On the bus from Rivas to San Juan del Sur Rhiannon and I met a fantastic Australian couple, Jess (aka Jeffrie) and Calum (aka Cal). They were meeting up with a friend, Claire, from California, for a few weeks. On the first night in San Juan del Sur we met a Belgian guy named Roger who ended up hanging out with us all for the next few days.
The six of us had a blast in San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua, a smallish beach town an hour or so from Rivas. How did we get there? You guessed it…more chicken busses.
We first met Jeffrie and Calum on the bus ($2) from Rivas. On arriving in San Juan del Sur we dumped all our bags with Cal and went in search of lodging. We found Mama Elizabeth, the matriarch of Casa Hospedeje. She is a feisty one, but lovable! Casa Elizabeth left much to be desired in terms of cleanliness (I don’t even want to mention the thousands of cockroaches we discovered in the kitchen late one night!), but the family was welcoming and energetic. And Mama’s front porch was the perfect place to meet new friends.
The horseshoe shaped beach is gorgeous with restaurants serving cheap (delicious) food and great happy hours everywhere!
One morning we got up early to go find Jesus. In San Juan del Sur, on top of a cliff, stands the world’s third largest statue of Jesus. We decided to walk…up…and up…and up. When we finally got there after an hour we discovered it was closed. Apparently it doesn’t open until 8:00 am and it was only 7:00 a.m. We offered money to the guard and, yep, he let us pass. 🙂 We walked up some more and found a locked gate. Shoot! But, we didn’t let that stop us. We had paid the entry fee and by damn we were going to see Jesus! So we slithered through the gate.
It was crazy windy at the top. But the view was amazing.
We got lost walking back, but the scenery was pleasant and the shade was welcome. Even so, when a truck came along we happily jumped in for a ride back to town! The wheels on the truck were at least 4 feet high, so climbing in and out was an adventure in itself.
Finally “home” we explored the town and found a hidden fish market where we bought 2 pounds of shrimp and a large slab of some kind of fish (for $5) to make for dinner later that night. When the power went out around 2pm (for hours) we talked a fabulous German guy into starting happy hour really early. We dubbed it the No Power Happy Hour. 🙂
Tomorrow we plan to rent scooters and explore the outskirts of San Juan del Sur. As with so much of this trip, a plan made is a plan abandoned. Scooter renting would have to wait. Hitchhiking became the adventure of the day. The tale to follow!
Audrey, Rhiannon, Jeffrie, Cal, Claire, and Rodger – six new friends who found each other (and Jesus) in Nicaragua.
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