Adios Nicaragua

Saturday was the final time Aimee and Ryan would wake up under the Nicaraguan skies.  They had a few hours before they had to get to the airport to fly back, but exhausted after a week of non-stop cultural overload, they decided to sleep in a little bit.  As they knew breakfast was being made for them downstairs they couldn’t hide out in the room too long though. 

When they did finally make it down to breakfast they tried to soak in as much as they could of their last morning sitting in the lobby of yet another beautiful hotel.  As with many of the other guesthouses they stayed at, this seemed like it would have been a perfect location to spend the entire 10 days.   Breakfast was shared with an English woman who was “on holiday” with her daughter.  As with any previous encounters, they shared stories of their adventures and some of the activities and sites that each of them enjoyed. 

After breakfast, Aimee  and Ryan packed up their car and headed out.  During the previous evening’s outing it was too dark to take advantage of the fact that they were near the shores of Lago Nicaragua.  The restaurants and bars were a quarter mile from the shore, and though they began walking towards the lake, it seemed dimly lit and there were not a lot of people around, so they decided it may be safer to avoid walking all the way to the shore.  Instead, they decided that this morning they’d do a quick drive through of the area and see what the view looked like in the daylight.

Lago Nicaragua from Grenada

Woman Carrying Plant on Her Head

This was the first time driving through this end of the city, and though all of Grenada’s streets were fairly narrow, in this part of town they were exceedingly so.  Additionally, as this was the busier part of town with shops, galleries, and bars, there was a lot more traffic.  It was less than an hour drive from Grenada back to the airport, but now they were getting caught in traffic that seemed like it could take us 20-30 minutes just to get out of this part of the city.

After a bit of trial and error to get around the gridlock of the Parque Central area traffic, they made their way through town and on to the highway.  From there it was clear sailing to the August Cesar Sandino International Airport on the edge of Managua. 

As they approached the airport, Ryan had a little bit of anxiety.  Given the issues they had up in Matagalpa, including getting stuck in mud, towed out, etc. he was a little bit worried there’d be extra scrutiny around returning the car. 

Unlike larger airports in the US, there was no person standing at the ready with their little hand held computer waiting to check is in.  The lot was very small, cluttered, and had a couple dozen or two little canopies that each covered two cars, and had some lock box/cabinets under them.  Ryan looked and found one that said Alamo, and pulled his car into an empty spot.  There was however no one around.  A couple canopies further, there was an employee of a different rental car company working on something, so Ryan asked him where they guy was from Alamo.  The other young man (in his late teens, maybe early twenties) looked around and said he had just been there, but wasn’t sure where he went.

Ryan and Aimee waited for 5-10 minutes debating what to do.  When they were just about to give up and go into the airport, a guy showed up.  He began checking in the car, and then called in the information on a phone.  There seemed to be some confusion, and in the discussion Ryan could hear them mentioning “the papers”  and references to the “other office.”  It seemed like there might be confusion related to the fact that we had gotten the car from a different Alamo office in the city and were returning it to the airport (even though we had prearranged this.)

After another 10 minutes or so, he apologized, and said everything was fine, but asked us to wait.  He then walked away. He was gone for another 10-15 minutes, and came back and began helping another car that had come in.  Ryan waited patiently, but at one point when the rental car employee was looking over papers, Ryan came and asked how much longer it would be.  The man told him just a little bit longer, and apologized again. 

Once again, Ryan and Aimee were getting nervous about how long they were standing here, and wondered how chaotic the airport would be and if they’d have any issues inside getting to the gate.  They still have an hour and 45 minutes or so, but time was ticking.  The entrance to the airport was in sight, and would have only been a 4 minute walk (with a lot of bags to get there.) 

Finally, another man showed up and began talking with the Alamo employee.  He handed him some paperwork, and the two talked for several minutes over everything.  At the end of their conversation, the first Alamo worker turned to Ryan and said they were ready.   After checking in the car, they said they would give us a ride to the gate, and that we had to go into the Alamo rental desk.  Uggh.  More waiting. 

Ryan and Aimee took the 2 minute drive, gathered there bags and went in, and stood in another line for behind a couple other people.  After another ten minutes or so they got to the front of the line, and the woman at the desk processed their card and gave them their receipt.  In talking with her, she confirmed that the problem out in the lot was that the other Alamo office had a hard time getting them a copy of the rental paperwork quickly, and that was what the hold up was.

With this process behind them, they proceeded to security.  While the airport was a very tiny airport by American standards and there were only 10-15 people in front of them in the Security line, the conveyor belt was packed with belongings piled on top of each other.  Ryan got through fairly quickly, but some of Aimee’s belongings went through the scanner while her shoes were left behind.  Aimee tried to wait for her shoes, but the security guard was sternly telling her she needed to proceed through the x-Ray.  Aimee had dispensed of all of the days’ patience in the car lot,  and tried to tell the woman in English that she didn’t want to lose her shoes.  The woman of course had no idea what Aimee was saying, but told her very clearly in Spanish, she was to proceed through the x-ray.

Ryan was watching this from the other side of the x-ray and was beginning to get in the way as he was stalling waiting for Aimee.  Aimee in frustration finally rolled her eyes and came through Security, whom then urged her to get her belongings and move along.  At this point Aimee got very frustrated that her shoes were still behind half a dozen people’s belongings, and at this point had other people’s things piled on them.  Ryan finally was able to gather enough Spanish words and explained to the security agent the issue, who then called back to another agent behind the x-ray machine whom then found Aimee’s shoes and passed them through, looking very irritated at the entire ordeal.

Ryan and Aimee quickly exited the area, and Ryan reminded Aimee the virtues of not showing visible frustration with airport security personnel…. In any country. 

After this ordeal, Aimee and Ryan certainly thought a final Nicaraguan drink was in order.  They grabbed a table at a Nicaraguan restaurant in the airport and ordered some lunch and a couple Macuas.  Unfortunately the bartender seemed to be a bit new at mixing drinks and between flipping through a bartending book, hints from another coworker, and about 20 minutes of time, the drinks finally came.  One was perfect, and one was bitter/sour with hardly any guava and sugar flavor.  Disappointing. 

After quickly finishing their lunch, Ryan and Aimee boarded their plane.  Ryan had the aisle, Aimee had the middle, and a middle-aged woman with a cellphone glued to her ear, and a loud voice had the window seat.  From the moment she got on the plane, she was carrying on an impassioned conversation with someone on the other end of the phone.  Once the door closed, the flight attendant came by and told her to put away the phone…which she ignored….and a few minutes later again told her to put away the phone,  and the woman acted like she was finishing up….but didn’t.  And a few minutes later again, the flight attendant came to tell her again.  This time, the woman put the phone beside her as if it was off. The flight attendant then went to her seat and strapped in for take off. 

Aimee’s seatmate then pulled the phone back out and continued talking during the taxi, takeoff, and about 5 more minutes into the flight before finally hanging up. 

A few hours later, they were back in the states, landing in Miami Florida.  More than anything at this point, Aimee was excited to get away from her seatmate whom she now referred to as Senorita Touchy-touchy.

In the Miami airport, the two sat and reminisced and laughed about the multitude of adventures from the previous week and a half:  almost getting stranded in the storm at Chacocente, Jose, their tiny but awesome Matagalpa tour guide, climbing a mountain at Selva Negra, getting stuck in the mud on a farm, the long conversation with the ex-cholo deportee… As detailed as Ryan’s itinerary was, it certainly didn’t include these many items.  Yet, it was these adventures, and misadventures, that truly made the trip to Nicaragua as memorable as it was. 

“That is what travel is all about.”  These were the words of a former colleague, and travel partner of Ryan’s in his first blogged adventures when talking about misadventures leading to unexpected encounters.

On this trip, Ryan and Aimee were given additional words of encouragement, by their companion through the tow truck ordeal.  Upon looking at our situation of getting stuck in the mud for several hours on their honeymoon, and riding in the back of a pickup truck with some tow hands, he said it is great that the two of them were still smiling at each other in a situation like this. 

Looking back at the trip while eating dinner in Miami, the entire trip was spent smiling at each other.  As had the year and a half leading up to the trip.  On this, the final day of their honeymoon, what better way to sum it all up than in the words of the tow truck hand:

“Tienes un companera para la vida!”

Yes, this is certainly true.  Companeros para la vida!