Managua Bound! Again...

We paid our bills and parted ways with the hotel. Definitely going back. The setup there is unreal and a 2 week stay there would be worth it. The staff told us the bus shows up at 3 pm on the street down the road. Off we went. Got there at 3 and asked some local if they saw a bus. They said "no, the bus doesn't come until 4:30". What! The thing about these countries is you don't trust anyone. They don't even know when the buses come. You ask them anything and they say 10 minutes. How far are we? 10 minutes away. Hiking the volcano: 10 minutes = to 15 hours.

Walked down the street to grab some road sodas and ran into some big truck with plumbing pipes. Juan asked them "Hacia donde va?" (where are you going). They said La Paz. Perfect! This is on route to Managua and we can find some bus there. We hoped onto this working truck and headed off. Not knowing how much it cost I asked Juan why he didn't negotiate with them before hand. He said if you look at someone in the eye and they look back genuinely, then you don't ask the price until after. I said okay.

Arrived at La Paz, thanked the drivers and asked how much. They said free. Juan = a legend and learning countless tricks from this kid.

Within seconds the Managua bus drives by. Seconds. Every transportation in this whole country we have made within seconds. Perfect record so far and flawless connections. We ran over and jumped on the bus.

Arrived in Managua a few hours later. Found some shady hostel next to the Tica bus station (similar to greyhound station) and booked the room. 3 beds in the room and a loud fan that looked like it would fall off and kill someone. But good internet! who would have thought. At this point I needed to make a decision on where I was going. Garrett was leaving at 7 am the next day back home in San Diego while Juan was going back to work in El Salvador, then back to Spain. My decision was to head to San Jose, Costa Rica. Only problem the station was closed and the buses are too professional, so you can't just hop on these ones. So I needed to wake up at 4:30 (same time Juan was leaving) and try and book a ticket when they open.

This is where the nightmare on top of my fucked up arm came into play: the small case of bed bugs. Hands down the worst I've ever seen. While the other two were snoring I was cracked out holding my cell phone over the bed trying to catch these sneaky creatures infecting my arm with bites. The way these creatures work is they feast on your blood in multiple locations. They can run and bite at the same time. If you get bit, you get bit about 10 times in the same area. All with a similar sting like a mosquito but itch for a solid week. So, I'm pulling a scanner darkly and freaking out. Each time I put my arm down something would jump on me and bite me. I easily had 100 bites on me...and still do. That night, I didn't sleep. I was freaking out so much, I tried to stand up and sleep but was still getting bit. I would kill them, and would explode with my blood. Freaky shit. I would go into the bathroom and just watch these bites swell up. Horrible night.

Watched the time tic toc and turned off my alarm before it had a chance to make some chicken noise. Some serious nightmares in the next few days are going to merge with the surfing accident and bed bugs.

I grabbed my gear and headed over to the tica bus with Juan to try and get a ticket for the 5 am bus to San Jose. Said my goodbyes to my new good friend Juan and wished him the best with his charity project. The 5 am bus was full and the guy put me on a waiting list just incase the someone didn't arrive. 5 came around and everyone showed up. I went back to the hostel and waited there until 6:30 for the 7 shuttle. 6:30 came around and Garret took off to the airport. Said my goodbyes and stoked he came out from SD to visit. Everyone is always busy and can't always travel so seeing a familiar face was refreshing. He left while I went back to the tica station hoping I would never return to that hostel.

I ordered some bread / egg sandwich and the guy called me over for an opening. Bought my ticket and jumped on the bus! Wahoo. Not sure how, but things always work out. 5 hours later in a freezing cold bus we got to the border. Supposedly you need a return ticket out of Costa Rica in order to return. I tried without it but got turned away with no exit ticket. Went back to the bus and told them my dilemma. I ended up paying the guy $20 for a open ended return ticket to Managua to trick the customs in thinking I was leaving the country. It worked like a charm. Few hours later ended up in San Jose. Typical move, I didn't know where to stay. Picked the first hostel in my book, hired a taxi and jetted off to a hostel called "bekuo". Taxi driver dropped me off and he started to take pictures of me. Must have thought I was someone else. haha, so I took pictures of him. Funny, funny taxi driver. Laughing the whole drive with this guy.

Bekuo Hostel is on a different level then other hostels. Extremely nice, modern home feel. Clean, pool table, back hard, living room with large flat screen American television. Very warm and inviting. A great place to post up and work and relax...and recover.

Been here for 3 days now and will head to Jaco tomorrow. Wahoo.