The Costa Rica Star has recently published information about receiving your permanent residency in Costa Rica to avoid border runs, wasting time, and money.

Over the weekend, I took a trip up to Nicaragua to get a new stamp in my passport. Costa Rica issues ninety-day tourist visas so if you are an expat trying to carve out a life here and you don’t have residency, every three months you need to leave the country. Another stipulation to entering Costa Rica as a tourist is that you must have proof that you’re exiting the country in ninety days. This constant exit/reentry routine is commonly referred to as perpetual tourism.

I’ve now been in Costa Rica six months and at the end of my first three-month stay, I jetted back to the US. Before coming back to Costa Rica, I purchased a bus ticket to Managua, Nicaragua through A Safe Passage (handy if you’re abroad), thereby having proof that I would be leaving the country in the required amount of time. So this last weekend was border-run weekend for me.

A Sensible Route from Jacó

As the day for my departure was approaching, I was kind of bummed out about how complicated the trip was going to be: my bus was scheduled to leave at 6am from San José, meaning I would have to catch a bus from Jacó (where I live) to San José the night before. I’m not a big planner so I was just going to wing it and figure it out along the way. I had decided, though, that I definitely wanted to check out San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua (just inside the border) and maybe not go all the way up to Managua. In talking about the fuzziness of my upcoming trip with one of my expat neighbors (who has been here about four years), he steered me toward a better path.

Taking his advice, I went to the Ticabus office here in Jacó (which I didn’t even know existed) and bought the other two needed tickets: one return ticket, one ticket exiting the country in another ninety days. Most importantly, I changed my existing ticket to leave at a slightly later hour which would give me enough time to simply catch a bus to Puntarenas the morning of my trip and then pick up the Ticabus from there. That saved me the cost of staying overnight in San José. And I’m all about doing things cheaply.

Putting off prepping for my trip until the last possible moment, I woke up at 5:15am on Saturday morning, exactly thirty minutes before I needed to be at the bus stop. I quickly got ready, threw my stuff in a bag, and walked the roughly one kilometer to the stop. As it turned out, a very cool couple of people I knew were heading up to San Juan del Sur for the same reason. So then I had some travel buddies! This actually worked out great because, even though the travel agent had taken the time to write down some handy directions on exactly how to get to San Juan del Sur (including connecting taxis and local buses to and fro), these two had already made this exact run a couple of times. This trip would now certainly be cake.

In Puntarenas, we got off near the Hilton hotel and then caught a taxi over to El Cruce de Barranca where the Ticabus to Nicaragua would stop. (Added benefit of traveling with people: splitting cab fare!) Once there, it was a one and one-half hour wait. This was fine because the soda behind the bus stop had some delicious desayuno offerings and some much needed café con leche. And then this little local kid came up with an adorably cute and curious variegated squirrel.

(By the way, don’t get all pissy with me and say that I’m advocating having squirrels as pets or, more generally, that I’m promoting some horribly unhealthy balance/coexistence with nature. This was a small child with a pet squirrel and the two of them together were cute. Someone gave him the squirrel long before I ever got there. The kid was all smiles, the squirrel was adorably curious, I took a photo and shot video. End of story.)

At 9am, the bus arrived and we boarded. My father, who has spent a good bit of time in other parts of Central America, used to ask me if Costa Rica had chicken buses. Actually, no. All of the local buses and the national lines are all very nice. In fact, I was surprised to see that they were playing a movie during the trip. Since it was an American movie dubbed in Spanish and subtitled in English, I was able to count the time I spent drifting in and out of watching it as “studying” español. It counts.

Crossing the Border

Finally, at I don’t even know what hour, we arrived at the border. If you’re used to flying and going through customs at airports, crossing the border on the ground is an interesting experience, certainly at the Costa Rica-Nicaragua border along the Pan American Highway. On the Costa Rican side, things seem pretty expected. You fill out your customs forms, exit the bus to stand in a line where you get a visa stamp to enter Nicaragua (for 6 months). Your baggage stays on the bus. Then you get back on the bus, the driver collects all the passports and the required $14 (or 350 córdoba) immigration fees from everyone and you’re on you way to get cleared into Nicaragua. And here I’d like to offer some quick monetary advice:

KNOW YOUR EXCHANGE RATES!

On both sides of the fence, there are numerous people walking around with fat stacks of cash. Money changers. Freelancers who are making a little money on the side exchanging colones and dollars for córdobas and vice versa. I did a REALLY stupid thing here and exchanged money without knowing the exchange rate at all. After he handed me cash, I turned to the person next to me and asked what the exchange rate was and immediately, the money changer put more córdobas in my hand. I looked down to count it and he was gone. Up until that moment, I didn’t even know what the currency of Nicaragua was. I don’t want to tell you how much money I lost but that was one of those times that the more sensible side of me was very displeased that I let loose the complete space cadet side of me to take care o’ biznatch.

So FYI: Always be familiar with the basic exchange rate before dealing with it. Otherwise, like me, you could get taken. At the time of this writing, 25 Nicaraguan Córdoba ~ 1 US dollar.

Back on the bus, we rode across the muddy, potholed road to the Nicaragua customs side. I imagined someone jumping on the bus and frantically yelling for everyone to quickly get off and make a break for it! Like start running through the jungle as if we were crossing illegally. Didn’t happen. Just a slow, jarring ride through one puddle after another. So we got to the Customs/Immigration side of Nicaragua a couple of minutes later, grabbed our bags from the bus, and laid them out on a wooden table in this open air terminal, I guess you could call it.

The next stage of this process was waiting for customs officers to walk by and possibly, possibly not inspect my bag. And by inspect I mean, open it, glance at it, close it. Some bags weren’t inspected. While you’re waiting for this inspection to happen, there are numerous vendors selling items: handcrafted sandals, bags, hammocks, food items, cigarettes, drinks, and so on. There’s a lot of buffer time before and after the inspection so you can do a little shopping if you want. You can even have a beer. Or five. Eventually, your passport is returned, you get back on the bus, and the trip continues on to your final destination.

San Juan del Sur

After arriving in Rivas, a little under an hour north of the border, the three of us caught a taxi back to San Juan del Sur, a 30km ride. We got a little ripped off on the price but, again, splitting it three ways made it a lot less than it would’ve been. And there are buses that go between the two towns which you can ride at much more affordable rates.

When we arrived in San Juan del Sur, I was staring wide-eyed at everything in sight. Instantly, I was sad that I would be leaving in less than twenty-four hours. Everything was brilliant in this little ocean-side village. We walked around for a bit looking for one specific hotel (a place the two of them had stayed previously but couldn’t remember exactly where it was). Eventually, we found it. The Irish House Hotel. Fantastic. Right on the corner, two short blocks from the beach, in the heart of this little town. The owner, Roberto, was incredibly nice and welcoming. For $30, I stayed in the room by itself on the top floor. Air conditioning, wifi, private bath, television. Excellent. Too, the roof of the hotel (just outside my room) served as a large balcony/patio, allowing for a great view across the entire city.

After decompressing for a few minutes, I went out to walk the streets. It was almost 4pm by the time we had arrived in town so there wasn’t a whole lot of daylight left and I wanted to make the most of it. All throughout the streets, the sounds of wooden balls clacking against one another is heard; a popular toy with the children. Friendly locals sit in chairs and stand around, watching the people come and go. Hostels, shops, cafes everywhere. Vendors selling wares on the streets and on the beach. Mountains surround the bay full of boats; the beach is lined with bars and restaurants as far up to the water’s edge as possible. It feels pure. It’s simply beautiful.

Walking around, I was caught completely off guard, running into another couple of people I knew from Jacó. They had also come to San Juan del Sur for their border run. Like me, it was their first time there, having arrived the previous day. The wonder of the town struck them just as it had me. And it isn’t just that it’s beautiful and quaint and cozy and warm: it’s cheap. They had five mixed drinks at one of the bars the night prior for under $14. And that wasn’t in some side-street dive bar; that was at a beach bar. Not a bad deal at all.

After grabbing a bite to eat and enjoying a Toña (Nicaraguan beer) while watching the sun set over the bay, I headed back to the hotel/bar to settle in for the night. The late hours of the evening were spent hanging out with my friends on the patio outside my room, looking out over the night lights of the city, drinking more Toñas, and talking about the problems of the world and how to solve them.

Departure

The next morning, I caught a taxi back to Rivas and waited for the bus back to Costa Rica. The crossing was virtually the same (except it was only $4 in fees to get into Costa Rica). After getting through the border, the trip was simply the day prior in reverse. Again, a long wait in Puntarenas for the bus. And again, I reached my final destination at around 4pm.

So if you’re doing the perpetual tourist shuffle and need to cross the border, I highly, highly recommend going to San Juan del Sur in Nicaragua. It’s close, convenient, cheap, and soul-soothingly wonderful. I am most certainly going back. I may not even wait for a border run. Totally, totally in love with that town.

All photos from this trip can be found here.