What a rally day in Nicaragua!

The Costa Rican side of the border crossing went seamlessly with no queues. The only problem being Nigel’s car running still like a bag of nails with absolutely no power. He got it off the rig and over the border and then the challenges began!

Although there was almost no traffic the border crossing took nearly 4 hours! First there was fumigation, then immigration, then paying and certification of fumigation, then searching of bags, then scanning of car, then Temporary Import Permit, then a tourist car payment, then stamping of the temporary import permit and then vehicle insurance and finally we were ready to go. But no! We then had to wait because the national police are going to escort us through Nicaragua because driving a right hand drive car is so dangerous!. After about 45 minutes a pick up arrives with an assistant inspector and four armed police to escort us. And finally we are off, the challenge being that we need to get 287km before dark and the police only seem to want to drive at about 60kmph!

The border crossing we had taken at Las Tabillas is a very much quieter one than the main crossing at Penas Blancas and was recommened by our Costa Rican friends because of the amount of construction work and subsequent delays at the main crossing. It was certainly quiet at 08:30am. The road from the border to Tipitapa was exceptional, quiet and incredibly rural. Very few vehicles with plenty of horses and donkeys doing the heavy lifting. This is cattle country and although basic everyone was incredibly friendly. I'm not sure that they see many 100 year old cars travelling along this road!

 

By the time we got to Tiptapi we were on our forth poice escort team now led by Captain Larry who was more than happy to put the "blues and twos" on and we enetered Managua like a presidential cavalcade. The main problem was, with the police flashing lights on we ouldn't really see anything. As we always say, rule one "never drive at night", the only caveat being if you have a police escort, particularly from Captain Larry.

We finally arrive at our hotel in Managua at 19:30 in the pitch dark with our forth police escort, lights flashing, siren blaring, traffic being stopped in all directions. It was like the president arriving!! But we got there. Nigel’s Lagonda still struggling but we have a plan for tomorrow. We are going to review all the valve clearances and see whether or not there lies a problem. Fingers crossed as we are always saying.