Godforsaken Island

Along with my ginger pills, with every ferry crossing I take some mysterious blue pills. And they knock me right out, so that when the ferry guy pokes me hard with his finger, I resent it and point upstairs to where the rest of the team is sitting... getting tan, frolicking, whatever, just not sea sick. And I close my blood shot eyes and go back to sleep, getting hit by seaspray and leaving myself open to robbers. The first time though I woke up and it took me a while to realize my bag was in a pool of seawater, I just hope that the spare socks and underwear and travel documents spared the more priceless items like my phone. The next time I learned my lesson, and put my bag on the bench, still waking up to curious stares from the locals, but I was dry...

We traveled to Ometepe. The land of two mountains. Except when we got there we found out the beach was under 6ft of water and a perpetual and violent windstorm didnt show signs of abating. And being trapped on an island even if it is in Nicaragua means they can charge unreasonable prices for some of the best grilled chicken Ive had, which was like $8. The fresh pineapple juice was also good. But basically that was my central activity. Eating. And 2 days was a blow to my budget...so I charged it. Sleeping in a hammock was my 2nd main activity... Meandering around watching Magpie Jays and seeing how drunk the two old guys were going to get was 3rd... Exploring boredom while other more silly people climbed a near 45 degree mountain face of Concepcion, was the basic theme. Their vigor was taken with a vengence as most of them are curiously ill and vomiting... we cant figure out what it was between them. But the poor souls are hobbling around the mountainous Monteverde now.

I cant say we were sad to leave the island, even though in its visceral moments it was awesomely, I dont know... atmospheric. Everything just whipped up and moving and in a loud frenzy, restless and consuming were the waves and everzthing in motion. We trudged ourselves out of bed around 6am on Sunday, van to the ferry, ferry to the taxis, to the van, where apparently we had the fastest border crossing ever from Nicaragua to Costa Rica, flipping up mud on our heels and legs and making it to the land of tourists and shopping centers. Theres something relaxing about civilazation as we know it, like you dont have to think about anything ever, but then its fairly boring also... something hesitant and inviting about shacks and ramshackled cement places, not so with uniform spanish tiling and gigantic shopping centers that met us near the border. They asked me if it was like american shopping centers.. i said, mostly like the ones near the southern beaches... but you know the a-c would be going stronger, and theyd have more to chose from then just azul for your pens, and cadberry for your chocolate, but itd have to do.