Three Borders, and a chance meeting

Well a fair bit has happened since my last blog way back in Guatemala After enjoying all the festivities we had to get on our way so, a bright and sunny (for bright and sunny read baking hot and sticky) morning saw us heading south east for the short ride towards the the El Salvador border. This border crossing went very well. Picked our helper, agreed a price and off we went. Sandra normally looks after the shed (although we have multiple offers to look after the bike, for a small fee of course) whilst I sort all the paperwork out. All went well and I even had time to chat with a French chap who was taking his whole family in a camper around the Americas. A teacher, he had dropped out of so called 'normal' life, and was educating his kids (3 of them) as they traveled

After the border we decided to stay stop for a night in El Salvador (you can, if you have the mind to, go through it in a day). We stopped at San Salvador and found a casino type hotel to stay in. Rates were good and it had a restaurant so it worked for us. A few beers, a meal and it was off to bed. We had an incredible thunder storm that night and the rain was torrential. It should be noted that it rains just about every afternoon in this part of the world.

The next day started off as a complete nightmare. We have limited mapping facilities on the sat nav and very poor sense of direction so we found ourselves, an hour after setting off, still trying to find our way out of the city. We decided to stop at a garage and ask, but our poor Spanish did not help. However, a chap who had just got fuel overheard us and said we could follow him out of town towards San Miguel. This worked very well indeed.

We rode on to San Miguel and the Honduras border where the border horror stories began. Now we are quite used to a handful of helpers meeting us at the border insisting that they can help, but nothing had prepared us for the masses that surrounded the bike all shouting and physically pushing each other away in order to win our business. It took a while but we picked on one chap who could speak English and who could help.

The border is a bureaucratic mine field. You are taken from one department to the next at a blistering pace, each location extracting cash from your wallet and you only pop out the other end if your wallet is empty. We knew this was going to happen so we pre emptied my wallet so they can only take what is in it.


I have no idea what I bought but some $40 USD later (that oddly enough is what was in the wallet) and some 2 hours later we had popped out the other side.

About 10 miles in we came across the first of many police check points and we were stopped. Three policemen asked for my license and I duly give them one of the copies I had expertly copied prior to the trip. "Mr RRRRRobinson" the lead copper said, rolling the R in a exaggerated way. He then proceeded to take my biking glove and but it on , holding it aloof and saying to all his policemen buddies "look Mr RRRRRRobinson's glove"..... all very odd. Whilst this was going on a chap in the police car was shouting out "ask for money, ask for money" all very bizarre indeed. I got my glove and my copied docs back and was told we could leave, everyone laughing as we did. We laughed too but we don't know why, it just seemed like the right thing to do.

Now, if you look at the map, it is entirely possible to go through Honduras in a day without stopping (highly recommended in my view) but we felt this unfair and we had to stay at least one night. So we found a town near the border and found the hotel Paradise (which was a fragrant lapse under the trades description act)

Food beer and sleep again saw an early start to the day. We were all ready to go when Sandra , tightening a pannier strap, hurt her back. It was so bad she could not get on the bike so we decided to stay put and rest all day to see if it got better. It did and the next day we tried again.

It was only a short hop to the Honduras - Nicaragua border , so within 40 mins we were at the border. Now, the nice robber who had ripped us off at the last border, had phoned his mate at this border so we could be ripped of again, without having the trouble of finding someone to rip us off. He was waiting for us and duly pounced. What followed is a blur of madness and confusion. My best efforts to calm everything down and keep control were useless. So we left Honduras poorer but hopefully wiser.

Entering Nicaragua was a breeze, we did it all ourselves. It was painless and actually nice. This first impression of a country has a lasting impact and we felt good about Nicaragua and very, very bad about Honduras.

A typical security guard fully armed up

On to the nation capital (due to the fact we needed an ATM due to the robbers at the border), Managua, which was not a great place. A dirty city with shanty towns in it's center. It took over an hour and a half before finding a hotel after asking a Harley rider who pulled up at the lights. The Holiday Inn is always our last resort. We like local, older places full of charm and local culture. The Holiday Inn is always soulless and drab, but in a difficult situation are a God send with nice beds and good clean showers and a beer. The staff where great and the Holiday inn did its job beautifully. The receptionist said we should visit Granada about 50 miles south, so we did just that the very next day.

Granada is a great little town (once the nations capital), with a very varied history. We found our hotel by 11 am and booked in. An evening stroll around this historic colonial town saw lots of interesting cultures and lifestyles, beggars, restaurants street sellers and a thriving square. As we approached the square I saw a BMW GS motorcycle... just like the shed... and another and another. Soon there where 7 or eight of them, all with UK registration plates. We knew then that we had bumped into the Globebusters tour. This is an annual event lasting 5 months which follows the same route that we are following but as an organised group headed up by Kevin and Julia Saunders, celebrities in the adventurer touring motorcycle world, The eight eventually reached 17.

We introduced ourselves to Kevin and Julia and had a few beers with them that evening. Now doing this sort of touring with a big group like that is not our cup of tea, but we sure would like to organise and take people on such a tour. We had a great time with Kevin and Julia who informed us that they had space on their charted cargo plane taking the bikes from Panama to Columbia and we could fly the bike with them.


It was great meeting them and we both enjoyed the meeting

So its now just a short hop to the Costa Rica Border for more fun and games