“So they didn’t give you another sheet of paper? You’re sure? A transit form?”
Here’s the thing: when the export office Cetrex in the town of Rivas, told me I had what I needed to take Rusty to Costa Rica I had no reason to doubt them. It turns out the clerk was wrong; he should have sent me to the IPSA (agricultural health institute) to turn his pile of papers into a pet export from that I would present at the border. We drove around Lake Nicaragua for about five hours from Rivas to Granada on to the border at Las Tabillas with the wrong exit papers for Rusty. What a great day.
We had spent Sunday night at the end of the bridge, parked on a gravel pull-out as close as the Nicaraguan army outpost would let us park.
We actually arrived in the dark in a rainstorm Sunday night but the road past the bridge to the border was closed, unconventionally but effectively:
The next morning, Monday, we showed up at the border bright and shiny and unconcerned by the expected border formalities at exactly at 7am. We had slept well with our lithium battery powered air conditioning in the van cocooning us as we slept.
As usual photography at border posts is prohibited and I got a stern reminder as we entered the area and I snapped a couple of -ahem- pictures. At 7am the place was swarming with Chinese and African refugees, at least I think they were refugees. They were all on foot walking in grossly unsuitably footwear like Crocs and plastic sandals. I like Crocs but escaping oppression by walking thousands of miles is not what they are meant for of course. There were crowds of people everywhere with a few possibly Nicaraguan and Costa Rican border crossers. And us.
Look at their feet. No idea what’s going on. I parked Rusty in the van feeling embarrassed as he lounged in the air conditioning and these very out of place people suffered in the heat and humidity outdoors. We went inside (no photos!) and talked to the officials. Surprisingly they were all lovely and helpful but the agriculture dude stopped play dead after shuffling Rusty’s papers and making a couple of calls. The customs and immigration officials talked to him, assessed our Dog problem and said no problem! Welcome back to Nicaragua (we never actually left of course) and why didn’t we go off to Managua and get Rusty the paper he needed so we could drive back four hours to enter Costa Rica with the proper papers. We thus officially re-entered Nicaragua, without ever leaving, paid the $26 fee and started the four hour drive back to Managua a capital city of chaotic traffic I had no desire to drive. Just perfect.
Still better off than the peculiar refugees lining the highway as we left in air conditioned splendor. I had wanted to drive the east side of Lake Nicaragua as I’d never been there and 25 years ago the road was a muddy mess when the central government was busy ignoring the needs of the English speaking blacks who live on the Caribbean coast. Nowadays they have their autonomous regions, paved roads and are getting some acknowledgment from the country’s leaders in Managua. Which meant the area was going to be easy enough for us to visit on our way to Costa Rica. I never intended to drive up and down three times.
The road is paved and has some bouncy bits and some radically deep and dangerous potholes but it’s not a difficult drive.
Nicaragua Highway 25 runs through the foothills of the mountains that separate the indigenous communities and the coastal black, English speaking population from the traditional Latin Americans that you think of when (if) you ever think of Nicaraguans.
The highway sweeps through fields of corn and grazing pastures, under broad old trees that throw shade across the road. With the neatly mowed edges it feels like a drive through a park, possibly even the Natchez Trace in tropical form.
There are villages and farm worker houses, shacks made of planks really, and one town with a fancy grocery store and several nice restaurants and coffee shops. Who in Juigalpa regularly buys sugar free ketchup and low fat tortillas and Special K cereal ( in four varieties) I cannot imagine but all that and more suburban American products are on the shelves in La Colonia.
On our third trip we stopped at a fancy restaurant and had some of the most tender steak you’ve ever eaten with wine for $56. And we got to spend the night safely in their lot.
We weren’t alone either. While families came in to enjoy a mid week dinner of fine dining. I felt slightly weird surrounded by a peasant culture outside.
It was a drive of contrasts that’s for sure.
The customs people at the border gave us the address of the Cetrex office in Managua. One of them entered it into my Google map on my phone so we drove straight there, an address right off the PanAmerican Highway next door to the main customs office. Easy.
The only thing was it wasn’t there. Not anymore. The security guard said it was four blocks south of the Plaza el Sol shopping center. I was in despair. So I had a brainwave and flagged down a van leaving Layne and Rusty in the van and we took off in hellish traffic to find the Cetrex office. This guy (below) drove round the barricade through the median and started driving the wrong way. Why? I have no idea; I got the hell out of there. That’s why I rode in a cab into the city.
I remembered seeing a sign in Rivas that tied Cetrex to another office called Vucen. I looked for that name in Google maps while Oscar my driver navigated the crazy traffic to the shopping mall and told me about his two boys and his rocky relationship with their mother. He was in his early thirties I guessed.
Found it! I said and he studied the address. He had me there in ten minutes. Managua was flattened by an earthquake in 1972 killing as many as 11,000, injuring 20,000 and displacing 300,000 people. The city was never rebuilt properly and there are no real street addresses weirdly enough. Directions are given by landmarks. The office I sought was 1 block south and three west of Plaza El Sol. Huh? Another reason I hired a cab. Good luck finding that address.
It took a bit but I finally explained to the agriculture guy in the office what had happened and what I needed. In twenty minutes my document was typed in duplicate: one for Nicaragua customs and one for Costa Rica authorizing the export of Rusty, as though he were a herd of cattle. Ridiculous!
On the road and off we went with Layne saying of this didn’t work we’re going back to Honduras an easy destination to export Rusty. I’ll tell you this: if you didn’t speak Spanish this idiotic circus would be almost impossible to pull off.
And as the situation in Panama continues blockaded and uncertain the truck above reminded me how volatile this region is. The San Juan River forms part of the border between Costa Rica and Nicaragua. And both highly intelligent countries want to claim it. “The San Juan River is Nica(raguan) says the slogan above. Everyone needs good neighbors…
This is the San Juan where both banks are Nicaraguan as if flows out of Lake Nicaragua. 25 years we resented a motor launch and went down the river to the old Spanish Castle where the river forms the border. It was beautiful and wild and sparked your imagination a bit more than here;
That was how I spent my Monday, how was yours?
