Southern Costa Rica

Dave, Deb, Elke, Lyel, Eric

Eric, Elke and their son, Lyel are great hosts and we are very thankful for their hospitality. We arrived at their house near Dominical, Costa Rica, just as they were going out for the evening and were told to make ourselves at home and they said they would return in a few hours. This from Eric, who we had met only once over a year before in Mexico at a motorcycle travelers meeting and Elke whom we had met for the first time on the road near their home just a few minutes earlier. During the time we spent with them it was interesting to hear the stories of Elke & Eric buying their property and building the home themselves while living in tents with three boys of 12, 11 and 4 years of age.

View from the patio

The view of the Pacific coast of Southern Costa Rica and a valley below their home is breath-taking, and the longer we stayed, the more we fell in love with the scenery. After a few days we were planning to leave but it rained all night and Deb didn't want to ride down the steep dirt roads in the mud so we thought we would stay just one more day to allow the roads to dry out. Eric suggested that we stay a couple more days to go white water rafting with them. We didn't have to think too long about that. After the rafting trip, it was a few days before Christmas and we started to pack our bikes to leave when Eric came up to and asked us stay for Christmas because they knew what it was like to be stuck at a border crossing on Christmas day. We planned to leave the day after Christmas and we were again packing when Eric talked us in to staying one more day. We felt guilty for being the guests that would never leave but it was so comfortable and they were such great company, we could have stayed forever.

Frog

Toucan

In all, twelve days were spent here with a white water rafting trip, several trips to the beach for boogie boarding, a party at a neighbor's house, and a night out at "Movies in the Jungle". It is a cool movie theater in a building without walls, and everyone brought food to share before the movies while enjoying the view of the sun setting over the Pacific followed by popcorn and soft drinks to enjoy during the movies.

One couple that are neighbors of Eric & Elke have an assortment of animals including 8 or 9 dogs, 3 kinkajous, a pisote and several budgies that we visited with one morning.

Kinkajou

The road to Elke & Eric's home is carved through the hills giving beautiful views, but as the roads are steep and a combination of clay and gravel, four wheel drive vehicles are the norm. During the rainy season I wouldn't want to live there without one. This serves a great benefit in that it only attracts self-sufficient people, not those that need a mall or MacDonalds within a few minute drive. All those that we met all seemed like nice folks. Eric did take us for a drive back to his home via the "alternate road" one day, but as it was just after the rainy season the route did not look like it had been traveled recently. We made it to within thirty feet of the main road when the deep ruts stopped us and we backed down to a place where Eric could turn around and head back home the "usual way".

The day Deb and I left it had rained most of the previous night, so Eric volunteered to ride Deb's bike down the steepest hill as it would be pretty slippery. I was not able to even get down their driveway before coming to an abrupt stop in the wet grass and clay. Deb and Elke seemed a little surprised to find me standing beside my bike trying to figure out how it jumped out from under me. Well, I road it back up to the house so Eric and I could straighten the twisted frame that the bag used to be attached to. Just as we finished adjusting the bike the ground started to jiggle from side to side. I thought it was just a delayed reaction of the earth from the impact of the bike hitting the ground, but Elke said it was a tremor as this area does experience earthquakes. I was relieved to know that I did not cause the ground to move, but it was interesting to hear almost complete silence after the tremor stopped. The only sound was the squeaking of the truck suspension as it continued to rock after the earth had stopped shifting.

Dave on the driveway

Eric and I rode the bikes down the hills to the paved road, where we said our farewells then Deb and I headed to Panama. The road along the coast was beautiful and the in very good condition, a rarity for Costa Rica. When we turned onto the Pan-American Highway and instantly knew we were still in Costa Rica as the roads sucked, more potholes than pavement!

The board crossing into Panama is infamous as a slow process. For us it only took 1 hour, 45 minutes which was better that we where expecting. Exiting Costa Rica was simple, when I had finished and got back to Deb and the motorcycles we then rode another half kilometer to the Panama offices. This is where it got amusing for me. Step one - ignore the "tramitidors" - the people that help get you to the correct office while collecting the highest payment they can from the "rich" tourists. Step two - present passports for inspection at the correct window for inspection with man #1 - after several minutes looking at both passports he writes a note on a scraps of paper and puts one in each passport then hands them back to me while pointing at the wall behind me. Step three - find man # 2 on the other side of the building - he spends even more time studying all the stamps on every page of both of our passports then requested $5 for each tourist permit. Step #3 - two tramitadors, boys about 9 years of age "hire" them selves as my "agents" to get me into their country. They frantically wave for me to follow them to get in line to visit with man #1 again. They run ahead to save me a spot in line, then run back to get me to move faster. While in line, one of these kids runs to get a man to sell me two stickers for our tourist cards at $1 each as an entry tax. Step #4 - At a snails pace I move to the front of the line where again man #1 reviews the passports as if they were the most interesting things he had ever seen. After satisfying himself that they are acceptable he stamps them and tells me I am done. Note: Deb has not come near any of the immigration/customs windows so it appears that it is more important to make sure that only safe passports get into the country, but they don't care which people actually get in. Also, I know that the motorcycles need their approval to enter the country, tougher than getting people in! Step #5 walk back to the other end of the build to the adduana to import the bikes.

At this point my young tramitidors jog between me and the adduana wanting me to keep up. I can only move at a slow shuffle as my ankle is messed up from this mornings crash on the slippery driveway, but I slow down even more, barely above a crawl just because it is fun to watch the kids try to decide if they should help me walk or just save my place in line. Step #6 get out of line because someone wants the bikes moved 20 feet closer to Panama. This drives the kids nuts, but is fun for me. Deb doesn't like it either as there seems no reason to move them. Step #7 - Deb gets in line at the adduana to handle importing the bikes, which gives me a chance to sit on the curb and watch people. Sign the paperwork for man #3 and we are ready to get the bikes fumigated. Until step #8 - man #4 asks me to step into a private office where he tells me to close the door. He slowly reviews my documents then says that our bags will need to be inspected with the inference that I need to bring them into his office. I remain seated and tell him it is fine for him to inspect everything. The bags are attached to the bikes and he is welcome to go out to look in them. After a 30 second smiling contest I reached over and opened his door politely holding it so I could follow him to the bikes. This is the only time on our trip that I have felt that someone was fishing for a bribe. I waited for him to leave the room, then gathered our documents off his deck a shoved them in my pocket. I open all the cases on our bikes with a theatrical flourish and he barely glanced in half of them before walking away. Step #9 ride the bikes into the fumigation area, which was turned on too soon, so I was fumigated with the bikes. Probably for the best as I was pretty well covered in mud and bugs from my slide down the driveway. My tramitidors reappeared and I paid them $3 for the entertainment value of watching them run between me and where I was suppose to be.

Our stop for the evening was in the town of David, Panama. I don't thi0nk it was named after me, but you never know. We did not explore the town as my ankle had swollen and started to turn purple, so Deb played nurse maid by locked the bikes, getting me a bag of ice and make a fabulous supper. Dominos pizza delivered to our room.

The ride to the next day was hot, though the Central American highway CA-1 was great. Only 2 potholes in 280 miles. We rolled into Panama City was at the peak of rush hour traffic and just as we were crossing the Bridge of the Americas over the Canal it started to rain and boy did it rain! We pulled off into a gas station to seek shelter and wait until the rain subsided before getting back into traffic. As we had no good map of the city our goal was to find an inexpensive looking hotel with parking as soon as possible to get out of the rain and traffic. This took a little over an hour and we felt we had ridden through the Canal rather than over it due to the rain.

Our jobs while we are in Panama City are to lighten the load on the bikes, as I learned how poorly they handle in mud. Fix my rear brake which had been giving me trouble for the past few weeks, but quit working completely as I learned from my spill on the driveway the day before and arrange shipping for our bikes to South America. Some maps show the Pan-American Highway going uninterrupted from North to South America, but there is an area named the Darien Gap, through which there are no navigable roads. This means flying or taking a boat. We did some extra last minute research and called Girag Cargo to check on a flight and was told the next plane with space would be in 8 days. We a little begging space suddenly became available in 4 days, so we will be enjoying New Year's Eve in Panama City.

I called the local BMW dealer and asked if I could bring my motorcycle in to have the brakes worked on. They told me to get there before noon, so off I road into rush hour traffic again. We have been spoiled as big cities are usually by passed in favor of the smaller towns where things are less expensive and life moves at a slower pace. The BMW dealer sells both cars and motorcycles, and I was fortunate to have Hector the only bike mechanic in that day stay and wait for me as he only had a couple of hours work then was suppose to be off by noon. With the bike back in order I toured a small part of the city before heading back to the hotel to tackle our repacking with Deb and to decided how much stuff we can get rid of. It is amazing to learn how little we can get by with, and I always remember that what we have with us is still more that many people ever have. So far this adventure has been a great learning experience as well as a whole lot of fun.

Finally a bike I can ride in the rain

Feliz Año Nuevo!

Costa Rica

We spent a relaxing few days staying with cousin Elsie and getting to know the history of Costa Rica from someone who has lived here for almost 50 years. She was a twenty-something Iowa farmer with two young children who flew in a DC-3 full of pigs and chickens to the south of Costa Rica to meet up with her husband Walter who had arrived ahead of her and the kids. They worked hard to build a coffee plantation but when the plans for the Pan-American highway changed and it took a sharp turn toward the Pacific coast instead of straight through the valley where their farm laid, they were left without a way to get their goods to the market and other investors in the coffee plantation backed out leaving them to fend for themselves. At that time there were only 350,000 people in Costa Rica and most of them were in the San Jose area so Elsie and Walter had a difficult time finding people to work on the farm. Everyone in the family had to pick coffee. After many years on the farm, they were entitled to it as homesteaders. They started the process to get title to it and unfortunately, they had an unsavory attorney. When the lengthy paperwork process was completed, it was titled in the name of the attorney and he sold the property out from under them. After that, they moved to San Jose and Walter worked in a gold mine on the Osa Pennisula. Sometimes the family would go down to the Osa and pan for gold. Now a large part of the Osa Pennisula is the Corcovado National Park. Of recent concern, it has been estimated that half the monkeys in the park have mysteriously died in the last two months. The park is closed and the scientists are trying to figure out what is happening. Elsie says the same thing happened in the mid-fiftys after a particularly heavy rainy season. Most of the monkeys died of yellow fever but over the years their populations grew back. She had so many great stories, we wish she would write a book so everyone could hear them.

Elsie let us leave our motorcycles at her place because we wanted to visit the islands off of the Caribbean coast of Panama and we weren't sure if we would find a place to keep them out there. We took the bus from San Jose to Sixaola on the border with Panama then a second bus and water taxi to Bocas del Toro on the island of Colon. The bus ride took us east out of San Jose over the mountain range known as Cordillera Central to the town of Limon, then along the coast past many banana plantations to the border of Panama.

Arriving at the border we found it much quicker crossing without the need to export then re-import our motorcycles. The fact that we had to walk across a railway bridge over the river separating Costa Rica from Panama convinced Deb that taking the bus was the way to make this trip. She was nervous walking across the bridge and said she would not have ridden across. While talking to Panamanian Immigration officer, he told us that the last boat to the island departed at 5:30, and suggested we get a taxi rather than a bus. As luck would have it a taxi was waiting. We had heard that it is common practice to help the taxi drivers by telling tourists that if you take the bus you would miss the last boat of the day - it turned out that in our case it was true. Our taxi driver was kind enough to call ahead and reserve two seats on the boat for us as it only held 15 passengers, and we were numbers 14 and 15.

Border Crossing to Panama

Bocas del Toro was a sleepy village inhabited by plantation workers until a disease affected the bananas on the island which are no longer commercially grown there. The village is quiet but growing quickly and surfing is the biggest draw here now. We found a new hotel and we were lucky to have left our bikes behind in San Jose as this hotel as well as almost all others on the island had no parking. In fact our hotel had one step on land, the rest was built on pylons over the water. The deck faced west across the water with a view of the marina on the neighboring island.

Scuba diving was on our agenda but as we talked to people in town we learned that if we wanted to go to the better dive sights we would need to charter a boat as the dive operators don't like to go to far from the dock and the better diving was out in the open sea and on the coral reef surrounding a pair of small islands about one hour from the dock at Bocas. We did find a boat and three other people to split the cost of the boat - Jasper, from Amsterdam and Lorna & Randy from Vancouver Island. The diving was not as good as we had hoped as the open sea was rough and the high waves had stirred up sediment reducing visibility. A break we had between dives took us to the tiny islands known as Cayos Zapatillas which is used by sea turtles to lay their eggs. Rumor has it that the English pirate, Henry Morgan, was supposed to have buried some of his loot here, but it hasn't been found yet. We did not spent time looking for it as the rest of the legend says that his curse is supposed to hang over anyone who does find it. Although the diving wasn't great, the boat ride was worth the trip because the islands were so beautiful with palm trees and vegetation growing almost to the water.

Beach in Bocas del Toro, Panama

After 4 nights on the island we headed back to Costa Rica, to the town of Puerto Viejo. We walked about 3 kilometers out of town to the best beach in the area and found La Costa de Papito, a hotel recommended by Lorna & Randy. We had our own bungalow, in the jungle with a table and hammock on the patio. The food was fantastic, penne pasta for supper and breakfast served on our patio. We walked across the road to the beach, but did not go in as the waves were high and the life guard told Deb, 'just look, nothing else'. The beach was nearly deserted and looked absolutely beautiful.

Beach at Puerto Viejo, Costa Rica

We headed to Cahuita next, another beach town on the Caribbean. It was recommended to us by Richard from Panajachel, Guatemala, but he had not been there in many years. The town seemed a little run down though the national park had a beautiful long beach and was only steps from the hotel we stayed in for two nights. The Parque National Cahuita has a walking trail that runs through the jungle parallel to shore. We had not even left our room at the hotel when we could hear the howler monkeys, and it was only a short time before we saw them in the branches of the trees. After a 10 minute walk further down the trail we walked out to the beach and while enjoying the view, noticed that the trees above us started to sway. That is when we noticed the quieter, white faced monkeys watching us from the tree we were standing under.

Deb in Cahuita, Costa Rica

The day after our return from the coast we went to downtown San Jose to explore the city. We went inside the National Theater which is a fabulous building, unfortunately the museums were closed on Mondays, so we just soaked up the atmosphere.

National Theater in San Jose, Costa Rica

Deb has a cousin on her father's side that she hadn't since he was a toddler. We heard that he was in the town of Jaco, so Elsie called the son of one of her friends who happened to own a hotel in Jaco and asked if he knew Dennis. He said, 'yes, but he lives in Playa Hermosa, the next beach down the coast'. Dave did a Google search on Dennis and found a place that we thought might be his. We rode down there and pulled up to the Brisa del Mar. There was a nice looking 30-something young man talking on the telephone, 'I love you Dad, I'll pick you up tomorrow.' We asked if he was Dennis and if his dad was from Iowa and then Deb said she was his cousin. He seemed pleased to meet us. Deb was doubly excited because that meant she would get to see her uncle Dean that she hadn't seen in about 30+ years. Dennis was the kind of guy you like instantly, very friendly and down-to-earth. He came to Costa Rica when he was 18 years old for a surfing vacation and decided to buy a piece of property with an $800 down payment. Since then he has built a 12-unit resort just a stone's throw from Playa Hermosa, a beautiful black sand beach that stretches for miles and is a haven for surfers. Dennis took Dave out surfing one day, now Dave wants to quit his job and become a professional surfer! Wait, he's already quit his job so he is halfway there:)

Deb, Dave, Dean, Dina, Dennis

The letter 'D' was just coincidence

Playa Hermosa, Costa Rica

We stayed at Playa Hermosa for two nights then continued south along the Pacific Coast to a town called Dominical. There were a few scary bridges made up of the iron rails trains use, laid across the bridge with no guard rails and a rushing river below. About 25 miles of the road was dirt, it was good practice for Deb since she hates riding off-pavement. There was a bridge out so we had our first river crossing. The water wasn't very deep and with more experience, we probably could have ridden straight through, but we decided to walk the motorcycles across. We have a friend, Eric, from Indiana, who has a house near Dominical. He doesn't have a phone so he gave us the telephone number of a friend of his. We called Eric's friend Bob who gave us detailed instructions to Eric's house. It was up steep dirt roads that were muddy in places. On our way up, we ran into Eric and his family on the way down. He turned around and took us to his house. It is high in the hills with a beautiful view of the Pacific coast far below.

Central America

After a couple of nights in Antigua, Guatemala we decided to see what the dirt roads were like. We had a route mapped out that would take us to the eastern part of Guatemala. We found our way out of town but it wasn't on the road we had mapped so we changed our plans and decided to take a dirt road that skirted Lake Amatitlan to the south. We took the exit to Amatitlan and could not find the road leading south so after stopping and asking for directions, we ended up back on the highway again. We chose another route and stopped for directions to a town called Santa Rosa Barillos. The reaction was 'you want to go there?' We were sent on our way, starting on a paved road up the side of a volcano. When the paved road ended, we stopped to ask a man if he knew how to get to Barillos. He told us that the road was 'muy malo' (very bad) and suggested we take the long way around on the pavement. We thought we would ride the dirt for a short distance and if it was too bad, we'd turn back.

The road was hard packed dirt and very rutted from the recent rainy season. We took it slowly and marveled at how well our bikes handled in the dirt. We would stand up through the difficult sections and were having a great time. The road continued to get narrower and whenever it forked, we would stop at the next village to confirm that we were headed in the right direction. The consistent response always seemed to be 'you want to go to Barillas?'. At one particularly tricky corner with a rutted, downhill, sharp right-hand turn filled with rocks, Deb took a spill. She didn't get hurt but her motorcycle was nearly upside down and the windshield was broken. The two of us were able to get it upright while a couple of women and some children looked on. Out came the duct tape, the windshield was fixed and off we went. As the road ascended, it became more difficult and several times Dave would ride his bike through a bad spot then come back and ride Deb's bike through.

Deb's Crash in Guatemalan Highlands

Dave was out of sight and Deb heard him say over the radio, 'just stay where you are'. She got off her bike and walked up around a corner to see a very steep hill with Dave near the top and his motorcycle on its side. Fortunately, he wasn't hurt either and his bike didn't seem to suffer any damage other than dents. He ran out of traction on the way up the hill, and after coming to a momentary stop he got to ride a 550 pound sled backwards down the hill with both tires skidding on the rocks. After a short distance the bike decided to throw him further down the hill. We were able to pick it up and lean it against the dirt embankment at the side of the road. Deb sat down by the side of the road while Dave took Deb's bike back to the last small village to see if he could find some help to get the bikes up the hill. As Deb was sitting there, an old man carrying a load of wood on his back and a big machete in his hand came along. He stopped and said a lot but she couldn't understand much of what he said. Then a man in a shiny new SUV came sliding down the hill. He stopped to talk, but Deb again found her spanish inadequate, lacking the words for 'motorcycle too heavy', 'hill too steep', 'big rocks', 'need to put motorcycles on a truck'. The man in the SUV left with Deb sitting by the side of the road waiting for Dave to return.

Dave rode into the last village and eyeing a flat-bed truck in front of a house, talked to the owners in very broken spanish and asked if anyone had a truck that could haul a motorcycle to the top of the hill. The best he could figure, the answer was 'nobody in town has a truck that can get up that hill.' Just then, the shiny SUV pulled up and Dave walked over to talk to the driver, suspicious of someone with a vehicle like that in such a poor farming area. After an animated conversion using lots of sign language, the man said 'regresa a su esposa' (return to your wife) and he would find help to push the bike up the hill. Meanwhile, while Deb was waiting on the hill, a group of women with children came by carrying various things balanced on their heads including dozens of eggs. Deb stood up to walk to the other side road and fell on the loose rocks. She was certain they were amused by this clumsy gringo.

Dave returned and they started carrying the heavy side cases up the hill to lighten the load on Dave's motorcycle. A few minutes later, the SUV returned and out piled 5 men, one short-barreled shot-gun and a machete. That's when we started to wonder if we had met the good guys or the bad guys. The driver gave instructions to the others and soon they had Dave's bike upright and slowly moving through the worst section of the hill giving him enough momentum to ride through the next two turns to the top. Dave then walked back down to the bottom of the hill and rode Deb's bike up with the front tire skipping around in the rocks and the rear-end sliding around. He made it all the way to the top without assistance and realized it was finally time to replace the rear tire on his bike. The guys helped bring the rest of the bags to the top of the hill and when we offered to pay them, they refused. The driver said something we couldn't understand, then paused while he searched for another word and came up with 'asalto' (assault) and that we needed to travel 'muy rapido' (very quickly) out of the area. The men waited while we got our luggage reloaded and were underway before they left. It was then that we wondered - when the first man we met told us the road was bad, did he mean that it was dangerous? It turned out that we were not far from Barillos and we rode as quickly as we could back to the main highway and then about another 100 miles to the town of Jalapa in the eastern highlands.

Dave in Eastern Guatemala

After our off-road adventure, we decided to stick to the pavement, even if it took us from one side of the country to the other. The next morning we had a very pleasant ride on twisting roads to the border with Honduras at the town of El Florido. Dave went inside to complete the paperwork while Deb waited with the bikes. A couple of bus drivers asked where we were going and when she said, 'La Ceiba', a town on the Caribbean coast, they said, 'you can't get there'... 'no road'...'maybe tomorrow'. We were disappointed to hear this because we wanted to take a ferry out to the Bay Islands to do some scuba diving. The border crossing was quick, about 50 minutes. We rode to the town of Copan Ruinas just a few miles into Honduras. It had been raining and some of the streets were dirt so slip-slided our way to a wonderful little place that cost $4.50 per person. It was the cleanest place we had been in so far and had secure parking. The town also had some excellent restaurants. We decided to stay two nights hoping the situation on the coast would improve. We visited the Mayan ruins of Copan about one mile from the town.

Mayan Ruins in Copan, Honduras

Copan Stella

When we left Copan, we rode north toward the town of San Pedro Sula, about 50 miles from the coast, but towns were still flooding and roads were washing away, so we decided to just go south to Nicaragua. We drove past Lake Yojoa where the fishermen selling their catch along the side of the road. We stayed in a town called Coyamagua, a nice colonial town with limited choices for hotels but found one we were happy with. There must have been elections coming up soon because there was a long line of cars, trucks, and motorcycles flying red and white flags and pictures of a political candidate while honking and yelling as they traveled every street in town. The next day we rode through the capital city, Tegucigalpa. It was surprisingly easy to get through, taking only about 15 minutes. We continued on to the town of Danli where we spent our last night in Honduras. The ride to the Nicaraguan border at Los Manos was another very pleasant ride through the lush mountains.

We crossed the border into Nicaragua expecting the roads to get worse but were very surprised to find them in excellent condition. When we arrived at the intersection with the Pan American highway, there was no traffic in either direction. We turned on to the PanAm and had an exhilarating ride down from the highlands to sea level. There wasn't much traffic and it was very exciting when Lake Managua came in to view. We were still riding downhill and seemed to actually be dropping below the rim of the lake. We eventually reached the town of Granada on the shore of Lake Nicaragua. It is a lovely town with a beautiful Central Park and many old colonial homes that are owned by wealthy Nicaraguans.

Granada, Nicaragua

One day, we went into a bookstore and found it full of Canadians. We spent time chatting with them, learning about living in Nicaragua. The owner told us about a school for handicapped people that had been operating for five years and were about to be evicted from the dilapidated building they were using. We went over to visit the school and watched them making pinatas, beaded jewelry, and weaving. They were so delightful, their personalities were just like our students in Indiana. The money earned from selling the things they make goes toward buying more supplies and to help the families of the students. The director and volunteers were very worried about losing the use of the building and said they will not go down without a fight. They had just had a fundraiser the day before we arrived. They raised $250, which they seemed to be pleased with, but it is woefully short of the $30,000 needed to buy their own building. This population of students, ranging from the deaf to those with Downs Syndrome, are referred to as “minusvalidos” which translates to – “less valid.” It is difficult to get this population accepted in the United States and Canada, so just imagine how they are valued in the poorest country in Central America.

Handicap School - Granada, Nicaragua

The director has made arrangements with a bank to accept donations from outside the country. We want to take this opportunity to ask you to support this worthy cause. Donations in the form of check or money order can be sent to the following:

Made payable to: Asociacion de Minusvalidos Artesano Nicaragua
On the memo line: BancoCentro, account # 451600710

The mailing address is:

Casa San Francisco
Attn: AMAN/EEAP
Calle Corrales, 207
Enfrente de Mr. Pizza
Granada, Nicaragua
Central America

They also have a website at www.eeapnicaragua.org if you are interested in learning more about them.

We enjoyed Granada so much that we spent 5 nights in town before moving on to San Juan del Sur, a beach town on the Pacific coast where we relaxed by the ocean.

San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua

The next day was Sunday and we decided to cross the border into Costa Rica then assuming we would have additional fees to pay rather than wait until Monday when the fees should be lower and the regular staff would be manning the border crossing. The exit from Nicaragua was fairly simple as we had to pay $1 each for us to leave and $2 to export the bikes. We then rode to the "aduana" to officially import our motorcycles into the country. We met a man outside the building and he told us that the office was closed on Sunday and he didn't know if immigration would be able to handle the importation of vehicles. As most people cross the border by bus, not in private vehicles, this was not a problem for all the others that we saw at the Costa Rican immigration office.

Well, we eventually did find an official that did all the paperwork for us and gave instructions take all his paperwork with us and ride father down to road were we would find another office with a computer where the official importation documents could be printed for us. Surprisingly this process only took about one and a half hours and cost us only $11.00 each for insurance for our bikes. We rode out to the Pacific coast again, this time in Costa Rica, and spent time on a beach called Playa Hermosa.

Costa Rica is the richest country in Central America, so we expected good roads, but had heard that the Pan-American highway was in poor condition. Having this information helped us with the decision to avoid the highway and continue down the Peninsula de Nicoya before crossing over the gulf via a beautiful bridge paid for by the Taiwanese government as a gift to Costa Rica for recognizing Taiwan as an independent country. We then rode north on the Pan-American Highway for 12 miles, which was farther that we cared to ride on this piece of pavement with pot-holes the size of small cars. To avoid the pot-holes involved weaving from one side of the road to other. Riding the road on a bike is easier than a car, as we didn't have two sets of wheels to try maneuver around these suspension-wrecking holes. The problem was that the oncoming vehicles used the same technique and since the cars and trucks are bigger than us they always have the "right-of-weight".

After the short ride back to the north on the Pan-American highway, we turned east and road into the mountains and then rode along the shore of Laguna de Arenal to see the Arenal Volcano. La Fortuna is a town that has embraced tourism and is a very friendly community. As we did a lap through town looking for a hotel a man stepped into the middle of the road to flag us down. He said a friend of his that lives in town rides the same bike and with the same colour helmet and he thought that David was him. We talked for a while then asked for his recommendation of an inexpensive clean room with safe motorcycle parking. He told us to follow him and he walked one block to a place where we got a room with a private bath for $14 per night.

Volcano Arenal - Costa Rica

We liked La Fortuna enough to spend two nights there and took a canopy tour in the mountains. The day was clear and sunny and started with a horseback ride part way up the mountain to a platform where we donned our climbing gear, then continued up the mountain on foot to a higher platform. Our guides, Carlos and Adonai, gave us instructions on the gear, then Adonai clipped onto the cable, stepped of the platform, and with the sound of the pulley buzzing he disappeared across the canyon. Deb & I rode 10 cables back and forth across the canyon, the longest of which was half a mile long. The scenery was fantastic with one of the cables passing over a water fall.

Deb on the Canopy Tour - Costa Rica

That evening we went for a guided walk in a rain forest were we saw a three-toed sloth, howler and spider monkeys, iguanas, several types of toucans, and an explanation of the different types of vegetation found in the forest. We exited the forest on the active side of the volcano just after dark hoping to see the glowing lava in the night sky. Unfortunately the clouds came in and covered the volcano while we were hiking, so we could hear the rocks tumble down the side of the volcano and only got a momentary glimpse of the red glow through the clouds. Our last stop was at Baldi Hot Springs. This is a resort with about 10 thermal pools all fed by water from the volcano. The pools ranged in temperature from 37 to 67 degrees Celsius or 98 to 153 degrees Fahrenheit. It was a very relaxing place to spend a couple of hours after a rigorous day in the mountains.

We continue to learn how small the world is as we met a group of people here that we had met several times before - at a hotel in Granada, Nicaragua; stopped on the road in San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua; and a hostel in Zacatecas, Mexico. It is a group of ten people on a six month trip from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego and we hope to meet then again somewhere on the road in the future.

Leaving La Fortuna in the morning heading to San Jose, we had a spectacular ride through the mountains on some very twisty roads with views into the canyons. At one point there was a layer of clouds above us at the mountain peaks and another layer below us blocking our view of the farms below. It was quite a neat experience. After some trouble figuring out how to use a phone card with instructions in Spanish, Deb got in touch with her mother's cousin Elsie and she came to meet us and lead us to her house. Elsie moved to Costa Rica in 1957 and homesteaded a farm in the southernmost province. She has so many interesting stories to tell of her life here, the Pan American highway wasn't completed yet and they had to fly to get there from San Jose. She said the most interesting visitors they had were a couple that walked from Texas to Panama. She now lives in San Jose. About 20 years ago, the government took her farm along with many others and she is still fighting to get compensated for it.

Elsie and Deb in San Jose, Costa Rica

Southern Mexico and Guatemala

Cathedral in San Cristobal Del Las Casas

San Cristobal De Las Casas is a medium-sized city in the state of Chiapas in southern Mexico. It is a popular stop on the 'backpackers trail' and has many affordable hotels, guest houses and good restaurants. We were happy to find a hotel that offered secure parking, free internet, bottled water and a room with two beds for $15 per night. The city had its fourth annual Cervantino-Barrocco festival going on with various cultural programs at the main square each night. There was everything from local dancers and singers to a jazz band from Cuba and a Chinese ballet. Women and children from the local indiginous community were selling woven scarves, belts and bracelets. At times the children became annoying because they would not take no for an answer and would cling to us whining, Com-pra-lo (buy it).

After 3 nights in San Cristobal, we rode to the Guatemalan border. Not knowing how long it would take to get through the border crossing and how far we would need to ride to get to a hotel, we opted to stay in Mexico for one more night. The hotel was dormitory style and not very clean but provided security for our motos. We met several other motorcyclists passing through that evening, three on Kawasaki KLRs and one on a BMW. The border crossing the next morning was very easy. We turned in motorcycle permits at Mexican customs, and went through Mexican immigration, then drove about 3 miles to the Guatemalan border and first had to have our bike fumigated, then purchase tourist visas at immigration, then temporary importation permits for the motorcycles at the customs office. We didn't have to wait in line at all and it took about 30 minutes on the Mexican side and 45 minutes on the Guatemalan side of the border crossing. The total cost to get into Guatemala was about $20 for both of us and our motorcycles.

We were surprised to find the highway in Guatemala in excellent condition most of the time. Most of all there were no more of the bothersome 'topes' (speed bumps) so prevalent in Mexico. There were a few spots where the pavement gave way to gravel and a couple of areas where the road had been completely washed away so the traffic was routed around it.

Where's the Road?

The road climbed to climbed to nearly 10,000 feet and it was cold so Deb stopped to put on another jacket. One of the guys we met at the border the night before rode up behind us and stopped to talk. He was an Englishman named Mel and with green duct tape covering his bike, helmet and pants. We were on our way to Antigua but he told us that we really should see Lake Atitlan and told us about a town called Panajachel. We took his advice and road down a steep twisting road to the town at about 5,100 feet. On the way down the hill, we came upon a temporary bridge called a bailey bridge. Large trucks and tour buses were not allowed to drive over it, in fact, a pick-up truck that was loaded with people had to unload and drive across while the passengers walked.

Panajachel was a small town also well known on the backpackers trail with many hotels, guest houses and restaurants to choose from. We stopped in a small grocery store and spoke to the owner, a woman originally from Wales. She told us a little about the town and where to find a Spanish language school. We followed her directions and found the school but it was closed so we started hunting around for another school. We met a guy named Bobby, originally from California who took us to another school that had a good reputation. We made arrangement to start school the following Monday. Bobby then took us to a very nice hotel where he knew the owner and negotiated a rate of $25 a night. We stayed in the hotel for two nights then moved in with a local family for the next week while we were in school. It cost $110 for two people for five hours of lessons per day for five days and $110 for both of us for room and board for seven days. The family we stayed with were an older couple, Francisco and Amelia. Amelia owned a restaurant a couple of blocks from the house. We ate breakfast at the house, then lunch and dinner at the restaurant, Comedor la Tipica. Amelia was a very good cook, all of it done on a wood fire but we knew every time she put a new log on the fire because a plume of ashes would billow over the wall and drift onto our table, chasing the flies away.

On the Sunday before our classes started, we took a boat trip with Bobby and his family. Panajachel is located on Lake Atitlan with a spectacular view of three volcanoes. Bobby was anxious to see some of the damage from Hurricane Stan as he had a friend whose house was destroyed in the town of Santa Cruz. We got off the boat and walked inland to the house that was closer to the lake than it used to be. Where once there had been a beautiful home with a wide front lawn, now was a gaping crevasse with a small stream running through the middle of it. Only the skeleton of the house was left.

Lake Atitlan

We got back onboard and cruised around the lake to Santiago Atitlan. We stopped at a quaint hotel and restaurant and had a late lunch. Afterward, we walked to the village of Panabaj. This was the village most devastated by the aftermath of the hurricane which dumped six days of rain in the area. Over one-thousand people lost their lives in a mudslide that buried the village at night. Because the victims could not be recovered, the area was consecrated and declared a cemetery. As we walked down a road at the edge of the village, children were playing soccer and laughing at Dave who momentarily joined them in their game. We were surprised by their resilience just one month after the disaster.

While in Panachel, we ran in to Miah one night - one of our friends from Creel whom we hung out with in Parral and Durango. The other guy, Allan, showed up a few nights later with a friend named Sacha. It was great to see Miah and Allan again and to meet Sacha, all of whom we hope to see again as we travel farther south.

Deb With Women Selling Scarves

Girl Selling Clothes

Friday is market day in Solola, one of the largest Mayan towns in the country, about 6 miles up the hill from Panajachel. We took a crowded 'chicken' bus there. People travel to Solola from all over the highlands dressed in their traditional attire to attend the market. At one point it we found ourselves caught in a crush of people pushing from both directions but going nowhere. At first it was funny and we were laughing along with everyone else, but as the crowd grew and pressure increased, it became scary. Since we were so much taller than everyone else, we could breathe but we were concerned for the children in the crowd who were crying and could have easily been suffocated. After about 15 minutes we were able extricate ourselves from the throng. There were thousands of vendors selling vegetables, CDs, knives, weavings, kittens, puppies, ducks, chickens, rocks and 'snake oil' and after plenty of people watching, we crammed ourselves onto another bus with about seventy other people for the return trip.

Women Near Solola Market

On the street in Panajachel, we stopped to talk to a man with a shiny white BMW F650GS like ours. His name was Richard and he lived just outside of town. He invited us to have lunch with him but we had to get to our class so he invited us out to his house over the weekend. On Saturday morning, we packed up and stopped to have an extension welded on to Dave's kickstand before heading out to Richard's. Richard and his wife Sylvia have lived in Panajachel for 15 years in a beautiful home on the lake with a breathtaking view of the volcanoes across Lake Atitlan. They designed the home themselves including the furnishings, all done in the craftsman style. There was a separate bungalow for us to sleep in and even the shower had a gorgeous view of the lake. Richard and Sylvia stay in Panajachel about half the year and travel the other half. For the last nine years, they've been exploring Europe by motorcycle on their overseas trips. We stayed we them two nights and really appreciated their hospitality. Richard gave us tips on places to see in Central America and entertained us with stories about life in Guatemala.

Us at Richard and Sylvia's House

Sylvia and Richard

Our short ride to Antigua was quite adventurous. We took secondary roads through the mountains that made a pretzel look straight. There was a lot of damage from mudslides and at one point we thought we would have to turn back. A sign blocking the road said the pass was closed due to a mudslide but a man on the side of the road waved us around the sign. They think we can go anywhere because we are on 'big bikes'! Deb got her rear wheel buried in the flour-like sand on a hill in the construction zone where the road was still being cleared. A construction worker was offering to help but since we had our radios on, she declined the assistance and asked Dave to come back down to help. Dave got on Deb's bike and fish-tailed his way up the hill to firmer ground and Deb almost needed oxygen after walking up the hill due to the altitude.

Road Closed Signs Don't Apply to Big Bikes

We arrived in Antigua and checked out several hotels before finding an inexpensive one with secure parking. We went out for dinner and felt sticker shock compared to the prices in Panajachel that we thought were a little high. We plan to stay two nights before moving on toward Honduras.