Nica what! (part 2)

We have now made it to LA alive. 2 days of heavy travelling on buses and planes has taken its toll on us. Having left San Juan del Sur has really made us realise what a freaking awesome time we had there. Yes, it may have been taken over by Westerners to a large extent, but it was still totally worth it!
The town being very close to the Costa Rican border clearly affected the prices compared to rest of Nicaragua, but it also made life pretty comfortable there. The selection of food was mind-blowing, ranging from pizzerias to burger joints and sandwich bars, and the fact that most people spoke English was rather refreshing, as sad as it sounds. But after eating nothing but chicken and rice and stuttering shitty our Spanish for weeks we really appreciated this place.

San Juan del Sur from the hilltop

 Coconut curry in a pineapple. Hell yeah. 

Attempted to cure our hangover with the famous Nacho Libre burgers, when in the end this protein overdose probably made it worse..

The first 2 nights there were a pretty interesting experience as we decided to stay at a popular party hostel called Naked Tiger. Located up the hill a bit further away from town and run by a bunch of Americans, this young people's hotspot never slept. The first night we unofficially attended the infamous Dirty Pub Crawl so sleeping was really not a problem. Unsurprisingly the next day was spent with a banging headache and overall shit feeling so we decided to have an easy night and catch some rest. Now that did not happen. The party bingers decided to never end their rave so the next morning the decision to leave the place was pretty easy after getting 0 hours of sleep. And thank God we did! We moved next door to Casa de Olas, where our friend Luke from Bocas had just got a job at. We ended up staying at this ''hostel'' (more like a kickass guesthouse where you became a part of the family) for 6 nights and if we could have, we totally would have stayed there for even longer.

Most days we spent by the pool overlooking the ocean from the top of the hill, hanging out with the pet monkey Buzz, chilling with some awesome people who we will surely reunite with at some point in our lives, and eating delicious food. Tony went surfing a few times while I worked on my tan. We also did what most people end up doing once they actually want something to do, climbing up the Jesus, which is pretty much a mini version of the big one in Rio de Janeiro.

 Bros at Jesus

 First time ever zip-lining. Great fun! (although you should really learn how to brake)

 MONKEY TIME! the peak of my every day was spending time with Buzzie.

Casual sunset from Casa de Olas. This place really is the bomb!

On our last night we all ended up having a craaazaay party at the hostel bar as most of us were leaving the next day. I mean, at what hostel can you do a line of dozen shots with the 60-year-old Aussie owner (who is more like 20), jump in the pool with her and dance your ass off until you pass out? So simply due to the most chilled out and insanely fun atmosphere, if you go to San Juan and do not stay at this place, you are missing out big time!

The best posse at the best hostel ever 

Next day's journey back to Costa Rica though, was far from fun...Words cannot express what a hassle it is to cross a national border in Central America! No signs, no one speaking a word of English, about 10 different lines and tourist fees (tourist tax when exiting a country??) and all kinds of paper work while your carrying 30 kilos of weight over your shoulders in 30 degrees heat may give you a hint how much patience you need to deal with it. This with a hangover? Again, no words..Should've really taken some pictures of the craziness.

Anyway, after 12h of sitting on non-AC buses, waiting, sweating, and starving we finally made it San Jose! Speaking of hassle, San Jose airport the next day is whole other story..Let's just say where happy to be enjoying some American lifestyle luxury where things run fairly smoothly and you don't have to constantly worry about getting ripped off everywhere you go. Now a few days in LA (currently in Venice Beach, where it is sadly raining) before jumping on a plane to Chinaland.  

Totally recommended link: http://www.casa-de-olas.com/Less recommended link (unless looking to get fucked up every single day and night): http://nakedtigerhostel.com/

Nica what! (part 1)

Well it’s been a while since our last post and we are now back in San José, Costa Rica for one night getting ready to leave in the morning.

After we spent a couple of nights in the old colonial town of Granada in Nicaragua, it was time to head to the Island of Ometepe, which is made up of two volcanoes. The ferry ride over was 4 hours and pretty comfortable. Of course we had to buy the most expensive tickets being tourists but it was still pretty cheap. The view of the volcanoes was amazing as they came into view. The fun started when we got off at the dock and were ushered into the nearest minivan, which was overflowing with people and some poor 7 ft German guy had to sit on the roof. Not sure traffic laws apply here and due to bad roads the suspension bottomed out several times.

After staying at a couple of uninteresting places around the big volcano we chose to head down and stay at Merida on the southwest of the island which we heard good things about. Buses on the island sometimes decide not to run but luckily we got a lift with an American couple going our way. The roads got worse and we passed more and more little shack villages until we arrived at Hacienda Merida. This place had a great atmosphere and plenty of things to do but also a great place to just chill out in a hammock. We chose to hike halfway up the smaller volcano to the San Ramon waterfall, which turned out to be quite a hardcore 6 hour trek in 30 degree heat. We were not exactly prepared but somehow we made it back without getting lost or dying of heat stroke.

Romance at the waterfall

 Before Petra's feet broke out in about 10 blisters

One of the numerous pretty sunsets at Ometepe

Jurjen, our Dutch friend from Bocas del Toro, joined us at the hostel and we decided to do a bit of kayaking. First to Monkey Island where apparently if you get too close the monkeys WILL jump on you and bite you. It’s true they did look pretty damn angry. After a bit of lunch it was 1 and a half hours kayaking along the coast to the river that runs between the two volcanoes. This place was so tranquil and it was so nice to just drift though the trees in the water and watch the animals. A few more monkeys made an appearance here. The way back was timed perfectly and allowed a great view of the sunset over Lake Nicaragua.

Petra's very first kayak, and already doing better than Tony!

Angry monkeys guarding their island

River kayaking, team work success!

It was discovered that the main food to be found was rice, beans, plantain chips and some sort of meat. It gets pretty boring very quickly especially as there is no sauce, so dry. The local restaurant in Merida was entertaining. Sitting down we had several animals running round the place, turkeys and a pig with a leash around its neck to name a few. A local riding a motorbike through the restaurant was common and we were treated to the topless fat owner with his trousers undone chasing the turkeys round the table threatening to turn them into a stew. This is all normal for here! After 5 days on the island we felt it was time to say goodbye and get a ferry back to the mainland, so we headed to San Juan del Sur, a surfer village on the Pacific coast of Nicaragua. This place was far from the tranquil, authentic Ometepe, but now we really need to hit the airport! So will return with stories from Gringoville once we settle in LA. Holla!

Our ride from Merida to the ferry on an old American school bus

Finally an escape from the Caribbean Ibiza!

For the past 10 days we have been residing in a surfer's paradise in Panama called Bocas del Toro (Mouths of the bull?). Since our last post, we moved into another hostel on the main street of Bocas Town. We really had no choice in choosing it as thousands of tourists and Panamanians decent upon this area for New years. We became close friends with people in the hostel and the nights leading up to and including new years consisted of quite a bit of drinking. (When the severe downpours hit there was really not a lot else you could do). Rum was obviously the drink of choice being in Central America.

 New Year's Eve at the infamous Aqua Lounge. Ron y piña, por favor?

The days when the sun came out were spent at one of the beaches on the main island (Isla de Colon) or on the close island of Bastimentos. A short water taxi ride would get us to any of the other islands, just make sure they come back for you because its a long swim. The beaches are ridden with coconut trees and at one beach we saw starfish and even a wild dolphin!

We became used to the way things work in central America, that is, incredibly slowly. Waiting 50 minutes for 2 drinks at a bar was clearly normal as well as waiting 40 minutes for 4 people to make a sandwich at a local deli. Queues do not exist and people are always trying to scam you out of as much money as physically possible rather than rely on repeat customers. This is to be expected though as people here are a lot poorer than most of the tourists and travellers who come through.

Food can be found for cheap here and the common dish in the local joints is meat, rice and beans. Everything you need for $4. After new years we had to escape as money still seemed to go very quickly here and so we would head for the border of Costa Rica.

Us at Red Frog Beach

A sloth chilling out. These guys only come down from the tree once a week to poop!

Our hike down to starfish beach

Attempting to harvest coconuts off a palm tree using a big log

Romantic beach picture

A 30 minute water taxi ride got us to the mainland and then we had to get to the bus terminal. The bus left at 10am and so we had 25 minutes to do a 30 minute journey. Luckily we had the most mental taxi driver who decided he would get us to the bus no matter if it cost all our lives on the way. Double overtakes on a blind bend at 120km/h was really fun. He did get us there on time though :). We threw our bags on and were able to pay the $14 each on board.

An hour or so on a non-air conditioned bus and we were at the border and told to leave the bus. We had to get stamped out of Panama. True Central American style there was no queue and no one knew what was going on with hundreds of people everywhere and only one guy stamping passports. We got the stamp after 2hr of waiting and made our way walking across the old railway bridge that was the crossing. The Costa Rican side was less hassle with an actual queue and an official looking building. Was glad to see our bus was there to greet us and hadn't disappeared.

Getting some fresh juice on the Panama/Costa Rica border

The bus got us to San Jose which was just going to be a stop-over for us before heading up the Granada, Nicaragua. San Jose was not the nicest place and after a couple of nights there we eventually got an 'executive' bus up to Granada. The bus company helped with this border crossing and all went pretty smoothly. We even got fed on the bus and got to watch horrible Spanish dubbed movies. We are now in Granada and all is well......except we left a bag on the bus and it will have ended up in Managua 1hr away.....oops!

Heatstrokes and freezing showers

So came Christmas. We spent it in Bocas del Toro, Panama. Before getting into much detail about this tropical paradise, i wanna quickly mention what we have been up to before getting here couple of days ago.

Where I left you last time was Miami, i believe. We met a cool Finnish couple in the hostel we stayed in (called Jazz). If you're in Miami and looking for a an awesome location and cheap prices for accommodation, this hostel is really the place to be. 

The couple we met and eventually hung out with for the 2 days we were in town, happened to be from the same fairly small town in Finland as myself! We did take it pretty easy in Miami, had some awesome food (Latino/Caribbean food is really the shit in Miami) and caught nice sunburns on the beach. After 1 night we changed rental cars and headed to Palm Beach, where we were warmly welcomed and accommodated by my lovely godparents who have a beach apartment there. Looking back now, ending our Great American road trip in style with pressured, hot showers and comfy beds was exactly what we needed, as it is starting to look like we might have to wait to get that again when we get back home in May. In short, Palm Beach was a pretty interesting place. Zero crime rates, guaranteed sunshine, and what best, a relatively large Finnish population, which can apparently easily be spotted hanging out at the local Finnish bakery, including one national icon Eino Grön, witnessed to be blasting his own music in his convertible while popping in to get a korvapuusti. 

After relaxing in Palm Beach we headed back to Miami, where we flew down to Panama City on the 20th of Dec. Having no real knowledge about Panama, the place positively surprised us. We stayed in the one and only hostel in the Old Town or Casco Viejo (old helmet?) called Luna's Castle. As it was located up on a hill outside the city centre, we only really experienced that neighbourhood of Panama City during the few days we spent there. It was very historic and cultural but what one can not help to notice is the radical contrast of the rich and the poor, often literally being divided by one narrow street. Other than that, Panama City was pretty awesome. Havana style bars with cheap rum flowing, and salsa playing non-stop in one place or another. 

Tony being an engineer geek, he was pretty excited to go see the famous Panama Canal, which was only a short taxi ride away from the city. Personally, I was expecting it to be waaaaay bigger and perhaps a bit more mind-blowing, but it was still fun to see gigantic million-dollar cargo ships being dragged through a narrow canal. This fun was free as well, so if you were interested enough you could sit there all day and watch the ships go through.

 Panama city skyline from our hostel

Our first Panama lunch in the city. Super fresh!

 Thats me truly appreciating the engineering master piece of the Panama Canal

Casual salsa sesh at a local market corner

One thing worth mentioning is the fact that locals do not speak English so we were forced to brush up our Spanish. I even managed to stutter it well enough to buy us bus tickets from an intimidating lady at a busy bus terminal. Score! The day before Christmas Eve we took the bus to Bocas del Toro, a range of tropical islands on the Caribbean side of the coast.

Now this is our 3^rd day here, the first 2 days were pretty much a monsoon, which we were not expecting after great weather in Panama City. All cool though, luckily for Christmas day yesterday, the sun decided to show up and our xmas moods were finally lifted. Been eating and drinking pretty well so far. Local cuisine in Panama is soooo refreshing after heavy junk food in the US. It pretty much always consists of rice, meat and beans, and plantains (which we pretty much discovered for the first time!). And tropical fruits, especially papaya, which seems to be in season, are dirt cheap and available at every street corner. So bikini body, here I come! (Better late than never)

 Central American breakfast specialty: Huevos Rancheros

 Tony enjoying his 3-course xmas dinner. By far the most expensive meal so far! 

 Local street corner food in Bocas 

 Finally got to jump in the water after sweating our asses off for days

Xmas chilling on a bar boat

So a quick summary about Panama so far; not as cheap as excepted, at least in terms of eating out. American dollars used as the officially currency clearly symbolises the long-lasting US influence in the region. Learn some basic Spanish if you wanna get by! Although here in Bocas most people speak English as its pretty taken over by Americans, who mostly run a lot of the hostels here. And last but not least, showers everywhere are FREEZING! Really starting to appreciate the luxury of having a hot water tap in your shower :) I suppose it makes some sense considering the all-year average temperature of 30 celcius...Adios for now!

Useful links for potential travellers:

Cheap hostel in Miami Beach: http://www.jazzhostels.com/jazzsouthbeach.php?gclid=CLD25ZaPubQCFQeynQodBnoAew

Party hostel in Panama city: http://www.lunascastlehostel.com/

Naked in Flo-rida

After our heavy times in New Orleans, we got ready for the final phase of our Great American Road trip, making our way to the sunshine state of Florida. After a night’s stop at (another!) motel in Tallahassee we broke our driving record and drove a 900km stretch in one day ending up in Homestead, FL. A random stop, but convenient enough to head down to Key West the next morning. Americans have been smart enough and built a 170km BRIDGE highway connecting all the islands that make up the Florida Keys at the very Southern tip of Florida.

Happy Holidays y'all!

Arriving in Key West and doing some research on accommodation on the island, turned out that the very cheapest option for 2 people was $100 for a shitty hostel dorm room! So prepare yourself for the fact that this place is definitely not budget-traveller friendly. So having no place to spend the night, we decided to go with the flow and hope things would sort themselves out, hence we hit the beach. HELL YEAH, this was what we’d been waiting for since we left Europe. Sunshine and heat. Funny enough, without us having to sleep in the car (which btw is illegal everywhere in Key West), we ended up meeting up with a hilarious Serbian friend through Couchsurfing who eventually let us sleep in his place! Thank you Mircco.

That night we also hit some bars in the infamous Duval Street, which is pretty much a combination of Sunny Beach in Bulgaria and Ibiza. Long story short, we were taken into a bar called Garden of Eden. Literally, EDEN. Basically the third floor of this bar was clothing optional and unfortunately the people who opted for no clothes were not the people you would want to see with no clothes. It’s hard to enjoy a beer when there are old men and women dangling their bits everywhere. No kidding. We wish we could’ve captured this grossness on film, but unfortunately this bar, for some funny reason, did not allow any pictures being taken.

The next, before leaving Key West we enjoyed an awesome day on a private island just off the South coast of Key West. This place was a true paradise, and we finally got our tans on!

 Soon-to-be lobsters

 Just chillin on a private island

Tony loving winter time

After leaving Key West, we spend a night in a motel (no surprise there), so we could have easy access to Everglades, the famous national park inhabited with alligators. So today we spent the afternoon at one of Everglade’s many safari parks, and it was totally worth it! Only cost $23/person and we got to go on an airboat ride, and got to see alligators (and their babies), and even got to hold one!

Now we are in Miami, which we will post on later!

 Alligators are kinda adorable, eh!

 Bumped into turtle twins

Baby and his momma

Belly full of food and booze

Before getting into more detail about the last couple of days, we just wanna recap New Orleans real quick and say HOW AMAZING IT IS. In conclusion, if you are looking for delicious food and crazy 24h nightlife, this is the place to be. Here’s what we were mostly up to in NOLA:

 Local food heaven, Johnny's Po-Boys

 Tony had Johnny's special. YUMMMMMY!

Our local friends took us to an amazing bbq joint in the Upper 9th ward...

...where the food was true Southern soul food! (and cheap too)

 Our ''one daiquiri at the corner bar'' turned into a crazy long night with a new friend we made from Florida. Here, Tony and Jarid holding an infamous ''hand grenade''. This night we witness a man next to us first buying drinks to the ENTIRE bar, then puking at the bar, and finally put into handcuffs by 2 police officers. Standard Bourbon St. 

 After party @ 5.30am somewhere downtown.

Walking back from our after party at 12noon the next day...

Jazzin' in New Orleans

Last night we arrived in New Orleans, being nearly 2 days behind the schedule. In the end, I am happy we stayed in Tyler for an extra day as it enabled us to have our very first visit to a baby ward. Yes, my friend Farrah had a baby while I was in Tyler!Hence we had to expand our stay by a day so I could go see the cutie pie. And oh boy it was worth it!

On Saturday Tony also got to see his very first live football game when the town where my Texas family is from (Hughes Springs) played one of their play-off games in Longview. Personally i wasn't too fascinated by it, as I spent an entire year going to football games every single Friday. But Saturday night was priceless as I got to reunite with the rest of the family I haven't seen for over 5 years. And since the crowd mostly consisted of small town locals Tony finally got to see some real-life rednecks too!

Tony's cultural experience exceeded his expectations

Farrah's adorable little burrito!

After our hospital visit we really needed to hit the road in order to make it to New Orleans at some point in this life time. Our drive was rather exciting as we were literally in the heart of a crazy-ass storm pretty much the entire 6h on the road. Later it turned out that it was a start of tornado that hit some of Louisiana soon after. That night we spent in a motel in Baton Rouge, which by the way, being a state capital is so unexciting! (even pretty rough to say the least)

The Exxon power plant, one of Baton Rouge's famous tourist attractions :)

So we finally made it to New Orleans last night. We were lucky to have someone accommodate us while we are here, and the fact that he lives in the heart of the French Quarter is definitely a bonus. So last night we enjoyed a stroll in the neighbourhood, getting a taste of some of the delicious Louisiana cuisine, which we had no real expectations of. We discovered a popular restaurant on Decatur, which offered us an excellent taste platter of the most famous local dishes (and even some much-missed Europe-style cider!). As a dessert, we enjoyed some awesome rhythmic live blues in a music bar couple blocks away from the house.

 Tony trying out some gumbo, rabbit jambalaya, cajun chicken and red beans 

Old folks busting some awesome tunes!

Louisiana restaurant on Decatur: http://www.coopsplace.net/