Nicaragua to Costa Rica Border

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Our penultimate destination was to be San Juan del Sur, and then on to Playa Majagua. We didn't really plan to make it that day, but despite some very bad roads and because of a few good ones, we just seemed to keep driving. The roads in Nicaragua are probably the worst we have experienced so far. On this day's journey we travelled over more tarred roads that were more potholes than pavement. But we also found that the Pan-American Highway when we reached it was, in comparison, a perfectly smooth, paved surface. The only hold-up to a speedy advance on that road was caused by the police investigating an accident in which a semi had apparently run over a bicycle. Due to the lack of a body or any blood on the road, we can only assume that the rider escaped unhurt. But the police had the driver manoeuvre his truck until it was exactly in the right position so that they could take measurements for their report. Meanwhile, the traffic in both directions was stopped.
We arrived in San Juan del Sur around 1.00 and were totally unimpressed by the town. So, we decided to drive on to Playa Majagua, where we had heard from various sources that there was a beautiful place to camp in peace and quiet. The road is dirt and used to be a railway line. Because of this it is very narrow in places, particularly through cuttings in small hills. It was also quite wet and slippery because of all the rain that had fallen in previous weeks. We drove much too far along this road because the turn-off to the beach we were looking for was unmarked. When we eventually found the right road, we were faced with crossing a river about 100m down it. No problem, it was shallow and we have high clearance. Then we had to fight our way up a short steep bit of road that was really badly damaged by run-off, and interrupt the locals playing baseball on the road when we reached the top. A few hundred metres further on and we found a piece of road that we decided was totally impassable. The wheel ruts in the mud appeared to be about knee deep.
We made our way back through the baseball game, down the rutted slope and took a turn to another beach just before the river crossing. On this road we just had to drive through a stream that the road had become and eventually a hotel on a hill came into view. Their driveway was also very washed out and quite steep, but we made it up to a parking spot and decided we had endured enough for one day and would stay the night. We took a room in order to get a much needed shower. It was the wrong decision - there was no hot water, the room was really hot and the air conditioner too noisy to run, you couldn't open the window because there were plenty of biting insects waiting outside the unscreened openings - Juergen spent the night in the camper and I tried to sleep without letting the air conditioner disturb me too much.
We had thought to spend a few days and then cross the border into Costa Rica. But this wasn't the place. We drove back along the stream, across the river, along the former railway line through mud made more slippery by overnight rain, through a lot of water running across the road, avoiding washouts that made the road almost too narrow for the truck and finally made it to San Juan del Sur. We didn't like it any more the second time round and couldn't find anywhere to stay so we decided to drive back to the Pan-American and see if we could find somewhere on the way to the border. The only hotel had a policy of not letting campers spend the night in their enormous and empty parking lot, so we found ourselves at the border by mid-afternoon, with little choice but to either cross, or spend the night in a parking lot full of trucks which may choose to arrive or depart at any time during the night.
It is necessary to say that Nicaragua was a disappointing experience for us, Granada really being the only redeeming feature. I am not sure that this is the fault of Nicaragua, but rather of the timing of our visit there. We missed the areas we had wanted to see because of the terrible rain that was falling, and beside that fact, constant rain and illness can wear down anyone's enthusiasm fairly quickly. So, I am loathe to say that Nicaragua is not a place to visit - the truth is we just don't really know enough to form an opinion. A couple of things we did notice though - there were many locals warning us to be careful of thieves or robbers, and it was the first time we had experienced that. And the people along the roadside that watched us pass gave the appearance of being anything but friendly and welcoming (unlike most other countries we have come through)!

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