Wednesday, February 8, 2006

Esteli is a nice town, laid back, mellow, and friendly, with a nice park and lots of banks. And a Payless Shoe Source, if you care. It's a small town but isn't lacking in conveniences. We liked it and would have liked to stay longer, but time's ticking.

We're on our way to the Corn Islands. These two islands are off the Nicaragua's Caribbean coast, clear across the country. We expect it to take a couple of days because we don't feel like wearing ourselves out. We may have to skip a lot of places in the country that we want to see (Granada, Leon) but there's no need killing ourselves just to save a few hours between Esteli and the Corn Islands.

We looked for Nixon this morning. I felt terrible about not seeing him last night. We wandered around the park and had no luck. We finally spotted his friend and waited for him to finish with a customer.

"Donde esta Nixon?" Michael asked him. The boy said he hadn't shown up and he didn't know where he was. He said if we wanted a shine, we should try in the afternoon. We said we didn't want a shine and that we were going to Managua. I told him to tell Nixon we said goodbye.

Man. I hope Nixon didn't have high expectations. If we'd actually found him and given him a few dollars, he would have been happy. But we didn't find him and who knows what he'll build up in his head that we would have done for him. Of course he may have had no hopes at all, but I would have, if I'd been in his shoes. I had all kinds of fantasies when I was a poor kid.

Good luck, Nixon.

We waited at the wrong bus station for a while, figured out our mistake, walked to where we thought we were supposed to catch the bus, did not find any evidence of busses, asked for directions and were told we had to take a taxi. When the taxi driver found out we wanted the bus to Managua, he didn't take us all the way out to the station. He chased down the bus itself, honking until it pulled over.

We're now much better at quickly transferring ourselves and our baggage through the back emergency exit of a school bus, so we barely held the bus up at all. Once in Managua we were at a slight loss as to what to do. According to our guidebook, there is a night bus-and-boat combo that goes from Managua to Rama to Bluefields, leaving at 9:30. (On another page, it says the bus leaves at 9:00.) We weren't sure we wanted to do that.

Eventually we decided to hop on a bus for Juigalpa, which is halfway between Managua and Rama. We planned to spend the night in Juigalpa and resume our journey in the morning. We bought a couple of Maruchans at the bus station, which made us think of Nixon again.

The bus to Juigalpa was unlike any other we've ridden. It was kind of... pretty. With flower-patterened seat covers. The cobrador turned out to be a large and cheerful woman, the first woman we've seen doing this job. And she didn't hold back. She hauled our bags onto the bus, took our money, honked the horn, everything.

The first hour of the trip was weird. Michael thinks we were taking a detour due to some unknown event. Questions of the bus's "boy" yielded no illumination. Basically we just drove around on incredibly bumpy dirt roads for an hour. I know some roads are made of dirt and that's just the way it is, but these couldn't possibly have been meant for busses as big and heavy as ours.

At one point the road turned into a short bridge over a gully and we had to pick our way through the ditch to one side of it. Long lines of cars followed us as we crept along, and another long, slow line came from the other direction. Everyone's nose and mouth were shielded from the thick, blowing dust.

Luckily we had almost finished our Maruchans, because the bumpy road made it impossible to eat them. In fact, we could barely hold them without getting splashed, even though they were almost empty. I wanted to throw mine out the window and get rid of it, but I can't bring myself to do that. Littering is gross to me.

We passed a shantytown. A row of dusty makeshift corrugated metal huts hugged the road. A few of the little houses were even made of cardboard. Dusty little kids wandered around in the "yards" looking desperate for the price of a cup of coffee. There were no adults in sight. It was horrible and it was eye opening, just driving by.

After an hour of vigorous bumping, we hit a smooth road. We finished our Maruchans. Fully intending to take the trash with me when I left the bus, I wedged my cup behind an armrest. Michael put his on the floor. After a short time, the boy came and collected them and threw them out the window. I winced.

But I didn't say anything. For one, it happened too quickly. For another, I thought it might be more rude to dirty the bus and make work for the kid than to just throw the trash out the window, where it belongs. Next time I'll put it in my bag. I really can't stand littering.

The cobrador took a liking to us, mostly Michael I think, and sent the boy to give us each an orange. We threw the peels out the window. Well, they're biodegradable, I guess. Later she gave us some chocolate mints. I hoped to get a chance to talk to her, but the bus let us out at Juigalpa's main square and kept going.

HOURS ON THE BUS: 155.25

 

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