The book is a Bill Bryson-style travel memoir of me getting into stupid and sometimes dangerous situations driving from Los Angeles to Panama, including getting stuck on the wrong side of Nicaragua during the uprising of 2018. It also contains a ton of historical information on ancient Mesoamerica and some of the modern politics of Central America—basically, anything that piqued my interest in the year+ I spent researching. Also, I eat a lot of delicious food.
Anyone curious about this part of the world should get a lot out of the book as part of a hopefully funny, entertaining read. I hope you enjoy!
I better post this before I get banned for welching on my bet and posting in DC. If I'm banned and anyone wants to go for any part of the trip - PM flopnuts or BRC - they know me on twoplustwo.com and can contact me. More eyes and ears are always welcome. I've got one guy who wants to go - but he'd have to quit his job, so obviously nothing is guaranteed.
I just got back from a photo trip in Patagonia, where we drove a lot. I LOVE the region and South America in general. Never been to Central America but I've had some great trips in Mexico.
I have two jobs and I'm sick of both. I don't think the side job will last much longer, and the day job is about done for me. I probably need to stick it out until the end of year to get my bonus and pay off some 401(k) loans. But unless I get plugged into some interesting projects - I'm gone. I figure there has to be some advantage to dying alone with no kids. This would be the adventure of my life. I'd try to live-blog it as much as possible.
Our photo tour guide from the Patagonia trip is planning a 20-day partial boat tour next May that he's calling "an expedition". We'll get into some fjords in Southern Chile that hardly any one's ever been to - much less landscape photographers. So that's my parameter - be in Patagonia by mid-May.
I've done some cursory research, and it seems pretty doable.
You have to ship your car across the Darien Gap - which is a PITA.
Very rough plan is to drive to Cabo, then take the ferry from La Paz to Mazatlan. Then head South. I'd probably zip across El Salvador and Honduras as fast as possible, enjoy myself in Costa Rica and maybe Nicaragua. I've been to Peru, Columbia, Chile and Argentina and know they're pretty safe. I feel like I'd want to avoid driving in Brazil, Venezuela (govt might seize my car) or the Guyanas. Paraguay, Uruguay, Bolivia should be fine. I know not to drive at night in sketchy places and find secure parking for my car.
I plan to mostly camp and stay in hostels. I can sleep in my car in a pinch. Maybe splurge on a hotel when I want some extra security for my car. On the way back I may either sell my car or ship to LA or Florida from Colombia.
Prerequisites:
Must learn reasonable conversational Spanish. I know a lot of words but no sentences, etc. I am using this online thing called duolingo. Looking for an an immersion program in LA. There are some Spanish classes by me but they don't start right away.
Lose at least 30 lbs. At 257 - I'm 40-50 lbs over-weight right now. It's just no fun in a lot of ways. I won't enjoy myself unless I get below 230. Plus I hope to get laid a decent amount with my fun story and mad Spanish skillz.
Maximize my social media footprint so hopefully the blog picks up some traction and has a lot of viewers. IE - finish photo website (pretending to sell photos), get active in 500px (2p2 for photographers), start blogging, get active on forum for people doing these driving adventures (forget the name), FJ Cruiser forums, Instagram.
Figure out what modifications if any I want to do to my car. A flat roof rack with a pop-up tent seems really cool. But as I'm going to be jobless maybe I should think about limiting spending. Or maybe some kind of hidden compartment to hide camera gear/computers/etc?
Research, get permits, visas etc. ahead of time.
Big question is whether or not to take my FJ Cruiser or buy an Outback or something for $5k:
Pros:
Great car, nice and high so I can see things developing.
Built like a tank to protect me in a crash.
Can get into fun places like camping on the beach.
I pan to blog the whole thing - so me and my FJ is a fun angle. Me and my Camry lacks the same zing.
Cons:
Everyone says try not to draw attention to yourself. Big ginger beard with CA plates in that car does the exact opposite. (I'm hoping people will think I'm ex-military or something lol)
I am stupidly emotionally attached to my car, and have put some customizations into it. It's got 100k miles so it could easily last me another 10 years. I really would have a hard time selling it at the end, even though supposedly you can get good money in Brazil. Also I know there's a very real probability it doesn't come back from being totaled, or stolen. I have to be ok with that.
15 miles to the gallon/15 gallon tank (yeah wtf) - but I figure I can carry extra tanks.
Any thoughts or advice is mucho appreciated.
I am fine with the idea that I could have everything stolen and have to limp back with my tail between my legs. You don't have an adventure w/o risking something. If I get killed I had a good life. My biggest fears are getting kidnapped or paralyzed in a car wreck. Both seem fairly low probability. [Reply]
Adventure travel update! I'm currently stuck in Bluefields on the sparsely populated Atlantic side of Nicaragua for an extra 5 days (hopefully not more) due to mass protests and roadblocks that basically block all car traffic from the Pacific to Atlantic side. The roadblock at Nueva Guinea went up at noon Thursday. I showed up at 4pm.
If my flight from Corn Island hadn't been delayed from morning to afternoon - I probably would have just made it. Or just missed it by like 5 minutes, which would have been really painful.
I spent the first night in my car along with everyone else - hoping they'd open up at some point. Btw in case you're wondering my 2007 FJ burns about 4 gallons of gas over 12 hours idling with the AC running. Then in the morning I gave up and went back to Bluefields. The minimum I heard for the roadblock was 2 days. There seems to be a word-of-mouth schedule to these things, but it changes a lot and no one really knows for sure.
The only thing I know for sure is there's a Managua/Bluefields bus trapped in Bluefields. When that moves I know the road will be open. I've got a local guy here keeping me up-to-date, for which I'm buying him a few meals. He also told me there's no panga boats to La Rama - not that that would help me much. Although he told me there were no flights to Managua, which is wrong. But he knows the panga captains so I think he's accurate on that.
Nueva Guinea to Bluefields is about a 2 hour drive but through some gnarly construction that gave me a flat tire the first time. I have since aired down to 20psi and been fine. This time it was raining on the super-slick clay mud. The mud is so slick literally you can barely stand up on it. I drove on a small patch and all 4 tires spun for a bit when I got back on the pavement, until the mud burned off. They were towing cars uphill to get through it. I saw a road-grader towing a bus towing a car.
So there's another fun factor to worry about - might get trapped by the rains. The cool part was they picked my car out of the whole line to be the first one down the hill. People were walking by remarking - "cautro por cuatro". It would be fun to try to get up it sometime. When I came back the next day they had spread rocks around and it was much better.
I went back to the front lines today and saw all the same people - no one's moved - even people in nice cars. The line was actually shorter than when I left the previous morning - as like me plenty of people gave up and went somewhere else. There are makeshift campsites all over the place. Multiple people said 3 more days. So I came back to Bluefields again. So frustrating because it's like a 5 minute walk from where my car is stuck to where I want to be. They don't block foot traffic, bicycles or horses - only motorcycles, cars, buses and trucks.
Myself and my car get a lot of attention in that line as the only gringo with a weird car they never see, and with USA plates - and people get drunker and want to joke around with me more as the night goes on. It's good natured and I'm sure it's most likely safe, but I felt a little like a sitting duck. I did see my drunk neighbor who kept calling me gringo and was making me a little nervous from the night before. He had gotten a hotel room and cleaned up, and was very nice during the day.
It's hard to tell the spectators and trapped people from the protestors - maybe that's by design. Except for a couple guys walking around with makeshift rocket launchers. They fire these throughout the night as fireworks - but were also firing them at cops (and getting shot at for it) in the protests a few weeks ago.
So by my guess it's maybe 30 protestors, a few of them armed with glorified fireworks. I didn't see any other weapons. But I did see some people in the back of a truck with a serious military rifle - driving towards me, about 20km away from the scene this morning. No idea what that was about. If everyone who's stuck just banded together I bet they could push these guys off. But maybe then hidden weapons come out or something. I've heard most of the other roadblocks at least let people trickle though - not this one.
Hopefully I get out of here Tuesday or Wednesday - if civil war doesn't break out.
Hanging out in our new home away from home. I moved the tanks to upright, but they were empty until now. I filled them just in case of emergency, and now they're denting the roof a little. I think I can put one of the extra roof slats under it. Or try to find a 1x4 tomorrow. [Reply]
Yeah it doesn't seem to be a one time thing. A lot of people are talking civil war. I think if Ortega agrees to run again it will end. The military and police aren't backing him very strongly. So who knows. [Reply]
Originally Posted by suzzer99:
Yeah it doesn't seem to be a one time thing. A lot of people are talking civil war. I think if Ortega agrees to run again it will end. The military and police aren't backing him very strongly. So who knows.
So far nothing's made me fear for my safety except my concerns about getting all the attention as the "wtf is this gringo with US plates doing here?". The protestors aren't targeting me.
But yeah I'm just looking to get my car out of the country ASAP at this point. In retrospect driving across to the Atlantic side, and then ignoring warnings about protests on May 10th was a bad move. But literally the only kind of protest that could have affected me is this - blockading one side of the country from the other. No one was predicting that.
The owner of the hotel I'm at says I should have gone up to the front and asked them to let me pass as an American. From every other gringo roadblock encounter I've ever read about, that wouldn't go anywhere, and would just draw a lot more attention to me. He also said I should call the US Embassy. So I emailed them tonight. We'll see what they say. [Reply]
I'm still stuck in Bluefields with my car. Current plan is I'm going to head back to the roadblock at Nueva Guinea tomorrow. Hopefully it opens then, as they were saying on Sunday. If not, thanks to help from Oasis Hotel in BF, I have the owner of a hotel in Nueva Guinea who has said he'll *try* to help me. I also will have a cooler full of ice cold beer as a propina/peace-offering/goodwill gesture. Heh. I figured it might be welcomed after 6 days of manning a roadblock in steamy heat.
My plan is to head to the Costa Rica border at Rio San Juan/Los Chiles and get across as soon as possible. There could be more roadblocks but hopefully if I can get through one I can get through the rest. I just want to get out of the country before my visas expire. Hopefully that will get some sympathy.
I'm still stuck in Bluefields with my car. Current plan is I'm going to head back to the roadblock at Nueva Guinea tomorrow. Hopefully it opens then, as they were saying on Sunday. If not, thanks to help from Oasis Hotel in BF, I have the owner of a hotel in Nueva Guinea who has said he'll *try* to help me. I also will have a cooler full of ice cold beer as a propina/peace-offering/goodwill gesture. Heh. I figured it might be welcomed after 6 days of manning a roadblock in steamy heat.
My plan is to head to the Costa Rica border at Rio San Juan/Los Chiles and get across as soon as possible. There could be more roadblocks but hopefully if I can get through one I can get through the rest. I just want to get out of the country before my visas expire. Hopefully that will get some sympathy.
One of your pics was too dark to be seen. Just so you know, I downloaded it, only to open it in Photoshop to lighten it to see it. Then I thought I do you a favor and just restore the color as an exchange back.
Don't know how it will look on your screen but it looked good here. Here it is.
