Just once it would be nice if a bus could keep to its schedule. We do appreciate that we're in a developing part of the world but surely sooner or later something has got to keep to time?
It didn't happen on Tuesday though as we travelled from Tegucigalpa to Managua, capital of Nicaragua.
We needed a cab across town in Te-goose and stood outside our hotel for a few minutes, seemingly the only place in town without a succession of white MOT failures passing by, waiting for one.
Finally one pulled up and I asked how much to Tica Bus. "150 Lempiras" came the reply, approximately 3-4 times what a local would pay and about double what I was willing to shell out.
"No señor", says I in my most authoritative way. "80 Lempiras is what I will pay. Si o no?"
He didn't reply, just spent 5 seconds crunching into first and then took off down the road in a cloud of smoke so I took that as his unwillingness to negotiate.
A couple of minutes later came the second bite of the cherry.
"How much to Tica Bus?"
"Where?"
"Tica Bus"
"I don't know it"
"You don't know Tica Bus? The main international bus station?"
"What is it called again?"
"Tica Bus. Ti-ca Bus"
"Ahhhhhh, Tica Bus, Si, Si, 120 Lempiras"
Give me strengt
Next!
Finally, and mercifully, the next fellow's opening gambit was 80 Lempiras which we gleefully accepted, much, I think, to his surprise.
Tica Bus operate throughout Central America and if one is of a masochistic persuasion it is possible to travel with them from Tapachula in southern Mexico to Panama City.
Our 8 hour 'hop' should be no such trial: 3 hours to the border, an hour's faffing about there whilst they stamp all of our passports and 3 hours into Managua. A cakewalk. With an 0930 departure we'd be there by 1630 and given that we'd earmarked a room about 150 yards away from the bus station we had about two hours of daylight contingency to play with. Nothing could surely go awry.
Though we met our first delay in departing Te-goose, 30 minutes, the first part of the journey was fine. Kerry enjoyed watching the film which was in English and I blogged. The TV screen was right by our seats and, in comical homage to the Dutch lady of the other day, I walked straight into it not once but twice.
At the Honduran side of the border we were invited to leave the coach for half an hour and seek sustenance from the roadside traders.
It was here that Kerry was stung in the leg by an unidentified flying insect whilst I went off in search of somewhere to spend a penny. I found a place, behind a lorry, though it was a little offputting to realise mid-flow that the driver was swinging in a hammock beneath his rig about 3 feet away from me.
A long, hot hour passed here with "She who goes mental if unable to find shade" close to a breakdown on account of the heat and the certainty that she was about to go into anaphylactic shock as a result of her sting. I rustled up as much compassion as I could muster and promised her that if she did succumb then I wouldn't hesitate to suck the poison out.
It was unfortunate that she was stung near her groin but in extreme circumstances a man has to do what a man has to do.
We were back on the bus for about 30 seconds and then we all had to disembark again, this time with all of our luggage from the hold, to go through Nicaraguan immigration and for a full luggage search.
There was a real melee here, no organisation, as we've come to expect, and various kids and other unsavoury looking sorts all trying to make a few pence out of the bus load of people.
We queued for what seemed like an age waiting for our bags to be searched. It didn't help that we were all stood under a corrugated iron roof which conducted the heat of the day, cooking our wilting bodies.
Eventually it was our turn and the poor unfortunate soul who had to finger my stinking baggage certainly drew the short straw compared to his neighbour who opened Kerry's case to be greeted by a pair of pink knickers bearing the legend "Sexi Kiss".
This all took quite a while, two hours in all we spent at the border so we had seriously eaten into our contingency time.
Just after leaving Leon the coach pulled up at the side of the road and I watched the driver get out and have a chat with a local.
He gesticulated down the road and a couple of minutes later we were pulled over again and a grease monkey was whipping our punctured wheel off.
I say 'whipping' but nothing happens here very quickly and it was 45 minutes before we got going again.
And so we pulled into Managua at around 1900. Another new city, another late arrival, more darkness.
I knew where the Hotel Los Felipe was, just a 3 or 4 minute walk up that dingy and unlit road, yes, that one with the silhouettes of people lurking around, the one that the straggly haired and be-vested local was telling up he'd walk us up for no money, you know, just because he's a good egg and likes helping gringos who arrive in a strange place at night.
The taxi ride cost $2 and was pitifully short. In fact, I think the driver may have gone round the block in order to spare all our embarrassment. But, we were there and we were alive, both reasons to celebrate wildly.
Our bible is the "Lonely Planet - Central
America on a shoestring" and, as we are learning, is pitched at students and/or people who are looking to do what we're doing for as little expense as possible. Of course, we don't want to spend money willy nilly but being so-called "Senior Gappers" we're perhaps looking for a slightly greater degree of comfort than our book's primary audience.
The Hotel Los Felipe was a good case in point. Whilst described as the pick of managua's accommodations we felt it left an awful lot to be desired. For instance: room to swing a cat, a toilet one could sit on without having your knees wedged against the wall, a shower head so that washing wasn't akin to standing under a pouring tap, somewhere to put your case (the latter being Kerry's latest and greatest bugbear).
However, at £13 per night we figured it would do us for the two nights we wanted and then we'd be shipping out so we took it.
It didn't happen on Tuesday though as we travelled from Tegucigalpa to Managua, capital of Nicaragua.
We needed a cab across town in Te-goose and stood outside our hotel for a few minutes, seemingly the only place in town without a succession of white MOT failures passing by, waiting for one.
Finally one pulled up and I asked how much to Tica Bus. "150 Lempiras" came the reply, approximately 3-4 times what a local would pay and about double what I was willing to shell out.
"No señor", says I in my most authoritative way. "80 Lempiras is what I will pay. Si o no?"
He didn't reply, just spent 5 seconds crunching into first and then took off down the road in a cloud of smoke so I took that as his unwillingness to negotiate.
A couple of minutes later came the second bite of the cherry.
"How much to Tica Bus?"
"Where?"
"Tica Bus"
"I don't know it"
"You don't know Tica Bus? The main international bus station?"
"What is it called again?"
"Tica Bus. Ti-ca Bus"
"Ahhhhhh, Tica Bus, Si, Si, 120 Lempiras"
Give me strengt
Next!
Finally, and mercifully, the next fellow's opening gambit was 80 Lempiras which we gleefully accepted, much, I think, to his surprise.
Tica Bus operate throughout Central America and if one is of a masochistic persuasion it is possible to travel with them from Tapachula in southern Mexico to Panama City.
Our 8 hour 'hop' should be no such trial: 3 hours to the border, an hour's faffing about there whilst they stamp all of our passports and 3 hours into Managua. A cakewalk. With an 0930 departure we'd be there by 1630 and given that we'd earmarked a room about 150 yards away from the bus station we had about two hours of daylight contingency to play with. Nothing could surely go awry.
Though we met our first delay in departing Te-goose, 30 minutes, the first part of the journey was fine. Kerry enjoyed watching the film which was in English and I blogged. The TV screen was right by our seats and, in comical homage to the Dutch lady of the other day, I walked straight into it not once but twice.
At the Honduran side of the border we were invited to leave the coach for half an hour and seek sustenance from the roadside traders.
It was here that Kerry was stung in the leg by an unidentified flying insect whilst I went off in search of somewhere to spend a penny. I found a place, behind a lorry, though it was a little offputting to realise mid-flow that the driver was swinging in a hammock beneath his rig about 3 feet away from me.
A long, hot hour passed here with "She who goes mental if unable to find shade" close to a breakdown on account of the heat and the certainty that she was about to go into anaphylactic shock as a result of her sting. I rustled up as much compassion as I could muster and promised her that if she did succumb then I wouldn't hesitate to suck the poison out.
It was unfortunate that she was stung near her groin but in extreme circumstances a man has to do what a man has to do.
We were back on the bus for about 30 seconds and then we all had to disembark again, this time with all of our luggage from the hold, to go through Nicaraguan immigration and for a full luggage search.
There was a real melee here, no organisation, as we've come to expect, and various kids and other unsavoury looking sorts all trying to make a few pence out of the bus load of people.
We queued for what seemed like an age waiting for our bags to be searched. It didn't help that we were all stood under a corrugated iron roof which conducted the heat of the day, cooking our wilting bodies.
Eventually it was our turn and the poor unfortunate soul who had to finger my stinking baggage certainly drew the short straw compared to his neighbour who opened Kerry's case to be greeted by a pair of pink knickers bearing the legend "Sexi Kiss".
This all took quite a while, two hours in all we spent at the border so we had seriously eaten into our contingency time.
Just after leaving Leon the coach pulled up at the side of the road and I watched the driver get out and have a chat with a local.
He gesticulated down the road and a couple of minutes later we were pulled over again and a grease monkey was whipping our punctured wheel off.
I say 'whipping' but nothing happens here very quickly and it was 45 minutes before we got going again.
And so we pulled into Managua at around 1900. Another new city, another late arrival, more darkness.
I knew where the Hotel Los Felipe was, just a 3 or 4 minute walk up that dingy and unlit road, yes, that one with the silhouettes of people lurking around, the one that the straggly haired and be-vested local was telling up he'd walk us up for no money, you know, just because he's a good egg and likes helping gringos who arrive in a strange place at night.
The taxi ride cost $2 and was pitifully short. In fact, I think the driver may have gone round the block in order to spare all our embarrassment. But, we were there and we were alive, both reasons to celebrate wildly.
Our bible is the "Lonely Planet - Central
America on a shoestring" and, as we are learning, is pitched at students and/or people who are looking to do what we're doing for as little expense as possible. Of course, we don't want to spend money willy nilly but being so-called "Senior Gappers" we're perhaps looking for a slightly greater degree of comfort than our book's primary audience.
The Hotel Los Felipe was a good case in point. Whilst described as the pick of managua's accommodations we felt it left an awful lot to be desired. For instance: room to swing a cat, a toilet one could sit on without having your knees wedged against the wall, a shower head so that washing wasn't akin to standing under a pouring tap, somewhere to put your case (the latter being Kerry's latest and greatest bugbear).
However, at £13 per night we figured it would do us for the two nights we wanted and then we'd be shipping out so we took it.
After eating at a spectacularly good street meat-feast emporium we turned in, both waking independently in the night convinced that spiders were on us though not mentioning it to the other until the next day.
So, Managua, capital of Nicaragua, though only so since 1852 when a new government was elected and they moved it from Granada.
In those early days Managua was no more than a large village but has grown to now house about 1 million people.
It's really a collection of small settlements and is one of the most low-rise and leafy capitals I've ever seen.
Don't let that description fool you though: for low-rise read 'corrugated iron or wooden shacks' and while it is undoubtedly endowed with an awful lot of trees, the visible poverty, polluted lake and broken footpaths hold your attention far more.
In 1972 a tremendous earthquake struck Managua, killing 6000 people and rendering 200,000 more homeless. The epicentre of the quake was in the area around Lake Managua and is still largely in a state of disrepair due to lack of funds to rebuild. What international aid was sent to the then government from other countries was creamed off and didn't reach it's intended audience.
The highlight of this area is the old cathedral, a truly beautiful edifice all the more evocative for standing ruined and with its two bell towers still intact, though with massive cracks running up them. The clock tower still shows the time that the earthquake struck.
The old Grand Hotel is close by and at the time of the earthquake one Howard Hughes was living in the penthouse.
Our walk took in a couple of impressive squares, some monuments to politicians and leaders of yore, a tribute to pope Juan Pablo 11 and a mystifying passenger jet parked down by the malecon.
Ah, the malecon. What could and should be the jewel in a beautiful city's crown is in fact a dirty road lined with seedy bars all pumping out loud music, behind which is the toxic Lake Managua, itself skirted by tons of litter.
We're having to turn a blind eye to litter but it's not easy. I don't know what can be done but if we're not careful we'll all be thigh deep before long.
Our next stop was an area of town called Acahualinca, a place where workmen discovered 6000 year old footprints of men and deer in 1874. They were made in soft mud and then covered by volcanic ash and preserved.
There are five volcanoes surrounding the city with four of them now extinct.
We took a cab across the city and happened across a very westernised shopping mall. We had lunch here and marvelled at the apparent difference in status between the shoppers here and the barefooted people we'd just left in Acahualinca.
Behind the mall is a hill which overlooks the whole city so we walked up it to get that birds eye view.
There was a strong military presence here and as we rounded one corner a Toyota pick-up screeched towards us with half a dozen masked and rifle-toting men in the back, a tad alarming and not really what either of us expected to see.
The road up the hill was lined with signs depicting Nicaraguan history of the past 100 years or so and though it was all in Spanish the message was clear. Essentially, the people have been oppressed, kept in poverty and/or periodically massacred whilst a very few got incredibly rich. That's really oversimplifying it but that's a one sentence overview of the Nicaraguan century.
A change should have come in the late 70s with a newly elected government but Ronald Reagan favoured the old one so financed the Contra war which dragged on for nigh on a decade.
At the top of this hill is an old volcano crater, now filled with a lake about 200 feet below the crater rim.
A highly enterprising chap has constructed a 1.2km long zip wire around the crater and as it was only £9 per go we simply had to give it a whirl.
What a thrill that was, especially the last leg of three, low over the water in a "superman" position.
Our final port of call was to take a look at the new cathedral, built in 1993 to replace the earthquake victim.
This dreadful concrete block is a monstrosity and if Prince Charles were ever to clap eyes on it he would surely be reiterating to his begonias that modern architects don't know their arse from their elbow.
I know money is a factor here but it looks for all the world like a cement factory which was once a prison, not somewhere to celebrate the glory of God.
Our next taxi driver was an arse who tried to demand more money than we'd agreed but him aside we found everyone very friendly and a delight to deal with. In fact, we really liked Managua and had we chosen more salubrious accommodation we would probably have stayed an extra day and explored further.
As it was we embarked on a mission to reach the Carribean Corn Islands by land and sea rather than take the easy option and fly, and what a little adventure that turned out to be.
We decided to split the journey into three: bus to a place called El Rama - 6 hours; panga (water taxi) from there to Bluefields on the Caribbean coast - 2 hours; ferry out to the Corn Islands - 5 hours. This method of reaching paradise would afford us an opportunity to see a lot more of the country than the 1 hour 15 minute flight would and it would probably make us appreciate it all the more when we got there too. A sure fire win-win.
We cut it a little fine to get out to the market in the east of Managua from where our 0845 chicken bus would depart, a fact not lost on our taxi driver who relieved us of $15 for ensuring we made it.
To put that in perspective our two bus tickets all the way to El Rama, a journey of 300 kms, only cost £6.
The market was the usual assault on the senses with our conductor trying to drum up trade for our bus, music blaring, food being cooked, fat being chewed and a hundred other things going on around us.
Though we only arrived 10 minutes before departure we were some of the first people on-board and took our seats in anticipation of it getting wedged. As is usual in Central America hordes of people got frantic as the bus started to pull away bang on 0845, emerging from various places around the market to leap on.
So, Managua, capital of Nicaragua, though only so since 1852 when a new government was elected and they moved it from Granada.
In those early days Managua was no more than a large village but has grown to now house about 1 million people.
It's really a collection of small settlements and is one of the most low-rise and leafy capitals I've ever seen.
Don't let that description fool you though: for low-rise read 'corrugated iron or wooden shacks' and while it is undoubtedly endowed with an awful lot of trees, the visible poverty, polluted lake and broken footpaths hold your attention far more.
In 1972 a tremendous earthquake struck Managua, killing 6000 people and rendering 200,000 more homeless. The epicentre of the quake was in the area around Lake Managua and is still largely in a state of disrepair due to lack of funds to rebuild. What international aid was sent to the then government from other countries was creamed off and didn't reach it's intended audience.
The highlight of this area is the old cathedral, a truly beautiful edifice all the more evocative for standing ruined and with its two bell towers still intact, though with massive cracks running up them. The clock tower still shows the time that the earthquake struck.
The old Grand Hotel is close by and at the time of the earthquake one Howard Hughes was living in the penthouse.
Our walk took in a couple of impressive squares, some monuments to politicians and leaders of yore, a tribute to pope Juan Pablo 11 and a mystifying passenger jet parked down by the malecon.
Ah, the malecon. What could and should be the jewel in a beautiful city's crown is in fact a dirty road lined with seedy bars all pumping out loud music, behind which is the toxic Lake Managua, itself skirted by tons of litter.
We're having to turn a blind eye to litter but it's not easy. I don't know what can be done but if we're not careful we'll all be thigh deep before long.
Our next stop was an area of town called Acahualinca, a place where workmen discovered 6000 year old footprints of men and deer in 1874. They were made in soft mud and then covered by volcanic ash and preserved.
There are five volcanoes surrounding the city with four of them now extinct.
We took a cab across the city and happened across a very westernised shopping mall. We had lunch here and marvelled at the apparent difference in status between the shoppers here and the barefooted people we'd just left in Acahualinca.
Behind the mall is a hill which overlooks the whole city so we walked up it to get that birds eye view.
There was a strong military presence here and as we rounded one corner a Toyota pick-up screeched towards us with half a dozen masked and rifle-toting men in the back, a tad alarming and not really what either of us expected to see.
The road up the hill was lined with signs depicting Nicaraguan history of the past 100 years or so and though it was all in Spanish the message was clear. Essentially, the people have been oppressed, kept in poverty and/or periodically massacred whilst a very few got incredibly rich. That's really oversimplifying it but that's a one sentence overview of the Nicaraguan century.
A change should have come in the late 70s with a newly elected government but Ronald Reagan favoured the old one so financed the Contra war which dragged on for nigh on a decade.
At the top of this hill is an old volcano crater, now filled with a lake about 200 feet below the crater rim.
A highly enterprising chap has constructed a 1.2km long zip wire around the crater and as it was only £9 per go we simply had to give it a whirl.
What a thrill that was, especially the last leg of three, low over the water in a "superman" position.
Our final port of call was to take a look at the new cathedral, built in 1993 to replace the earthquake victim.
This dreadful concrete block is a monstrosity and if Prince Charles were ever to clap eyes on it he would surely be reiterating to his begonias that modern architects don't know their arse from their elbow.
I know money is a factor here but it looks for all the world like a cement factory which was once a prison, not somewhere to celebrate the glory of God.
Our next taxi driver was an arse who tried to demand more money than we'd agreed but him aside we found everyone very friendly and a delight to deal with. In fact, we really liked Managua and had we chosen more salubrious accommodation we would probably have stayed an extra day and explored further.
As it was we embarked on a mission to reach the Carribean Corn Islands by land and sea rather than take the easy option and fly, and what a little adventure that turned out to be.
We decided to split the journey into three: bus to a place called El Rama - 6 hours; panga (water taxi) from there to Bluefields on the Caribbean coast - 2 hours; ferry out to the Corn Islands - 5 hours. This method of reaching paradise would afford us an opportunity to see a lot more of the country than the 1 hour 15 minute flight would and it would probably make us appreciate it all the more when we got there too. A sure fire win-win.
We cut it a little fine to get out to the market in the east of Managua from where our 0845 chicken bus would depart, a fact not lost on our taxi driver who relieved us of $15 for ensuring we made it.
To put that in perspective our two bus tickets all the way to El Rama, a journey of 300 kms, only cost £6.
The market was the usual assault on the senses with our conductor trying to drum up trade for our bus, music blaring, food being cooked, fat being chewed and a hundred other things going on around us.
Though we only arrived 10 minutes before departure we were some of the first people on-board and took our seats in anticipation of it getting wedged. As is usual in Central America hordes of people got frantic as the bus started to pull away bang on 0845, emerging from various places around the market to leap on.
We travelled approximately 50 yards before stopping to pick up more people. There are no official stops out here, you just stick your hand out and the bus will pull over for you. Compare this to England where if you are stood above one foot away from the designated stop then the driver will probably drive straight past you, gesticulating wildly at YOUR failure as he does so.
The road out of Managua was surprisingly good, two lanes for a good while and then once we'd cleared the city we were on a very smooth surface which was largely traffic free.
We made good speed, impromptu stops aside, passing various settlements made of corrugated iron, wood, even heavy duty black plastic sheeting at one point.
Before too long we had reached the town of Juigalpa and waiting for us were half a dozen people or more with various things to try to sell to those on-board.
The bus was now full and standing so it was difficult for these people to get up and down the aisle, particularly given that they were carrying anything from armfuls of watches to great big pots full of soup. Many of these women were not what could be described as svelte either so it was an hilarious and chaotic scene we witnessed, noisy too with each vendor rattling out what they had to sell.
This was repeated another couple of times and more and more people were getting on all the time so we were packed in like sardines by the time we reached El Rama at around 1530. It was, therefore, quite a relief to get off that bus and set about finding somewhere to sleep for the night.
El Rama is not the most prepossessing of places. Even our 'shoestringer' targeted guide book described it as seedy so on the basis they thought our hotel in Managua was good what on earth would we find here?
Two gringos walking around with wheeled cases is a source of great interest and amusement to the locals so we feel it's a priority to get checked in and lose them quickly to prevent our being quite so conspicuous. What we wanted first though was to orient ourselves, to locate the dock so we could choose accommodation in its locale.
But where's the dock?
I asked a fellow who looked like he probably knew but rather than give lots of unintelligible and animated directions as a Brit would when asked the way, this chap got up, breathed liquor tinged halitosis in my direction and said he'd take us there.
The thing is, we didn't want him to. Every such kind offer is expected to be rewarded with a few shekels, a slightly awkward situation that we'd rather not be in. (Have you got change, do you give a pittance and offend, too much and grieve, assume he was doing it out of the goodness of his heart and give nothing. There's too many variables.)
Despite my protestations he wouldn't hear of it and our being led through the streets by this chap only served to garner us more unwanted attention.
As he skipped away with his US dollar I was engaged by a young Dutch girl, desperate to enlist us to help fill their panga to Bluefields. (They only go when full).
I apologised that we were intent on spending the night here and travelling onwards tomorrow, leaving her to continue touting.
We chose the nearest hotel to the dock and the chap took me up to see the room which would cost us a handsome £5 if we took it.
It was an eight foot square, white painted box in which were two single beds.
I sat on the first one and as I felt a spring from the paper thin mattress twang beneath me I joked to our prospective host that this would be the bed for the 'wife'.
Sitting on the other one and having the sensation in my buns that they were sat on a large bag of stones I shifted that decree and told him she could have this one instead.
There was no way we could stay here in this room but luckily he had another, much better appointed offering for £9 so we took that.
The bed was comfortable enough though the broken mosquito netting, prison-like interior, open plan toilet facilities, lack of shower head and siting of the toilet paper dispenser about 6 feet away from the pan let it down somewhat.
The last feature did engender an entertaining game of "guess how much bog roll you'll need before you take a dump" for both of us.
In case you're interested, Kerry required an extra half dozen sheets whereas I nailed it first time.
We had a couple of hours to have a wander around El Rama and my goodness, what a place! A more filthy and ramshackle place you could hardly wish to see; corrugated iron abounded, mouldy fruit for sale, litter everywhere. We were still being stared at but there were some smiles and the odd "hola" so it felt ok.
There was very little to choose from in the way of food. It was either something unidentifiable and deep-fried from a roadside cauldron or, incongruously, a pizza restaurant.
We had to wait a full hour for our pizza to be cooked, during which the whole town suffered a 10 minute power cut. We sat in the restaurant in pitch darkness before it came back on.
Back at the room at about 2100 we had another one, much more worrying because it lasted for half an hour and of course knocked our fan out of action. We lay there in sticky discomfort getting hotter and hotter and more claustrophobic with each passing minute until it came back on.
After a hearty breakfast of scrambled eggs and beans and rice (where the hostess inexplicably asked if we wanted bacon then said she didn't have any in the same breath) we made for the dock and put our names down for the next panga to Bluefields.
Unfortunately we were passengers five and six and they need 20 before setting off so we thought we might be in for a little wait.
That 'little wait' turned into three hours.
Somehow we ended up being last onto the panga meaning we had to sit on the one row of seats facing backwards. This wouldn't have been too much of a problem if we both didn't have such flowing locks. We spent the next two hours trying to stop our retinas being whipped by split ends and the only relief we had was on the six or seven occasions that the heavens opened and we all hid beneath some black plastic sheeting.
It was nice to be on the river rather than on a bus and fascinating to see some of the dwellings out here in almost total isolation.
Two thirds of the way into the journey we slowed to a stop alongside a hollowed out canoe in which were two men and a woman. There was an exchange between our pilot and the occupants, the gist of which was that the woman was ill and needed a hospital and could she come on our boat. I don't know what was wrong with her, it looked to me that she was holding her arm as if it was broken, but in an act of inhumanitarianism our pilot denied the request and we sped off.
And so to Bluefields, a former haven of Dutch pirate Abraham Blauvelt whose anglicised name the town now bears.
Whilst it's a sizeable town, certainly for this part of Nicaragua, it was really just another El Rama. The main difference was the people, there is a large population of Black Caribs here so you have the strong feeling that you're in the West Indies rather than in Central America.
The docks here were a real seedy dive; drunks, prostitutes and hustlers were in evidence and we said thanks but no thanks to a couple of different guys who offered to help us find an hotel.
We selected the best hotel in our guidebook but at only £13 per night we knew not to expect too much.
What we didn't expect was to almost set the place on fire and to electrocute ourselves in the process.
We had a walk around the town and bought a few bits before retiring to the balcony of the hotel to have a beer and watch the locals go about their business. People watching is a fascinating pastime, particularly from the sanctuary of a first floor balcony.
We watched a funeral procession pass beneath us, after which Kerry went to shower whilst I had another drink.
When I got to the room she complained that her shower was cold so I investigated and found that the shower unit could be plugged in to the mains, thereby creating hot water.
Smugly luxuriating in my toasty water I lathered my hair up with shampoo, the prerequisite state for a shower based disaster, before hearing Kerry shriek at length and seeing what looked like a Jean-Michel Jarre concert taking place the other side of the translucent shower curtain.
The plug I had oh-so-cleverly inserted into the wall had shorted out sending sparks shooting out and then flames licking up the wall.
Despite the near-death experience, the hours on a crammed bus, anal pounding on a hard wooden seat of a speeding panga and spending time in towns that are unnerving at best and downright dangerous at worst, we absolutely had a ball this past couple of days.
Hardships and dirge are just as memorable as wonders such as the Grand Canyon or the cliff divers at Acapulco and we are loving the fact that this trip is giving us healthy doses of each end of the spectrum.
Long may that continue!
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