Merry Christmas Everyone!!

From Punteranus we moved closer to the border and stayed overnight in La Cruz, a small town with a good view of the ocean which is only a few kilometres West of them. The Costa Rica/Nicaragua border was familiar as we had crossed at the same spot on the way South, and we even saw a few “big” bikes both at the border and on the highway. Surprisingly we have not seem many other bikers thus far. The border process took about 5 ½ hours in total. The Nica exit was very busy with holiday travellers, and again timing is everything, and we arrived behind a bunch of busses. The immigration line alone took about 3 hours.

San Juan del Sur


The drive into San Juan del Sur was quiet and relaxed, and once in town we pulled over to discuss where we should stay, then as we were just about to pull away our friend from Canada walks up and says he is staying in the hotel just behind us. Well, problem solved, we turned around and parked the bikes so we could check-in. Matt had planned to meet us in San Juan so it is not some freaky coincidence that he was there, it was a little freaky that we found him, or rather he found us, so quickly after arriving. We spent the next few days just hanging out and enjoying the Christmas festivities of the town.
The Nica people start their Christmas celebration at midnight on the 23rd, so it is literally minutes into Christmas Eve and the bands start playing and the fireworks start popping. This carried on until about 4am, the marching band was part of a procession to deliver the Virgin Mary to the church. Then on the night of Christmas Eve, the children put on a re-enactment of Joseph and Mary looking for a room by going door to door asking the locals if they can stay in their house. Joseph leads his burro with a very pregnant Mary riding atop. Very cute as they have little costumes and painted on beards, more resembling pirates than pilgrims. Finally, just when almost all hope is lost, a room is found and the re-enactment is completed. This is of course followed by loud music, more firecrackers and fireworks, and finally by some serious drinking until the wee hours of the am. Christmas day seems to be just another day for this tourist town, some businesses are closed but the beach is very busy with Nicaraguan residents taking advantage of the holidays and spending a day at the beach. Brenda and I managed to talk to her family via skype, the video call is a great way to keep in touch, later we found a nice restaurant that is high on a hillside so the sunset was a nice treat from this vantage point as we enjoyed our dinner.
















We had lobster bisque, turkey breast stuffed with pork and cranberries, rosemary roasted potatoes, and a squash/spinach soufflé, and a nice chocolate torte ala mode for desert.

The evening was filled with cultural events at the Church square and of course more serious drinking at the local watering holes. Brenda and I opted out of the serious drinking part, as we were pretty tired from the lack of sleep over the past few nights. Earplugs in equalled a good nights sleep.