San Juan del Sur

Popoyo was great but a little crowded for our taste, so we continued on down the road. We stopped in Rivas for provisions and ended up in SJDS for an afternoon. There are no waves in the harbor here and camp options were limited, so we stayed out of town, and ventured back for coffee, groceries, atms, etc.

This town is a major tourist destination, with cruise ships and overweight whiteys roving the streets. The bars might have been fun at night, but we kept to our favorite coffee shop Gato Negro for speedy internet and fresh coffee. We filed our taxes during low tides, then went back to the playa.
This building is next door to the place we heisted our new guide book from.

One day I watched a menacing dog jump a large metal fence and tumble onto a parked bicycle. Bristling with fury, the beast extracted himself from a mess of bent spokes and attacked a dog on the street, who was obviously shocked. Two, three well placed bites, and the aggressive dog was satisfied, and calmly trotted away.
The up close and brutal incident served as an accurate projection of what will happen to the Giants at the Ravine in LA this season. Eat it pat.
We carried Camper through the strife afflicted region.
Regresamos a la playa.
A

Popoyo!!!

This place is awesome; it has everything to offer. There are colorful birds that squak all night.

One says 'hola' and the other, our favorite, just says 'goddammit!!!'
There is a monkey named Max who, though tethered, seems to have the best time hanging around in his tree and riding the local dog around. Camp wouldn't have it...

What a fun little bastard to have next door.

He bites!

I'm not sure if I'd want a barrel full, but we had a fun time with this fellow.

This place also has waves; good ones.
When it's BIG, the inside wave shuts off, making the outside reef break your option. This gets big; they tow in with jet skis. Luckily for us, it wasn't that big. We don't have any surf pics as we're usually both out there at the same time, but we're having a damned good time out there. The water is cold here, wetsuit cold.
It's strange to put a wetsuit on when it's 90 degrees out and you're in the tropics, but with board shorts, you can only surf for about 45 minutes max, getting out shivering.
We camped at a restaurant here,
and spent the hours not surfing going on walks

and reading a bit... Three nights, great waves, nice people, but once we ran out of money, we had to head south where they have banks and grocery stores and more waves. Cheers
GB

Granada, Nicaragua

Granada is a lot like Leon which is a lot like other colonial cities own here. There are cool buildings with great architecture
and a lot of churches. This place is on the enormous Lago De Nicaragua but it is too polluted to swim in, so... Not much for us to do here but get caught up, spend money, and drink some Tonas. There are hordes of whities, from oldies to backpackers to couples to spring breakers. We stayed here two nights; just long enough for Alex to find a future girlfriend,

and to find out where to go next. Of course, we had to enjoy a few nights out on the town, where we met people from Atlanta, D.C., New York, Sweden, all sorts...

We found a hot little room with two fans at a hotel that didn't have a problem with the dog and caught a massive procession one night where tons of people walked about the town taking turns carrying a huge, heavy looking Jesus statue and beating on drums.

Existing in this heat without an ocean or lake or river to jump in is a bit stupid, so we're off to the beach......
GB

Border Cross Hassle

This was probably the least fun day of the trip. We knew it was going to suck.... It did.
We crossed into Honduras, after a border crossing nightmare. We forgot to hit the ATM on the way, and halfway through our paperwork realized we did not have the cash. It was about 200 degrees out and with abrasive "helpers" in our faces, it was very frustrating.

It became apparent that I would have to take a cab back to a town where there might be a cash machine, while Garen stayed back to help Camper guard the truck from shifty border loiterers. My tiny 3 wheel cab instead took me out to the desert, where I figured to get shot after having my PIN # interrogated out of me. Turns out, the cab driver lives out there and wants to take his Tercel for the remainder of what he says is going to be a long drive. 25 miles later, we found a Scotia bank, and I made it back to the truck safely.
Immediately after crossing into Honduras, we had to pay a cop $20 for not wearing t shirts while driving. There was simply no talking to this hard ass.
It was a long day for all of us.

We were pulled over 6 times in Honduras all in all, usually to check and see if we had a fire extinguisher and emergency triangles. No triangles here, so we convinced the cops that they were buried under all our stuff and it was too damned hot to unload everything. So they flat out asked us for cash. And sometimes for something to drink.
Of course they were given nothing.
Wearing a shirt in the car sucks.

Crossed the other Honduras border into Nicaragua about 3 hours and infinity potholes later. This one was much smoother.
We drove through Leon and out to the beach at Ponoloya. The drive was pretty enough, but bad road conditions plagued us the whole way.

We stayed at Playa Roca, an overpriced shit house.
The were no waves so we split the next morning.
A

Las Flores

The plan was to camp out on the beach at Punta Mango, where there is an uncrowded right, but the camping options sucked, so we stayed at Las Flores near Cuco for two nights. The swell was very minor, providing us with mushy two to three footers that would occasionally jack up only to close out. We surfed three or four times anyway for lack of better things to do.

We camped behind these trees, neighboring a fancy white person resort. There was no ping pong and beer was ridiculously overpriced, so they were useless to us.

We briefly chatted with some other campers, but mostly just read, relaxed, and ate.
A