Tag: Border crossing

Border Crossing – Nicaragua to Costa Rica 20221002

Another day. Another Central American border crossing. Got up in San Juan del sur and headed out. I was feeling itchy as I usually feel on border crossing day, like something will go wrong. I was mostly worried about the insurance which I most certainly did not have for a long while, and most certainly was supposed to have(it was impossible to renew online).

I headed towards the border but stopped at my favorite food place first where they have the most tender and garlicky chicken in the world and cheesecakeeeee. Nicafe.

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Nicafe Restaurant, amazing spot

Some of the best cheesecake of my life

The border crossing ended up being pretty simple. To leave Nicaragua they handed me an exit paper that I filled out and thank god they didn’t check insurance.

Then I went to the immigration building where I needed to get 3 signatures on that document. One from the aduana, one from aduana police and 1 from reg police or something like that. I just had to ask the baggage search lady to stop watching her marvel movie before she would sign the paper.

She grunted, asked me if I had a drone and told me to get lost. I ran into 2 nice Canadian guys that were crossing the border on motorcycles as well. I helped translate for them and basically just went through the whole process with them to help them out as they spoke no Spanish.

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Donkey at the border

Waiting in line

Make sure you get an exit stamp before you leave as they did not give me one, I forgot to check, and they gave me shit when I tried to leave out of the gate.

I then arrived at the CR side where you first need to get through the aduana. There was a big line and it took a bit of sweating to get through. The Canadian guys started telling some of their riding stories on their long road down and how they were headed for Lima while we waited in line.

They didn’t speak a lick of Spanish so I became their guide. After getting the entrance stamp we headed to a little hut where the lady wanted to see everything. License, title, registration passport and wanted a copy of everything.

She then made a document and stapled the copies to it and sent us down the road 100 meters to another aduana building. We entered and bought insurance. The minimum was 90 days and cost $34.

Then we had to walk outside to get a copy of the entrance stamp to Costa Rica. We handed everything again to the aduana guy and he gave us our 90 day temporary import permit

Once we got through the Canadian guys said they would follow me to the hostel I was staying at in Liberia, Costa Rica. A place that only costs $10 per night, Hostel Doredo. I knew 2 of my friends from Ometepe would be there so I wanted to head there. An hour of riding in the rain and we arrived soaking wet.

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Awesome Canadian dudes

I found Rikke and Jonah and we went to eat some Pollolandia in town, the most typical Central American fried chicken place. It wasn’t as good as I was expecting. I had been seeing it for so long. There was no crunch at all in the breading.

We walked around Liberia and Costa Rican vibes began to set in. There’s clearly more money in Costa Rica. There’s international businesses on the street and people have nice things. It was clear we had left the more intense poverty of Nicaragua.

We then played monopoly go and other card games. Rikke trashed me at monopoly go time and time again. A great day full of great people!

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Rikke and Jonah

Border Crossing! Honduras to Nicaragua at Las Manos – 20220803

Border crossing day! Drove from Valle de Angeles straight through to Las Manos. Slightly nervous as always to cross the border.

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Off to cross the border

So far an easy process. On the Honduras side I got stamped out of one window and handed them the Honduras document at another window. They wanted me to fill out an exit form so I did. Then I continued on and right past the border the Nicaraguans waved me over. They took documents into a little hut just to look at them I guess? Passport, license, registration, and title. They kept telling me my title had expired and I kept explaining that it hadn’t. What I was most nervous about was that the registration does expire in 5 days. I thought maybe they wouldn’t let me in with that little time left.

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This is where I got stamped out and got my entry form

Had to pass this little gate

I then went to a little building where they checked my covid vaccine. They gave me a little slip of paper which I took to immigration right past the covid hut. They took the slip of paper, passport, and asked to see the form I filled out the week prior.

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This is where they checked my covid vaccine and gave me a little slip of paper

The cost was $13. Yes, they do not accept their own currency. Only US dollars. Then I had to go back to the little front hut. They then told me to drive down to “the tree” and “la niña” and so I drove down like 5 seconds until a lady waved me over. She pointed to some guy who then sprayed the bike real quick. I don’t have a clue what it does. But it was kind of funny watching him walk around fighting ghosts.

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Ghostbuster

Then she wanted to look through my things. She found my gopro and could just not wrap her head around it. She must have asked me 100 questions about it. An official then came over who was clearly drunk and kept asking me about it. I just straight up ignored him until he went away. She asked if I had a drone and I said no. I would only find out later that drones are illegal in Nicaragua.

This lady was the biggest hardass I’ve ever had at a border. Thank God she didn’t find my drone.

She then told me to head back to aduana where I’m at now. They wanted license, title, and immigration form and passport

They gave me a form that lets me enter Nicaragua for 30 days. I then went on to the next roadblock. They wanted to see the receipt, registration and license. They then told me I needed insurance which would cost $12. There was also a guy there that sold me some stupid piece of paper that cost a dollar. Some tourist BS. Easily the most annoying border crossing so far. They again asked if I had a drone and I said no. Why is the insurance guy asking me? Feels scammy.

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The first few minutes after a border crossing are pure bliss

I finally got going and immediately noticed how different Nicaragua was from Honduras. Almost the whole road from the border to Esteli was flawless. I rode fast and comfortable. No stress of trying to dodge pothole after pothole.

I also noticed how much better people took care of their stuff and how sparse it was. Perhaps the population is much lower or they live more on the coast. I stopped to eat a very late lunch and the people were so nice and the food was so good. Some kind of chicken mixed with yucca and chicharrón with some kind of coleslaw mixed in.

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Pure delicousness

I ended up staying at a place called Albergue something. It’s only 400($11) and I got a room with 3 beds. Super cozy and the wifi is actually pretty damn good. Tomorrow I will try to voyage deeper into the mountains.

Guatemala Border Crossing at La Mesilla, on to Huehuetenango – 20220701

Border crossing day! 1.5 hours to get to the border from Comitan. Stopped 3.7 km short on the México side at the banjercito. They gave me my stamp out and a document to bring to the Guatemala side. No cost. Dudes were nice.

Entrance to Guatemala. 2nd border crossed!

Cross the border and immediately on the right is immigration. They gave me a form to fill out, my stamp, and I walked down like 30 seconds and they asked me to bring my bike around. They checked the Mexico doc and walked around the bike. They wanted the Mexico doc, drivers license, passport and reg. Super easy. Guy was nice.

Entry document. I have no idea why I wrote Nicaragua, but they didn’t care.

The border is pretty chill actually, pretty narrow entry and exit and the roads aren’t great. A couple shops throughout

I got one document from the Guatemalan side which cost 160 quetzales.

1 of 2 docs you get on Guatemalan side
2 of 2 docs you get on Gua side. 90 day verhicle permit.

Rather than get ripped off by the money exchange guys walking circles around me I walked 8 minutes uphill to get cash out of the cajero. One of my travel rules is to never exchange money, especially with people on the street. I got the paper and took off!

8 mins up the road you can get cash out of an ATM here

It was about 2 more hours to get to Huehuetenango. Overall it was a nice ride with amazing views but also some amazingly profound potholes that I dodged left and right. I’ve been to Guatemala before but I arrived with a really fresh perspective. Everything seems a little poorer yet a little more expensive.

The roads are generally in much worse shape than Mexico. I had remembered from before that the chicken bus drivers are all turdheads and a couple tried to kill me on the road already. Guatemala also has way more other motorcyclists than Mexico so I’m checking my blind spots much more because often someone would creep up on me without me noticing. I’ve found so far that people are a little friendlier here than Chiapas and more interested in what I’m doing.