Leaving Nicaragua on to the next Adventures

Sunset in Tamarindo

With that said let me back up and explain how we got here. We left Granada, Nicaragua this morning as planned. Today was the last day of the San Ignacio summer school but we had to miss it because our vehicle permit expires today. Nicaragua only issues a 30 day permit (which Ryan had to extend once and that proved to be a huge pain). It is a $50 fine if you over stay the 30 days and a $1 for each day past. So we planned to leave today giving ourselves a week and half of free time before I start my English course in San Jose, Costa Rica. We headed to the Nicoya Peninsula in the northwestern part of Costa Rica known for its miles of beautiful beaches. So that was our simple plan to be on the beach watching the sunset by this evening.

Yeah sounds simple but of course nothing goes that smooth in Central America. On our way to the infamously difficult Nicaragua-Costa Rica boarder we got stopped by a routine police check in Rivas. We have been through this several times before so we thought nothing of it. UNTIL the police was looking at our insurance and vehicle permit and said it was expired by one day. WHAT?? No way, we are on the way to the boarder now cause it expires today. Nope. Low and behold the permit says 30 days on it but the expiration date was typed as yesterday, 29 days. Rule #1 never trust Nicaraguans for their math skills. Luckily the police let us go but now it meant we would have to pay the late fine at the boarder.

We got to the boarder at 10:30 am and a two hours later Ryan was on the last steps to check the van out of Nicaragua without paying the expired permit late fee. But just as the clerk was filing his paperwork she pulled it back to double check it and caught to late fee. Crap!! This equaled another two hours of standing in lines, collecting paper work, and paying fines. Finally we made it out of the horrible Nicaragua boarder and onto the Costa Rica boarder that thankfully only took an hour in total to stamp in and get our vehicle permit which was issued for 3 months.

Now in the clear we headed to Playa Brasilito in the northern part of the Nicoya Peninsula. Our travel book said Playa Brasilito is a budget traveler spot located near the luxury accommodation and real estate beach of Playa Flamingo both whom have white sand beaches. Budget travel is right. As we drove in we felt everyone was watching us with judging eyes and were not welcoming. The hostel recommended in the book was run down or being remodeled. It was definitely not what we expected and not where I wanted to spend my birthday the next day.

So we decided to head south to the next travel spot before sunset. That’s when we ended up here in the one spot we planned to miss Tamarindo. And what a good decision that was. We found a great hostel with really nice rooms with a kitchen and bathroom included in the room, checked out a sailing and snorkeling tour for my birthday and found the one delicacy we have been missing the most Sushi. Though it was hard we decided to save sushi for my birthday dinner tomorrow and instead are going to call it an early night. It has been a long day.

written by  ryan & debbrial on January 22, 2010 from Brasilito, Costa Rica
from the travel blog: Us Discovering the Latin Americas
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