Home Sweet Home

I was woken up wiht a shake from the flight attendant telling me that we were about to land at JFK international airport. The flight was compleatly full exept for row 38DEF, which happened to be my row. During the flight I was free to switch seats at will, checking out the view from behind the left wing, and laying down accoss all three to watch the in-glight movies and catch some shut-eye. We landed and before I knew it I was outside in the freezing cold in flip-flops and a tshirt trying to find my way north. All of the buses had left heading to boston so I decided to rent a car and drive up to Surry Maine, some 480 and 9 hours north. After paying an extra $70 because I am under 25 I took off in my brand spanking new Volvo S80 into the night through New York, Coneticut, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire finally arriving in Surry, Maine at 9:30am. After arriving and greeting my mother we jumped back in the car and drove to Ellsworth, MDI, and then back to Ellsworth for Brunch. In the evening we found ourselves contra dancing at College of the Atlantic late into the night. It was a full day, and though I am back home I still fell as though I am traveling. Maybe traveling is not about the destinations we make our way towards but the mentality of experience.

Day ?

So I must have become obvious that the blog has been falling behind ever since we went surfing in Playa Maderas, Nicaragua. I blam not only myself but also the great waves and wonderful friends on the beach. It is really hard to sit down and write when the water is calling you and at night all you can really do is make dinner and go to sleep because of a full day of surfing.

I have lost track of the day of the trip, I will do some investigation work into this at home so that I can figure out exactly how long this trip was.

After San Juan Del Sur I headed to Tamarindo, Costa Rica to meet up with Bonnie Todd, Frauke Meyn, Simon and Eva Baudenbacher to rent a car and surf the Nicoya Coast. We ended up not renting the car because the guy would not let me read the insurance agreement. That night I made the decision to see the Panama Canal and in two days made it down to Panama City via the Pan American Highway. Crossing the boarder to Panama was very simple and quite cheap.

A really great moment was crossing the Panama Canal and arriving in Panama City. Finding the backpackers took me a few hours of getting lost in the city along with the fact that the backpackers moved and its only sign on a side street is a hand written sign in sharpy on the wall next to the doorbell. The backpackers was filled with travelers coming to and from Colombia via water and air. It was a great mixture of peaple just starting out their travels and people who have been traveling for 12 years.

Being a tourist I went to see the Panama Canal locks for the one day I was in Panama City. Looking quite simple the locks are just about 100 years old and are an amazing engineering feat. I can't Imagen what it looked like during World War II. It is a very simple design that utilizes the gravity of water filling up the locks one by one from the source lake.

The next day I booked it back to Tamarindo, a 16 hour trip that I did in two days on the way down. Back in Tamarindo I sold my amazing surfboard and tried to sell my bike with no luck. I recieved an email from a craigslist.org post of a guy in San Jose who wanted to buy it. To my luck I meet up with Frauke and Bonnie at Tranquilo Backpackers in San Jose and said my goodbyes.

I am selling my motorcycle to Tony from California who has been here in San Jose for 25 years. If it works our I will be flying back to the states tonight, back to Maine to regroup and then possibly off to Reno, NV for a RopeWorks Course for Wind Turbines.

Colin - Day 82-87: Playa Madera, Nicaragua to Antigua Guatemala

From our roadside parting I headed north paralleling the coast, avoiding the capital city of Managua, and twisting down roads that, despite the pockmarked surface, were quite the roller coaster ride. All along my route I had a string of towering volcanoes on my right and the pacific ocean on my left, although not always within view. Just before sunset I found my way to a backpackers I had heard about located in the little coastal town of Jiquilillo called Rancho Tranquilo.


A corridor of palm trees led me into the rancho, a large palapa with rooms on either side of an open common area. At the far end of the property was a little gate leading out to a flat beach with gray sand and waves curling in toward land stretching as far as I could see. What was missing from the picture was people; the beach was completely deserted. I think I can deal with that. I decided to stay for a day and took a stroll down the beach and into the estuary that makes the town of Jiquilillo just a finger of land surrounded on three sides by water. Take a place like this and add great people and great food and it's easy to imagine finding oneself lost here for many days.



With Rancho Tranquilo behind me a pushed north and inland to make my way to the western most border crossing with Honduras, once again in the shadow of the towering volcanoes which dominate the prarie landscape here.



I arrived at the fronterra around mid day and began the paperwork needed to exit Nicaragua and enter Honduras only to find mid way through the process that it was now lunch time and I would have to wait an hour. That's fine and dandy except that the official that I needed to submit my paperwork to simply came out of the office and stood by chatting with the money changers and border agents who had been "helping" me with the process. Hmm. With my wallet greatly lightened, I headed off across the short section of green Honduras I had to cross to find my way to the border with El Salvador. Another 30 minutes of racket and a handful more money set me free from Honduras and off I went across the bridge into El Salvador as the sun ducked below the horizon and dark rainclouds drizzled down a cooling mist.

I get the feeling that Honduras is on a whole different page than the rest of the central american countries when it comes to visitors or tourists or whatever you want to call them. It seems that they want to take as much money and time from you when you enter or exit the country. In contrast, El Salvador simply required filling out a form, making some photocopies and then I was free to ride on. I found an cheap hotel with secure parking in the town of San Carlos just ten or so miles from the border and was happy to lay down to rest after such a long day.

With sunlight creeping through the interlocking terracotta tiles of the roof, I emerged into bright sunshine and set out to make tracks as I had planned to end up further north yesterday (no thanks to Honduras border crossings). Heavy traffic, at least the heaviest I've experienced in a while, accompanied my morning travel as I made my way south towards San Salvador before I turned south to head for the coast. I stopped for breakfast at the parquero centro in the little mountain town of Santiago de Maria and had a wonderful plate of eggs, rice, beans and tortillas with coffee and freshed squeezed orange juice. mmm mmm good. With a full belly (well full enough) I headed onward finding my way onto El Salvador highway 2 which parallels the coast line several miles inland for the southern half of the country. The northern half of highway 2 is a true coastal highway that seemed to me to be someones attempt at copying California Coastal Highway1. The road twists, turns, rises and drops, following the following the contour of the coastline affording grand views of the ocean crashing onto the cliffs below. Definitely one of the best sections of road on the trip encouraging the use of 3rd gear to launch oneself out of hairpin turns and around the slow traffic. Yeehaw!

Not being able to take pictures of the sights while riding a decided to take a lunch break at a beautiful overlook. Wanting to take full advantage of my seaside comedor, I ordered up the first fish item on the menu with no idea what I was going to arrive in front of me. A large grilled fish stuffed with lots of shrimp in a cream sauce was the result of my food adventure and all I could think of was how this was something you would only find at a Legal Seafood back home. Looks like I'm all set with food for the rest of the day.


to be continued....

-Colin

James - Day 85: San Juan Del Sur, Nicaragua

It was almost to perfect the end of the beginning and the beginning of the end. On the side of the road just after paying off the police again on the pan-american we sat knowing that we would transision from riding shoulder to shoulder to one riding north while the other riding south. The umbilical cord between us would be the double yellows that we got to know so well on our trip of over 7,000 miles together from Boston through the blue ridge parkway to new orleans to austin and then on to the carribean mexico crossing the river to Guatemala and into Honduras with the immigration officer and then the beautiful dirt twisty through the mountains to Nicaragua. We visited many islands, been on volcanos, went diving on the second largest correl reef in northern
hemoshere. Stopped by military, met amazing people from around the world, talked with locals and found roads that didn't exist. we slept on the side of a highway and on a carribean cay. Drove through snow storms and on beaches. We ate beans and rice cooked in the bathroom in a nasty little motel and we ate like kings in the most beautiful swamp hostel in Guatemala. We surfed and hiked, we got sick in buisy hostels and on the side of volcanos. This is a trip of a lifetime and would not have been possible without Colin and I getting together and buying the bikes last minute.

It's kind of funny, being here in Nicaragua writing the blog in a hammoc on the beach watching the waves and listening to music from friends I feel at home many many miles from what i call home. But, at this age I am not sure if I have a single place I call home, I feel like a rambling man or that I have many places where I feel at home. The question arises, is my house my home or is it a place i feel at home. The same question arises for a church or temple or a monistary. For me this is an enlightening realization as I sit here. My home is where I am right now right this moment wether I like it or not. I am just getting to know this world I live on and understanding that this is my home, every inch of this planet and all of the people are my brothers and sisters.

I have been losing track of the days, and the date and the day of the week and the month. Time has become a thing of unimportance, it is made up. My plan from here is to travel south with Eva, Simon, Bonny, and Frauke to Costa Rica, surf the coast for a week and then head south to Panama, maybe for some diving and find the end of the pan american highway, then back to panama city and find a flight back "home" to Boston, or should I fly somewhere else...

Day 71+...: Matilda's, Playa Madera, near San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua

We have made it to the pacific ocean finally! We have journeyed over 7,000 miles in about 70 day (for all of you math buffs out there thats about 100 miles per day)

Our first night here the hostel we wanted to stay at was full so we opted for the misquito infested tent, we woke up in the morning and there were 30+ of these guys floating around to full to eat any more of our blood. We were happy when we moved into our dog houses, a cozy structure four feet in its highest spot and just big enough for two beds.

It is 100 cordobas per night per person ($35 per week buffs), which is not to bad considering that I can look out from my bed through our screen half doors, out the small gate leading to the beach and am just able to make out the size of the waves and what tide it is. By these calculations I can roughly figure out what time it is and if I need to brew some coffee and start another day in paradisimo.

I picked up a surfboard today, meaning i shelled out 200 bucks for a really nice 7'3" piece of foam to take out in to the ocean and play with waves, a phenominon that occures when a serge of water meets a sloaping sand beach and the top of the wave moves at a quicker speed than the bottom of the wave, through friction all of you thermodinamics people, so that the wave curls over, usually when this happens the entire surge breaks all at once, but if you are lucky the serge comes in at an angle and breaks over a period of time either from right to left or vis versa. Depending of the size of the serge and the shape of the ocean floor the waves are unique their area. Going out onto these waves is quite an interesting experience, first you wade out upto your waist and jump up onto your board and paddle out. Paddling seems to be quite easy but I think it is the most difficult thing in surfing, try getting through pounding waves with the only propulsion being your arms. They get buff really quick.

Surfing is like fishing, its not called catching for a reason because most of the time you are not catching but getting pounded by the waves, a nice little reminder that mother nature can still kick you ass. And it is not about how big of a wave you can catch and what sick moves you can throw down, it is about how much fun you are having and how this experience makes you feel. It is a great feeling the power of the wave in a positive way, having it propell me while I am
standing on it even just for a split second, I can only imagine...

At night we cook some dinner and make a fire on the beach, sing and look at the stars, the milkyway, and other planets in our solar system. It is so clear you can see everything and visualize the moon spinning around the earth which in turn is spinning around the sun along with a few other planets, and our sun is just one of many stars in our galexy and I realized that all things are relative, the only real significants of a year or a day is that it is just our reference to the sun that we call time, but there is a universal time that is much "slower" than what we experience, it is one that time is measured by the speed of light and of entire solar systems changing their relative distences from each other over a "long" time. We are lucky that we have the ability to see a "snapshot" of this time. We are significant only in that we make this reality based on the information we are able to access. What is it that we don't know, but is right infront of us waiting for us to discover it, and if we discover it is that when it has an existence or dose this possiblity already exist, and if this is true, that these possibilities exist than this means that everything is possible until we prove it otherwise, and even in this case of proving it we are only using the tools that we understand to prove it and if that is true how can we find something new if don't know that it exists. Why is it not possible to float off of the ground or fly? Because we think that it is not possible or because it is not possible? and how do we know for sure that it is not possible, are we only using what we know to come to this conclusion?

Lots of questions that bring up more questions, I think this is philosophy, but thats only what they tell me, you know those people who say it exists.

Day 70; El Zopilote, Isla de Ometepe, Nicaragua to Matilda's, Playa Madera, near San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua

With our bellies full of a wonderful breakfast of homemade bread, cheese, eggs n'shit (ie a scramble with veggies) and hot coffee we set out from our relaxed accomodations back across the isla to Moyogalpa where the ferry docks. There are many boats running between the mainland and the isla each day although not all of them are car ferrys. The eleven o'clock boat was a large launcha (well it was at least much bigger than the launcha we took to cross the river from Mexico to Guatemala) with passengers sitting in the lower coverd deck and the cargo and our bikes on the open upper deck. With no properly secured ramp for loading up the bikes, the guys helping us load up had to get a bit creative with a wood plank and at least a dozen sets of hands. with the bikes secured we set out for the heavily rocking hour long boat ride back to San Jorge.

Unloading was even more exciting with frothing waves tossing the launcha up and down while we once again manuvered the bikes across a wood plank and onto the solid ground with the help of many hands.

Not wanting to stay right in the center of town in busy San Juan del Sur, we headed north when we reached the ocean (woohoo, the Pacific at last!) to Playa Madera where we heard there was a great hostel and beach in a more pleasing setting. Turns out, as with much oceanside property in central America, the hostel and surrounding land has recently been purchased by a private party who does not want to share so no dice there. Good thing there is still Matilda's: a little compound with a few cabanas, a half dozen private rooms, four "dog houses", ample space for camping, a communal kitchen and the gate opening right out onto Playa Madera. Perfect.

Day 68-69: Hostel Hacienda Merida, Isla de Ometepe, Nicaragua to El Zopilote, Isla de Ometepe, Nicaragua

Day 68: Today we hike Volcan Madera.

so when hiking up a volcano it is important that you know that it is a volcano and can be dangerous, not only because it is a volcano but because it is a very large object that you are trying to get on top of. This volcano, and many like it, generates its own cloud and has its own cloud forest in which it is extremely muddy. We decide to join up with some other travelers, on peddle bikes, and hike this badboy. The only thing is that we leave out the guide that is meant to protect you from the dangerous volcano. We slowly make our way up some small paths and through farmers yards and we ask directions from these farmers and get mixed looks and expressions like, "el comino is muy peligroso". We ignore these and ask if the top is up, they say yes, and we continue.


Little paths cross big paths and faint paths cross small paths, over bare hills and past farmers and cattle and flowers, a breeze blows the heat off of us, we get up to a little plato and have a view of the lake, white capped and the volcano conception with its top hat cloud.

we don't stop long and continue up the mountain. similar to hiking to the waterfall as we continue the trail gets steeper but this time it get more and more muddy until we are sinking in to our ankles.



About two hours from the top I get a small pain and dismiss it for a little cramp, about twenty minutes later I have stopped and can't move. Hours from any road I am bent over and loosing energy quickly. We tell the other hikers that what is happening and we head down very slowly. My salvation is thinking of the little lookout spot in a field of flowers and sunlight that i can lay down in. After at least two hours of crippling pain, and getting rid of breakfast, we step out into the field and i lay down and curl up into a ball while Colin eats what is left of our sandwishes. After a while we make the rest of the trip down, get on our bikes and make it back to our hostle just as our hiking partners arrive after hiking to the top and back down the other side. We pack up and jump on the bike, heading back over to El Zopilote the backpackers where we had homemade pizza Tuesday night and met up with our friend Nate, whom we first met at Casa Perico back in Guatemala. It turns out it has been exactly 28 days since we saw him last, we know this because it seems he is our full moon buddy.

Day 69: Enjoying an cooperative organic farm on the shoulder of a volcano.

El Zopilote is a pretty amazing place. First there is the setting, just breathtaking amongst hundreds of banana and plantain trees with a little watchtower affording views of both volcanoes and the lake waters below. Then there is the hostel itself: hammock and tent space, dorms, private cabins, composting toilets, concrete and glass showers and great people. Can't forget of course the produce and goods grown and produced right on the farm such as coffee, jams (try mixing bananas and ginger sometime, wow), homemade bread (so good) and whole bunch of veggies. Some travelers come for a few days, some stay and work for months.


We also took some time to go down to the windy beach on the east side of the isthmus: another idealic place to chill.

Volcan Madera: