With my final flight home now in the
near future as opposed to at some intangible time, my luggage has
been gradually increasing in size. I've been carrying my possessions
in a rucksack on my back and a day bag on my front for ten months.
The thought now goes that if I have to carry an additional cloth bag
in my hand, with my water bottle in the other for the last couple of
months, so be it. So be it until you get to a border where excess
luggage becomes an absolute curse. So I shuffled and kicked my bags
forward in the queue for the Costa Rican exit stamp and then
convinced the German girls in the queue to splash out a dollar with
me to get a man with a cart to take our bags the one mile to the
Nicaraguan border offices.
The Nicaraguan side of the border was much
worse. First, there was a huge faff about each person having to fill
in a health form. These forms were
meant to be doing something to prevent
the spread of Swine Flu (would anyone actually tick 'yes' to
questions relating to a history of health problems when they are
trying to get into a country?). Then there were a number of
disorganised and barely-moving queues which we assumed we had to join
although there were no signs sharing any information about them and
nobody to ask. The amount we would have to pay to enter Nicaragua
kept changing depending on who we asked in the queue. We finally paid
$7 each and then a mysterious one dollar tax just to walk out of the
gate to where the buses were. By that point we would have probably
given anything we were asked for just to get out of the chaos.
The two hour border crossing ordeal
gave me the opportunity to discover that the couple in front of me, a
Brazilian girl and an Australian guy, were also hoping to get to Isla
Ometepe that day. We were under the impression that the last ferry over to the
island was at 15:30 so we agreed that we'd have to get a taxi to San
Juan. Unaware of what the name of the currency even was in Nicaragua
never mind any knowledge of a good exchange rate, I'd gone against
principles and got some money out at the border. I was thankful that
I did as it would be some hours before I'd see a cash machine again.
