Miss Maps Goes Solo

Just realised how that title sounds so before I go on, I`m absolutely fine and happy in Granada, thank god.

Friday night, my bags were packed and I was all hyped up for the long journey ahead. Later that evening I got a phone call to say the bus wouldn`t be going until Sunday, bugger. Still, some friends and I went out to this fantastically dingy locals place, drank stupidly cheap rum and chatted to the locals. I`m sure Jenny and I were practically fluent, at one point we were all singing the Labamba at the tops of our voices, Jenny and I squealing with delight at actually understanding what the hell that song is about!

So Saturday I nursed my hangover, wandered around Antigua and watched a little girl getting her confirmation in one of the churches.

The journey from Guatemala City to Managua, Nicaragua, took 17 hours. Actually being on the bus for so long was fine. Meals, films and regular border crossings provided enough distrations. We had to cross into El Salvador, then Honduras and finally Nicaragua. I started to get the fear when I realised I was the only gringa on the bus, infact the only English speaker. At one point I heard some people making a joke about ´La Turista`, not a nice feeling. I then discovered that the bus wouldn`t reach the scary capital of Managua until 11pm, shit. I expected it to get in around 8 or 9 and so didn`t book a hotel in advance.

Outside the bus station a bunch of unsavoury characters watched us from behind bars as we unloaded our bags. As I stepped through the prison cell-esque barrier, a number of them came over to offer taxis and hotels. I chose the most trustworthy looking driver and asked him to take me to the place I`d looked up in the Lonely Planet.

Sorry, this gets a bit dodgy.

So we drive to this hostel through some seriously dodgy looking streets and my driver points out the ladrones (robbers) who stand on the street corners with guns and sticks, I´ve never seen anywhere so menacing and I`m totally at the mercy of my taxi driver. The hostel is of course full, brilliant, so we try another place down the road, full again. At this point I tell him that if the next one is full he has to take me to the Intercontinental, sod the money, I want to be safe. Anyway, we found a place for $20 per night (rather than the $3.50 I was going to spend). My 3 weeks of Spanish entirely let me down and I couldn´t understand anything the security guard at the hotel (who also had a gun), or my taxi driver, were saying. I didn`t care, I had a room!

I locked the door behind me, put a chair up against it, fell on the bed and had a bit of a cry.

The room was lovely, two double beds, TV, air-con. I can`t even tell you how comforting the BBC World channel was at that point. I slept badly of course, waking up at the slightest noise, and was incredibly glad when the sun came up.

This morning my taxi driver came back to take me to the bus station. Problem was I had about $3 left so I had to hit the cashpoint before getting on the bus. Of course the cashpoints are nowhere near the bus station so I had to get the driver to wait for me while I used the cashpoint, so dodgy! Thank god he was decent. Well, he ripped me off for the taxi fare but it could`ve been worse.

1 hour later and I arrived in the lovely Granada, I´ve never been so happy to see gringos! I´ve spent the last few hours wandering around the town. It`s great, Colonial like Antigua but much more dirty and smelly (horses and carts are a major mode of transport here and the roads are covered in horse poo) with lots of character in a more real setting. My hostel is great too, I`ve already met a few great people.

Sorry if this update has worried any of you, I was debating whether or not to be honest about last night and decided it`s all part of the experience.

Believe me, I will NEVER EVER AGAIN arrive in a capital city after dark.

Off to do a tour of the islands on the lake tomorrow so hopefully the next update will be much happier with lots of pretty pictures!

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This entry was posted on Monday, November 21st, 2005 at 6:47 pm and is filed under Nicaragua. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.