A Roving Exchange

Our bikes were loosely tied together atop bags of grain on aferry, headed for two volcanoes rising out of the largest lake inCentral America. Late-afternoon sun flooded across the scene.The rocking waves lulled us to contentment after a sweaty,humid Nicaraguan day cycling through pastoral countrysidesdotted with schoolchildren, cattle carts, roadside garbage

in Central AmericaStory and photos by Blake Gordon

32 ADVENTURE CYCL IST FEBRUARY 2007 ADVENTURECYCL ING.ORG

dumps, and a German cyclist heading north.With seven days of cycling Nicaraguabehind us, we looked forward to a bikefreeadventure and relaxation ahead of us beforedeparting the country.

Four of us were headed across Lago deNicaragua for a break from our demanding100-kilometer-a-day pace. A fifth, the do-it-yourself Belgian named Walter, lingered inthe aging colonial town of Grenada to createhis own trailer. I remember running intoNate, our videographer, in Grenada’s loose-ly gridded streets.

“Where’s Walter?” I asked.“He’s trying to construct a trailer out of

a huge pile of bikes in someone’s house.”Envious of our own manufactured trail-

ers, Walter was consumed by his task. Wewould meet up with him later on the CostaRican coast, mumbling about the peculiari-ties of his semi-successful creation.

Across the lake, Volcán Concepción,which last erupted in 1957, had created thelarger portion of Isla de Ometepe, meaning“between two hills” in Nanhuatl, an Azteclanguage adopted by the local indigenouscultures. Although there are 400 islands inthe lake, Isla deOmetepe is by far the largest,and from its heights, glimpses reach across anarrow swath of western land to the PacificOcean. Sitting at a scant 105 feet above sealevel, forty-five rivers flow into the enormouslake, yet only one drains it. Emptying fromthe southeast corner into the Caribbean Sea,Mark Twain called the famed Rio San Juan“an earthly paradise.” The river was thebackbone of a formidable trade route acrossthe continent before the Panama Canal.Bullsharks used the river as a route to immi-grate into the lake.

In exodus southward from Olmecs inMexico, oracles told the indigenousChorotegas and Nanhuatls they would findthis land and settle it. Ancient stone statuesand petroglyphs dot the island. With only avery basic tourism infrastructure set amidenticing natural wonder, it exemplifies thereason I joined two ex-roommates and agrowing number of their followers cycling inCentral America.

By midmorning the next day, we werehiking halfway up the volcano, encrusted inour own sweat and the thick jungle humidi-ty. We were following the brisk lead of our

overly self-confident guide whomwemet thenight before at our lakeside campsite. Hefondly referred to any of us as “guy”, and weknew him simply as “the guide.” He enter-tained us with the story of another guidewho instantly abandoned his group at thetop in a full downhill sprint the moment hefelt the earth tremble. We weren’t surewhether to think better of him, or be con-cerned about the quality of guides on thisvolcano.

“I guide this volcano four or five days a

week,” he said.Conversation drifted to other topics,

and we moved above the tree line into a coolthick fog of muted grays pierced by steadyrain. When he started to look for a whiteplastic bag that marked the crossing point ofa rocky crevasse, we heard: “It’s right aroundhere, but the last time I climbed this thingwas six months ago.”

Our confidence wained as the rainthickened. Farther up, vaguely near the topof the 5,282-foot volcano, we abandoned our

A plethora of parts. Walter, the Belgian trailer maker, wades through the inventory.

ADVENTURE CYCL IST FEBRUARY 2007 ADVENTURECYCL ING.ORG 33

lighthearted wonder when rain instantlyintensified, sending dark brown channels ofrunoff underneath us. The water in a nearbychute sounded like a train and I peered pre-cariously over the edge to glimpse the mostviolent stretch of water I’d seen in my life.Nearly black and moving in every directionpossible, if it had been given the chance, itsforce would surely have ripped us apartagainst the sharp volcanic rock.

Earlier we had mentioned this possibil-ity, and regardless of our hunger for thesummit, we decided that now would be anappropriate time to head back down —slowly. As slow as ascending was, it wasnothing compared with descending theloose pyroclastic hillside.

“Rock!”We move at a snail’s pace, ever so care-

ful not to dislodge the rocks that occasional-ly careened chaotically down the volcano orslipped and fell into the scar-inducing vol-canic rock. Although he tried to conceal it,worry showed on the searching face of theguide as he looked unsuccesfully for the offi-cial white bags. Trying to dismiss thoughtsof being air-rescued two days later, John andI exchanged smiles at each other. After toomany slow, concerned steps downward,white bags appeared in the monsoonlikerain. Relieved, we continued our decent asgaps in the clouds briefly revealed sun-drenched jungle and the pastures below sur-rounded by Lago de Nicaragua.

At the base of the volcano, away fromsteep pitches, torrential rain, and importantdecisions, we ambled through the junglewith sounds of spider monkeys and urracas(blue-throated magpie jays) filling the thick,towering canopy. Howler monkey callswrapped around our ears like wind from apassing train. Our tip for the guide’s leader-ship and entertainment was a promise tosend him pictures of the four-foot boa con-strictor he grabbed and put on displayaround his neck. Satisfied with our heavyhike on foot, tomorrow would be time toreturn to the bikes and pedal farther southalong the final stretches of Nicaragua.

As we prepared for the next morning’sdeparture, we came across an enormousfour-person economy tent. It belonged sole-ly to Harold Mueller, an endearing jean-wearing German who quit his job as a com-

munications engineer in Stuggart to cyclefrom Alaska to Argentina. Although cyclingfromAlaska to Argentina is not uncommon,we thought that Harold was probably one ofthe few to attempt to do so in Levi’s. Whenhe joined us farther south in Costa Rica, wetried unsuccessfully to convince him thatbiking in ninety-degree heat and occasionalrains would be more comfortable in shorts.Harold, however, thought keeping his shortsclean took priority over riding in comfort.

John heard about this Harold longbefore we crossed paths with him on Isla deOmetepe. A pair of cyclists John and Mikehad met in Alaska had ridden with Haroldthrough parts of Canada. John relayed sto-

ries that they told about this memorablecharacter.

In the middle of nowhere Canada, Johnsaid, “Harold came across a discardedportable phone on the side of the road,resuscitated it, and then, using his electricalengineering background, he was able to wireit up to a phone jack or electrical outlet onthe telephone poles. He immediately startedmaking calls as the others stared in disbe-lief.”

Our roving bicycle troupe had startedwith two brothers and the Arctic Ocean.Seven months ago, Mike and John Logsdonhad left Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, with theirsights on Ushuaia, Argentina, the southern-most town in the world. Video camera inhand, Nate became firmly attached to themin Baja on a stylishly dated red Univega.Farther south, in Puerto Escondido, thethree crossed paths with Walter cyclingalone on a basic mountain bike with home-made panniers.

Walter remembered talking to the hotelmanager the night before about my wish tomeet some fellow cyclists. “When I wentback to the hotel in the afternoon the next

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Nicaragua

Costa Rica

Mexico

Pacific Ocean

Caribbean Sea

TexasFlorida

Belize

Cuba

GuatemalaEl Salvador

Honduras

Panama

34 ADVENTURE CYCL IST FEBRUARY 2007 ADVENTURECYCL ING.ORG

day, I saw that my bike was flanked by threeothers,” he said.

Having wandered by bicycle on his ownthrough Ireland, Mike related to their long-ing for companionship and laughs, so ofcourse there was an open invitation.Although their group was originally sup-posed to be short-lived, it was the beginningof a 2,000-mile relationship.

“He kept telling us that he would onlybe with us for a day or two because hewouldn’t be able to keep up,” Mike laughed.“However, he left us in the dust for most ofthat first week.” I joined Nate in GuatemalaCity, where he was tackling computer prob-lems, and met up with the other three in ElSalvador.

Seven days before our daring volcanohike, all five of us arced with the sunset at the

northern Honduran border over a concretebridge kindly donated by the Japanese.Adding to an already struggling economy,the country is still recovering from the heavyblow dealt by Hurricane Mitch in 1998.Although the the hurricane did not passdirectly into Nicaragua, its massive reachdumped up to fifty inches of rain over atumultuous forty-eight hour period, affectingover a third of the population. Heavy rainstriggered mudslides and other damage thatleft seventy percent of the roads unusableand seventy-one bridges heavily damaged ordestroyed. We would cross several moreJapanese bridges in the following days.

Moving southward through the county,we transitioned from the civil war-scarred

countries of El Salvador, Guatemala, andHonduras in the north, and the more mod-ern ecotourist-besieged lands of Costa Ricaand Panama to the south. A wide variety oflife was evident within its boundaries, frompoor children who lined the road chantingGringo! in the north to the Pacific coastbeach of San Juan del Sur in the south, over-run with ex-pats from Europe and NorthAmerica. In between lay stretches of naturalbeauty amid volcanoes, aging colonialgrandeur, gritty modern life, and an abun-dance of almost anything else in between.

The hot Pacific lowlands we crossed toget to León constantly sucked water fromour bodies. Because most water was not safeto drink, we loaded up with huge, thick, blueplastic jugs. Taken off industrial shelves out-side gas stations and roadside stores, the

water’s balmy temperature echoed theweather. We all became accustomed to thesuper-heated water from our plastic bottles,and long stretches went by without enjoyingthe luxuries of ice water.

In the early morning of a León weekday,I studied the riding style of Latin Americansen route to Catholic school. Two small girlssat smiling across the bike’s top tube, safelycaged in by their father’s guiding arms as hepedaled them to school. Kids doing the samecut across the plaza flanked by theCatherdral de León, Central America’slargest cathedral. The national poet ofNicaragua, Ruben Dario, rests inside.

In the countryside are mythical oasesalong hot, grimy roads. You find yourself

pulling over without knowing why, thenrealizing that it’s the perfect time to grabsome fresh fruit for pennies. Juegos, freshfruit juices including papaya, melon, pineap-ple, bananas, guayabana, and many more,were available everywhere. Later, in Panama,I made the mistake of getting a dollar’s worthof bananas. In a plastic bag hanging from myhandlebars, I swerved toward our hostel withten pounds of bananas for a smoothie fiesta.We blended ourselves sick.

Situated near the middle of the country,Managua rose from obscurity when a con-troversial compromise declared it the capitalof Nicaragua in 1857 to appease the feudingcities of León and Granada. Unfortunately,after a 1972 earthquake leveled much of thecity (again), geologists found the city’sbedrock riddled with faults. A decision wasmade to abandon the older buildings, andnow the city is fully realizing its potential asan intimidating decentralized mass of unin-spiring modern life.

Here, Nate wrestled with the logic ofthe world as we went on a wild goose chasefor video-camera products in the secondpoorest nation of the Western Hemisphere,where seventy percent of the country’s pop-ulation lives beneath the poverty level. Anentire day disappeared pedaling from onestore to the next — to one place that vague-ly looked like its proprietors might possiblyknow about video cameras, back to a storewhose inventory and service made us won-der if we had missed the “everything mustgo” sign. Fortunately, salvation came late inthe day in the form of a gleaming white shop-ping mall that drew most of its crowd withsub-freezing air conditioning.

Onward to Grenada, the dueling broth-er of León. Like León, we were enticed into alengthier stop to wander the loosely griddedstreets. Both towns were founded byFernandez de Cordoba during his explo-ration of the region in 1524, just two yearsafter the first Spanish exploratory mission ofNicaragua. They have been opposed politi-cally ever since. León established itself as atheological center and the capital, whereasGranada grew as a center of commerce, fos-tering a trade route from the Carribean to thePacific.

This is where we leftWalter to head forIsla de Ometepe. On our last day in the

A sunny interlude. A slight break in the clouds reveals the jungle below Volcán Concepción.

ADVENTURE CYCL IST FEBRUARY 2007 ADVENTURECYCL ING.ORG 35

country, we decided to stock up on nacata-males, a Nicaraguan dish of cornmeal, meat,vegetables, and herbs wrapped in steamedbanana leaves. Traditionally served on week-ends, its taste had evaded us since León.

This time we were not so lucky. Insteadof the richly rewarding nacatamale meal wehad enjoyed previously, we were left pickingbone shards from some undesirable pork outof our teeth. The sweet taste of cornmealwas overpowered by grease, and John imme-diately looked for a trash can where weplaced our to-go orders. Despite the unbear-able taste of our last Nicaraguan meal, we

were thankful for the land and people behindus.

The country is a raw land blanketed inheat and humidity. There is often just a thinfacade between tourist amenities and therealities of daily life. My dog-eared guidebook promised, “Travel here isn’t easy.Journeys along pockmarked roads are botharduous and time consuming. But yourrewards will be proportionate, and you’relikely to leave Nicaragua more enriched thanyou had ever imagined.” With heavilypraised Costa Rica and the official addition ofHarold to our group looming on the south-

ern horizon, each of us silently agreed thatthe people and land of Nicaragua had been aspleasantly surprising as any CentralAmerican country. I left satisfied I had hadan honest glimpse into the heart of CentralAmerica and had gained three new bicycle-traveling friends.

Blake Gordon is a photographer/writer/adventurer/wanderer. Among other things, bicycling makes himhappy. For more about him and his work, visitwww.blakegordon.com.

Onward to Ometepe. Both locals and travelers cross the waves of Lago de Nicaragua on the hour-long ferry ride to Isla de Ometepe.