April the 9th we start our journey to San Marcos, Nicaragua. A dear brother, Ken Bromiley, took us to David so we could catch our first bus which would take us to San Jose, Costa Rica. We boarded the bus at 8am or a little after. We were taking the Sanders bags to them so we had 4 large suitcases and our carry-on bags. After all passengers were on we took off. The trip was pretty uneventful. Paso Canoas is the border we cross to get into Costa Rica and it was very simple and painless. After we finish our border crossing we head for San Jose. Once we arrived in San Jose the views were spectacular. Not that we didn't see some really pretty views on the bus ride but the city of San Jose was very beautiful. A brother from one of the many Spanish congregations in San Jose, whom I might add we have never met before, picked us up at the bus station and even took us to two other bus stations to see if we could get tickets on to Nicaragua. We thought we might have to stay all night that evening and leave the next morning, little did we know how busy "holy week" is in Central America. The soonest we could get out of San Jose was Friday at noon. We had planned on being back home Sunday night...not going to happen. We stayed with Eduardo and his wife Yolanda, who I might add were the most hospitable people in the whole universe!!!! They did not speak English, we do not speak Spanish, but we managed to make it through. Our new friends let us know that the next night they would be hosting four more people who were staying all night on there way back home to Mexico City. You guessed it, we were reunited with our friends from Bocas! We had an amazing evening with music and laughter, and lots of fun trying to talk Spanish! We were so nervous staying at first but by the time we left on Friday we were sad to leave our new friends who had become our family.
The bus to Nicaragua was a lot different than the first bus. It had air conditioning and movies and food! We went through the borders and it was crazy busy, it took almost 3 hours because of how many people were there and how many buses were going through. I guess a lot of Nicaraguans live in Costa Rica and go home for the holidays. Once we got to a town called Nandaime, we got off and a brother in a truck was there to meet us. He was from a Spanish congregation nearby and gave us a ride to the Sanders'. He does this for a living. We had found out that there had been two earthquakes that day. One was in Nandaime and the other near Managua. 6.6 and 6.1 were the ratings. There was one death in Nandaime.
We were so happy to see the Sanders'. We thoroughly enjoyed the time we spent there. That is my next post....
Mango tree in Costa Rica
The beach from the bus in Costa Rica
This river had a sign posted: Alligator Crossing
Mountains outside of San Jose
Singing after dinner at The Rojas'
Eduardo playing the guitar
On the bus to Nica
Very nice
View from the bus to Nica: this is still in Costa Rica
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