then go back to the window and get the official entry stamp.

Return to the Aduanas window towards the back of the covered area.  Get entry paperwork here.  It was quick and easy to get the paperwork.

Once you get that paperwork, you need to complete it by getting a signature by the Customs Inspector.

For me, I had the paperwork for both bikes and he signed the forms then gave them back to me.  In spanish, he started asking for a propina, or tip in order to not search the bikes.  What is funny is that the beginning of the time I was joking around with him in Spanish then when he took me to the back office to sign the paperwork he got serious.

Then he asked for money and all of a sudden, I forgot how to speak spanish.  He kept saying that he wanted money in several different ways and I kept looking at him confusedly.   He then looked at me and smiled and said, “You understand exactly what I’m saying, quit lieing”.  With that, I chuckled and walked out of his office with the signed papers in my hand.

Lots of CamoPolice

Strange police building

This is a pretty bad picture, but the roads in Panama are fantastic.

On my way from the Allegro Papagayo to Liberia I encounted problems with the police.

What I thought was just a normal checkpoint to verify paperwork was actually a speed trap.  This was no problem for me as the speed limit was 60kmh and I was going around 60kmh.  Or so I thought.

Since I thought it was a check point and I wasn’t pulled over, I opened with my big smiling DaveSpan (which is actually pretty good these days).  I presented them my documents then they presented me with a radar gun showing “81 kmh”.

There was NO WAY that I was going that fast.  But, they had it on radar and argueing with police never seems to work.  I knew what was happening:  They were after their own share of gringo dollars.

Usually when I get pulled over by police, I speak absolutely ZERO spanish.  “No fumo espanoll”.  But since I didn’t realize this was a ticketing opportunity, I just had to keep speaking it.

Interestingly enough, my level of comprehension decreased significantly once I realized what was happening.

Mustashed police man: “You were going 81 kmh, you should be going only 60 kmh”

DaveSpan: “*cock head sideways*, eh?”

Mustashy, in broken english: “You too fast *showing me radar*”

me: “No entendus”

Musty, back in spanish: “You need to pay a $80 fine.  You can pay it at the bank + 30% more, or you can pay it here, $80″

Me: “No tuvos dinnero, only plastico”

Musty repeats what he said in spanish a couple of more times, then in broken engrish.

I keep repeating the same thing too, it is like we’re stuck in a loop.

I tell him, “Yo go to the el banco and pagar”

I then go to show him my fake wallet becuase I knew I had only a tiny amount of money.

He sees $11 US, and says while reaching towards my wallet, “That will be fine, just slow down”

I’m shocked.  He grabbed at my wallet and I didn’t know what to do.  I guess I was happy to done with the situation by only paying $11US, but my policy is to not pay a bribe under any circumstance.   ARGH.

He leaves and lets me go on my way.

I email Theo this and tell him to drive VERY slow, slower than posted, and to expect to stopped by police.

Interestingly enough, he gets stopped by the EXACT same cop and has to pay a small bribe too.

This is the first time after being stopped MANY times by police looking for a little something-something from the rich guy on a bike.  Even crazier is that it is the first time the Theo had to pay in something like 30 counties.

Costa Rica in the majority of ways does not give the vibe of Latin America. This is because of the huge level of US and other foreign development. That being said, my disclaimer should be that I was told that I went to the wrong places in Costa Rica because everywhere I went was fairly touristy.

Speaking of tourism, one of my goals for the trip was to be a proper gringo tourist for 3 nights at an all-inclusive resort. I figured Costa Rica was the place to do something like that. Enter Hotel Allegro Papagayo:

I drove here after staying in Liberia for one night.

Sticker shock.

I pulled up to the Allegro Papagayo and tried to get a room. The price was INSANE! They really like to have a double standard for “nations” versus “non-nationals”. They first wanted to charge me $180US a nigh!!!! That was unaccectable. Instead of storming out at the horrific price, I tried to negotiate. After about half an hour of going back and forth between front desk minion and manager we settled upon a rate of $120 a night. Still way too high, but hell, I had a goal to accomplish.

Thats the room that I stayed in. Well, thats the room that I slept in or watched Discovery channel in English. They had tons of english channels and I was really torn between mythbusters and having free drinks by the pool.

Overall, I was unimpressed with this kind of travel. It was completely isolating. Usually I’m able to talk myself into all sorts of conversations, but people here weren’t interested. The bulk of them were British people trying to stay fall overdrunk the whole time while turning their white skin into a shade of see-look-at-my-lobster-skin-i-went-on-holiday-red.

I really only had one good convesation and tons of crappy all-you-can-eat buffet food. The food was terrible. I would have rather eaten at a comedor on the side of the road than the crap that they threw in the feeding troughs at the buffet.

If it wasn’t for their excellent cable TV and beautiful beach that I roamed alone, I would have left after one day. After traveling around Central America on a motorcycle where each day is an adventure, roasting next to a pool with a bunch of drunk people is my idea of fun. So much for my vacation away from vacation.

What is nice about the influence of tourism and gringoism is that Costa Rica really goes out of their way to protect the environment, unlike most other CA countries. The rivers were clean and there was not the obvious clear-cutting and mineral extracting like I’ve seen throughout my trip. Costa Rica is beaufiful, especially the drive from San Jose to Panama.

I had a Glandslam at Denny’s!!!! Look at all that food!!!

Theo’s comment was very European on Denny’s, “No wonder Americans are so fat”. Yeah, he’s right.

I spent most of my time in Liberia. I spent over a week there waiting for my replacement computer for the one that I fried while I was trying to replace the power supply. Here is where I stayed. It is Hotel Los Angeles, in Liberia. I highly recommend it.

After spending several days in Liberia, I found this restaurant, Los Comales, by the recommendation by the guy who did my laundry. This place was awesome. It was traditional tico food. Not only was it tastey, but it was also cheap. I was back to eating my $2-$3 dinners. That is much better than when I was dining in the center of Liberia at $10 a meal. Ouch.

After a week, I met up again with Theo. We started riding to Panama. He’s really out of control with his photography”

Nicaragua to Costa Rica border crossing
This was a needlessly frustrating border crossing because of gaming going on between the border “helpers” and the police.

In order to leave Nicaragua you need to first cancel you motorcycle permit, then cancel your own immigration permit.

To cancel the moto permit we had to complete a scavenger hunt.  The mission was to receive the signature of a customs official and a police officer.

Usually this kind of thing is very easy as those kinds of people are all over the place.  We were constantly offered help, especially by this english speaking guy who’s name I forgot.  We’ll call him TVGuy.  He’s TVGuy because he learned english exclusively from watching TV– no proper classes or travel.

Anyway, TVGuy met us at the first building when entering the border zone saying, “I help you free!”.  He kept saying this and I kept saying that we didn’t need any help.  He persisted as did I.

We drove slowly to the Immigration buildings to the left where our friend was there waiting for us.  He handed us a sheet of paper that needed the two signatures of police and customs to correctly export our bikes out of Nicaragua.

So I started the hunt to find signatures.  The first once ways easy, there was a uniformed customs guy standing right next to us when we parked.  He looked at the bikes for .3 seconds and signed.  Customs guy, Check.

Once TVGuy saw us get that signature he walked quickly away.

I was struck by him walking away from us and not towards us like usual.  One by one, he started talking to the police and mount pointing towards us.  Mouth pointing is what people do in Central America instead of using hands or fingers to point.  Try it with me.  Pucker your lips and scrunch your mouth and eyebrows in the direction you want to indicate.  It is REALLY funny the first few times you see people’s faces move like this.

Now the game was in play.  Every time we walked towards a cop, he strolled the other direction.

I eventually caught up to one cop and he looked at me like he had never seen one of these papers before.  Interesting.

I looked again for more police and did not see any, where when we first got there, I saw 3 or 4.

Funn enough, TVGuy came up to me and asked if I needed help.  Needing to go to Costa Rica and not wishing to spend the rest of my life sitting in a border zone, I accepted it.  I knew something was up, but had no choice.

Curiously he was able to find a police officer within 10 seconds and we were off to the customs building to get our permit canceled.  We were done in 10 minutes.

Here’s the step by step:
1.  Pay toll to enter border zone if you’re gringo
2.  Park at building to the left
3.  Get sheet of paper that shows your bike was inspected by a customs and police officer
4.  Get said sheet signed
5.  Ignore the huge line of people at the migration and go directly to the Aduana office
5.  Show them your old permit, passport, and signed piece of paper

I don’t remember if we had to pay any fees to leave. My guess is yes in addition to the “helper” fee of “only 5 dollar for 3 bikes, good deal”.  Yeah, great deal.  Thanks TVGuy.

If Nicaragua felt like a border crossing from the 70s, CR was fully mordern and uninteresting.

Documents:
Title
Drivers license
Passport
Canceled permit from Nicaragua

Fees:
Mandatory insurance for around $8-10US
Fumigation for $5?

Steps:
1.  Get bike fumagated
1.  Immigration inside the building to the left.  Second or third door on the left once inside, past the bank
2.  Buy insurance at the sketchy looking first door on left.  It should be $10 or so
3.  Go to little shack on the right across from the Migration building and get the permit

Yeah, that border was way too easy.  It was an indication of what to come.

Nicaragua is a country I’d like to return to and spend more time exploring. Because of my need to respect the timeline to make it to Tierra del Fuego, I needed to really start making some miles through Central America. As a result, my understanding of Honduras and Nicaragua is very limited.

I was in Grenada, Nicaragua for a few days. Grenada is like Antigua but without cobble stone roads and busloads of gringos. In Antigua, there are tons of horses offering “romantic carrige rides” (that have poop bags) through the Spanish Colonial city. In Grenada, the road is their bathroom. The beautiful scenery is disrupted by the stinch of horse shit.

With sufficient mouth breathing, Grenada is a beautiful town. Many of Managua’s rich come here for the weekends. It is very well developed for tourism offering a variety of tours. We went on a boat ride of Like Nicaragua.

Getting to Grenada was pretty easy. Our original plan was to go to Leon, but the road from Honduras to Leon was _very_ slow. While the road was paved, it was not maintained. There was a reasonable amount of traffic on the road, but because of its condition, we did not feel safe driving it. My understanding is that the road went on for 3 hours of complete dodging of potholes.  It is really interesting to watch cars (and probably bikes too) drive down this road because of the massive swerving required to not have your tire swallowed up by the road.  It looks like there are some seriously drunk drivers.  Well actually, there could be some seriously drunk drivers.  You never know.

However, the main road to Managua / Grenada was great:

Once in Grenada, we stayed at El Club. Lonely Planet described this place as “sleep where you party”. That is what we did. There we met the owner Marco who very generously hooked us up with a great room and rate.

El Club is a boutique hotel that has a modernly decorated bar in the front and a hotel in the back that exuded modern elegance. This place was nice. Check out my room!  Thanks Marco!

In Grenada, I continued the tradition of not shaving myself.

After a couple of day in hip luxary at El Club, we headed to Costa Rica.

Because I had no computer at the time, I have no idea about the border crossing except that it was fairly painful.

Here are some misc pictures I took through Nicargua:

This is Bryn’s camera mount. He tapes his camera to his arm. It is actually a brilliant idea and the footage he gets is pretty good.

Here is a giant wind generator on the coast of Lake Nicaragua.  I found it interesting that they were pursueing alternative forms of energy when they have such greater social problems like individual security.

This is the view of Theo from my bike.  Look at all that stuff!!

The following pictures are by Theo Schlaghecken. Please visit his blog and if you’re feeling generous, donate to his paypal account that he’s using to fund projects helping children who he meets around the world. Most recently he built a playground in Guatemala. Seriously, buy a few kilometers. I mean, it isn’t like he’s selling miles, you can afford a few KM, right? All of his pictures are copyright Theo Schlaghecken and are only for use by his sole discretion. Without him, I’d have no pictures of myself!

Here Pop, I lit a candle for you a month ago in Nicaragua.

My current level of flare.

This guy is working hard on the boat ride we went on in Lake Nicaragua

Sad doggle.

Honduras money changer.

I’m happy to be in Honduras.  Yeah, I noticed I didn’t have a post from Honduras.  It is because we went through it in 2 days and I don’t have any good stories or insight.  Basically we were trying to make it south and in order to get to the nicer places in Honduras, we would have had to tack on a couple more days of driving.  The part of Honduras that I drove through was beautiful rolling hills.  Everyone had Aunt Sandra’s haircut!  I didn’t realize it was a Honduran thing.

More death heaters.  Even in nice hotels.

Theo is happy to be in Nicaragua.

Inside El Club, Nicaragua.

More Inside El Club, Nicaragua

Wheels roll THAT way.

Grenada

Lake Nicaragua

Grenada

Nicaragua, like Guatemala, had armed guards all over the place.  Almost every store had a guy with a sawed off shotgun.

Another potholed shot.  That road was wild!