In Seattle

I'm in seattle now. Took three flights yesterday.

One from Managua which was an hour late. Made me nervous as I had to connect to another flight shortly after and had to clear customs. Two years ago, when returning to Managua through Canada I got a full search done on the contents of my bags and my wallet. The guy was seriously desperate to find something on me. He was swiping down my money with detection swabs, he was swiping down the bottom of my bag pockets with swabs and even took a candle I got as a gift to another machine to hav it checked out.

So what would the US customs be like when they see that I was in Peru and Nicaragua?

Fortunately, they were easy. He asked why I went to so many countries, thought it was a good idea that I take a break from programming and waved me through!

I flew next to Salt Lake City. I had a window seat. In between was an American and on the Aisle was a japanese girl wearing a Sister Something name tag. She was a mormon missionary. So the guy in between got a 'have you invited Jesus into your life' speech. What was funny to me is that the phrasing sounded so familiar like something right out of a movie or comedy. He was a good sport and by the end of the flight had a jesus postcard, some literature, and another card with an invitation to the church. She was working with another missionary who was seated separately.

Salt Lake city, from the plane and airport looked really cool. A super flat city, surrounded by mountains. I also saw a yellowy lake which I imagine is the salt lake.

Flying to Seattle... it's a jog backwards if you think about it la-salt lake-seattle, but that's how Delta works right now - I sat next to a guy from Boeing working on a 787 plane that is to be made of composite materials instead of aluminum. Interesting, but I imagine it will be a challenge to, uh, well, get that, uh, project, uh, off the ground. Sorry.

Nicaragua notes

High humidity, yellow school busses, vulcanization shops, pop in plastic bags - I was here two years ago and these are the funny things that I re-recognized right away.

I had a good visit with Rob and Fabiola. We visited Leon and a volcano lake. Saw a monkey, ate french toast and drank Tona beer.

Actually we drank the Tona beer in a super market. Fabiola suggested it. You can go into supermarkets, which are air conditioned, grab a beer, sit down and drink it, then take the empty can to the checkout to pay for it.

going to Nicaragua tomorrow

Might be going to Nicaragua tomorrow - Maybe. Kim might be going to Seattle.

carribean side of Costa Rica

ok, so after leaving La Fortuna which is in the mountainous central region we tried to drive to the eastern Caribean coast. It was slow going as the roads were windy, single lane and there were alot of trucks and people riding bicycles in the dark. Eventually we got to a sketchy town called Puerto Viejo (the one in the middle of C.R. - -there is another one). The lonely planet book actually sorta described it as sketchy and when I asked this guy for directions and he yelled and swore randomly at me, the city gave me a weird sense. Anyway we found a cabin outside of town and it turns out their restaurant was really good. Or at least I really liked my Jalapeno beef.

The next day we did make it to the Eastern Coast - to the other Puerto Viejo. Being on the Carribean coast I expected bongo drums or steel drums or some sort of drum music, but was disappointed. We did find an italian hostel owner who liked to flirt with Kim. I think he gave us a good price on the room we got. The city itself had tons of bars and promised to have a happening night life, so I actually got dressed up thinking there might be something nightlifey to do. So at night we followed the music, but it just led to an empty disco - so we went for dinner which took forever for the food to come so we got drunk on the drinks while waiting. After that we went and checked out the disco, still empty - intimidating even as it was so loud and empty that approaching it would just draw attention. Anyway it wasn´t that exciting of a night and I can assure you this paragraph is more exciting than actually being there. Actually we went to a restaurant called Chocolate and Bread which Kim liked.

The next morning, after Kim got up earlier, got an impromptu neck massage from the hostel manager, we headed up to Cahuita which I liked better than Puerto Viejo because it was a small town. So small they didn´t have a bank machine or any way to get a visa cash advace so we ended up driving up to Limon and back to get some money.

Today we got pulled over by the police. We were driving back to San Jose and passed a police checkpoint. Kim said she saw someone point at us and then a few miles up the road they pulled us over. A small SUV with 4 cops pulled us over and wanted to search the car.

Search the car? For what? ¨Campanata¨ or something like that. Guess what that means? Drugs? Fruit? Bananas?

Nope. It´s... Camping equipment.

Turns out our hostel owners called the police with our passport numbers and license plate number saying that we had taken some camping equipment or a tent or something. Weird. We didn´t take anything so it was pretty confusing, the police were apologetic, but it was still weird. These guys pulled us over about 3 hours drive (or maybe 1/4 the width of costa rica) away from the site. So they were radioing ahead... Hunting for the tent bandits. With our passport numbers.

I´ve tried to guess what happened. Or where the misunderstanding is. Maybe the hotel owners lost a tent or someone stole one last night and they suspected us. Another possiblity is that I bought a mosquito net last night which had a white hula hoop part on the top, so I left the hula hoop part in the room garbage because that part was bulky - but I figured I would keep the net part and maybe give it to Kev as he has or had a frayed one... Anywhoo, so now I wonder if maybe the hotel owner saw the hoop, thought it must be part of a tent, confused him or her, so she thought maybe it was a clue to a tent that she thought she might have had at one time.

Anyway, we are hoping that they haven´t somehow flagged our passports with customs.