Days 703-709! After finishing up a very nice trip visiting family, it’s time to head back to the warmth of Nicaragua! And let me tell you, it was a hectic start to this leg of the traveling. Not only did I experience many flight delays, the airline even lost my bag at one point! But I’ll tell you all about it in this week’s blog post.

I woke up to another chilly day on Thursday, December 4th. I read for a bit and then my parents and I bundled up for a walk to a local restaurant, One World Cafe. This is one of my favorite restaurants in Peoria and I actually worked there the summer after my freshman year of college!

We were meeting some family friends, my friend Josh’s parents (I visited Josh this summer), for an early lunch to catch up and enjoy good food.

It was delightful to get to spend some time with these two. I have many moms around the world, as you all may know, but I have a few that were local as well. And Mindy was one of them! I spent a lot of time with my friend Josh growing up, so it was great to see them and update them on my life.

I spent the rest of the afternoon reading, playing more casino with my mother, and then I played some guitar as well! Before dinner my parents and I played the Trumpet Game and then played more of it after dinner as well.

Afterwards, I officially accepted the job in San Diego and finished up my onboarding for it! I’m looking forward to finally checking off a bucket list item of living in California (and surfing there too).

Friday, December 5th started with more reading and card playing. The casino series was starting to swing in my direction this time around. After a having a major defeat in Australia, it was time for my turn to have a winning streak against my mother.

I helped my mom set up for brunch and we were having another family friend over. Funnily enough, another one of my friend’s parents who was another mother to me! I should say, I love my mom a lot, definitely a mamma’s boy. But it can’t hurt to have people caring and looking out for you all over the world!

We had a wonderful brunch of lox and bagels and after yet another feast while being in the US, we played lots of cards. I performed a few of the songs I had written for them and then, after that intermission, we played more cards! We played a few hours of cards, which was a very nice treat! It’s been a long time since I’ve seen Stacey, I believe since December of 2023, so it was really nice to catch up.

I played cards with my mother (we weren’t gamed out yet) and then read for a bit. For dinner we were making one of my favorite childhood meals, homemade Alfredo. My dad makes the best Alfredo’s I’ve ever had and I helped him cook it up. I did a lot of stirring, an important part to the Alfredo making, and the laboring paid off with a delicious meal.

We couldn’t get enough game playing in today and we played the Trumpet Game after dinner. We followed it up with a game of Cahoots After that it was time for some TV watching and then bed.

I started Saturday, December 6th by looking into potential hostels/homestays in Managua, Nicaragua. I didn’t want to spend too much time there, since I haven’t heard great things about it and I don’t necessarily enjoy staying in cities (a bit of foreshadowing here). I ended up deciding on a place and reserved a room through chatting with them on Facebook.

I moved on to reading and then played more cards with my mother. We then shifted to playing backgammon, which is one of her favorite games! I always forget how enjoyable this game is, definitely one I want to play more.

We then went out for a late lunch to a restaurant I had never been to, Chef Moussa. It was a Mediterranean restaurant with a very charismatic owner. We met some of my parents friends at the restaurant and had a nice couple hour lunch chatting with them. We made our way home and got into a long and intense game of Wizard, a trick taking card game.

My friend Dylan wanted to hang out one more time before I left town. So he, along with his younger brother and friend Purbi, picked me up and we went to a Mexican restaurant to eat. Since I had a late lunch I only had a couple tacos, but it was nice spending a little more time with one of my best friends!

When I got home, I made myself some wraps to eat for my travel day the following day. When I wrapped that up, I serenaded my parents one more time on the guitar. I love playing the guitar, as most of you already know, and it makes me very happy my parents like to listen to me play!

We then watched TV till much later than I anticipated and before going to bed I packed up my clothes! It was time to head back to Central America!

Sunday, December 7th was finally here! It was time to head back out on another Central America adventure. I woke up at 6am to shower, finish packing, and have breakfast. And around 7am my parents and I were heading out to the bus stop in our car. It was another frigid day, so sitting in the car to wait for the bus was very nice to be able to do. Especially since I wasn’t bringing a winter coat with me down south.

The bus pulled in pretty much exactly when we arrived, but I sat a little longer with my parents before boarding. I’m so thankful to have such amazing parents! To be able to spend so much quality time with them over the past couple weeks is very special. I think I’ve spent more time with them in the past two years than I had when I was living in Kansas City. Which is definitely something I want to keep up doing!

I gave them both big hugs and then hurried onto the bus to escape the cold.

I pretty much slept the entire bus ride! I hadn’t slept much the night before so it was very much needed. When I was awake, I saw that the roads near Chicago were super slushy. There were a few big accidents too. I was glad to be taking the bus and not having to worry about driving or having my parents drive me in these conditions.

When we arrived at O’hare airport, I got on the WiFi and found out my flight had been delayed an hour already. I was a bit nervous about this but had been hoping it wouldn’t affect my flight. Unfortunately, I’d be very wrong with this thought…

I checked into my flight and dropped my bag off. I dislike checking my bag, but I was flying spirit and they’re very strict about bag size and payment for checking bags. So I listened to the rules this time (again… foreshadowing). I was still staying optimistic, but as the day went on, my flight kept getting more and more delayed. Thankfully I had my wraps to munch on and didn’t need to survive on expensive airport food… but I was getting tired of sitting around.

At this point my flight was delayed 4+ hours and I got to the airport a few hours before I needed to… it was a long day at the airport. I spent most of this time reading and took a solid chunk out of the 5th Stormlight Archives book which is 1,500 pages long! I also wandered pretty much the entire airport and stopped in random spots to watch the Packers vs Bears football game.

I FaceTimed my friend Ryan as well! We finalized our plans for when he’d be traveling to meet me in Nicaragua!

I read for a bit more and finally started boarding my first flight. I was a bit nervous though, we were scheduled to land, pretty much, at the same time as my second flight took off. I was told by the spirit employees that if I missed it I’d just be rescheduled to the next flight… but that was 24 hours later. I felt pretty resigned to my fate that I’d be spending the night and next day in the Fort Lauderdale airport (FLL).

I was near the back of the airplane in the middle seat. After voicing my concern to one of the flight attendants, he let me move up to a row closer to the front (row 10). Not only did this help with my positioning to get off the flight, but it was an aisle seat that had even more room than my previous had! I spent the entire flight reading and as we approached FLL I was pretty much fully prepared to miss my flight.

When I landed I texted my parents and my mom told me that my second flight had been delayed! I still didn’t believe it since we landed about 30 minutes after the flight was originally scheduled to depart. But by some stroke of luck, as I excited my flight, I saw my next one was just boarding!!

I was so excited! I immediately got in line as they called the last call and boarded my flight. I was shocked that I wasn’t missing this flight… but unfortunately, my troubles weren’t over with this success. As I was boarding my flight, I messaged my homestay for the night saying I was going to make my booking (I had told them earlier in the day that I might not be able to make it)… they responded that they already had booked my room! With no wifi on the flight I was stuck hoping that there was wifi at the Managua airport (spoiler alert… there wasn’t).

I sat next to Jordan and Filipo, both of whom were very chatty individuals. Jordan was returning to Nicaragua for the first time in many many years. He was leaving the US due to the political situation and also was using this as an opportunity to see his family and a few of his kids he hadn’t seen in a long time. Filipo was a traveler from Rome. He had a place booked for the night near the airport and said I should just tag along with him and see if there was a room available. I was definitely about to get myself into a very Elie situation.

I slept the rest of the flight and landed in Managua around 2am on Monday, December 8th. Immigration had a long line and took a while, but thankfully this time entering the country was a breeze! However, by the time I got to baggage claim, all the bags were off the carousel anddddd I didn’t see my very obvious bright green backpack.

My heart sank and a reality that was in the back of my mind came directly to the forefront. My bag was lost.

I’m not sure how this hasn’t happened within my 2 years of traveling… but it finally did! One of the baggage employees was kind enough to let me use their WiFi hotspot, since the airport didn’t have WiFi. And Filipo hung around for a bit too, which was nice of him. Eventually, he went to wrap up immigration and the spirit baggage desk opened and I was able to report my lost bag. Karem, the worker, was very helpful and even gave me her WhatsApp to communicate with me further about the issue.

Apparently I was supposed to recheck my bag in FLL?! I’m not sure why since I was on the same airline… but my bag was just sitting in FLL waiting for me! I was happy to know it was somewhere and not lost in limbo. But I’d have to wait till 3am the following day to see if it arrived in Managua. They offered to ship it to me but I had no clue where I was staying and didn’t want to deal with potentially losing it again, so I decided to stay in Managua for another day.

Filipo and I walked through the quiet streets to the nearby homestay. When we arrived, another guest was outside trying to talk to the host, but his Spanish wasn’t good. Turns out he booked his stay for the night of the 8th not the night of the 7th… so the host was confused why he was so early. Thankfully she had one room left though, but it was a double twin bed room… soooo me and this 40 year old man from Canada were going to share the room.

I was just happy to have a place to sleep and shower, even if I didn’t have a change of clothes. The owner of the homestay said we had to be out of the hostel by 12pm. But I was up at 10am and she was ready for us to leave already.

I had booked a new hostel for the following night, since I needed another night in Managua and wanted to stay closer to the city center. So, Filipo and I walked to the main street to get a taxi. One pulled up super quickly and we got a $15 ride into the city (probably overpriced but we were tired and hungry). Unfortunately, this driver claimed to know where he was going and didn’t use his phone for directions… andddd took us to the wrong spot. Thankfully this wasn’t a malicious act and he truly just misunderstood what my google map pin had told him. We had a bit more of a ride to go but he quickly remedied his mistake with no complaint. We ended up paying him $20 as a thank you for getting us to our destination.

We arrived at my new hostel and met a very lovely receptionist, Anna. We had a conversation only in Spanish as I checked in and apparently my room was already ready! So I was able to set my small backpack down in my room and then head out for lunch with Filipo.

Anna told us about a couple local spots nearby for lunch. But it was a holiday today and they were all closed. There was a mall with a food court around the corner so we started walking our way there. On the way, we stopped at a gas station and Filipo was able to get a SIM card for his phone. I decided to add more data to mine as well since a 3 day 3 gigabyte plan was just over a dollar. I also thought it’d be smart to have data with the situation of having a lost bag.

Our walk was filled with fireworks too, a classic way to celebrate Central American religious holidays.

We had a very hearty lunch from one of the food court vendors. I’m glad that I met Filipo, having a friend definitely made for a smooth transition with having lost my bag. It was nice to have company and not dealing with the situation totally alone.

We were both exhausted, so we headed back to the hostel. I said my see you later to Filipo and went to my room for a nap. He chilled out at the hostel for a bit and then went to get a bus to the nearby town of Granada. I napped for 2 hours, which I desperately needed. When I woke up, I chatted with another one of the receptionists, Judy, for a little bit. She was very chatty and full of energy. There weren’t a lot of guests at the hostel, but the receptionists were both super friendly.

I ended up reading a lot and then ordering food for delivery. Judy suggested it was the best way to do it in town. I had another feast of typical Nicaraguan food. While I was eating, I received a FaceTime from my friend Bethany, the person that ran a marathon to hang out with me in Costa Rica. We had a really nice time catching up, I was glad she called me out of the blue.

I went to bed hoping to have some good news at 3am and had my alarm set to make sure I was up and reading to act when I got the call.

But 3am rolled around andddd there was silence. No WhatsApp message from Karem or phone call. I wasn’t thrilled about that. But there wasn’t much I could do and it was pretty far out of my control at this point. So I took some deep breaths and tried to get more sleep.

When I woke up at 8:30am, I received a very exciting text, my bag had arrived!

As excited and relieved as I was, I still had time till I could pick my bag up. So I went back to sleep. I woke up around 9am thinking I could get breakfast at the hostel and then head out… but breakfast ended at 9am, not 11am like I had remembered the receptionist saying. Oh well! So I just ordered a taxi on an app InDrive, Nicaragua’s Uber, and headed to the airport a little early.

When I arrived, it took me awhile to figure out where the Spirit office was. None of the employees at the airport could give me a clear answer and it took awhile for Karem or the other guy that texted me to respond. Eventually I found out it was behind the check in counters that had a door with no labeling on it… but sure enough, once I went through those doors and down a hallway, there was the office… and there was my bag!!

Now unfortunately, my jeans were missing (they were clipped on to the outside of my bag like usual), but I had everything else! I couldn’t wait to brush my teeth and change and immediately went to the bathroom at the airport to do so. I ordered another taxi to the bus station and the driver noticed I liked his music and he ended up blasting it the entire ride.

On the drive to the bus station, I decided to change my plans. I was thinking about going to San Juan Del Sur but decided to go to Ometepe Island instead! Ometepe is an island on a lake, which I had heard great things about. I saw online I could take an express bus straight to San Jorge. So when I got dropped off at the bus station, I asked for the bus and a guy took me to one that said Rivas…

I asked if it was to San Jorge and he said yes. I asked again and he said yes. And then no… it took me to Rivas, but that was okay because it was nearby San Jorge, it just meant I needed to get a ride to the ferry town rather than go directly to it.

The bus was super crowded and I ended up sitting cramped next to a local for the majority of the ride. But it was only 90 cordobas! After a two and a half hour ride I arrived in Rivas. Some of you might remember the taxi drivers from my last time in Rivas. I knew their games this time and didn’t trust them when they said they’d drive me to San Jorge for $5 but “if we found more people they’d pick them up to and make the price lower.” Instead, I started walking to a nearby gas station where I read online colectivos picked up from.

Colectivos are shared taxis that the other taxi drivers were pretending to be. As I walked to the gas station a peddle bike cart offered to take me for $10 and I politely declined. He told me the colectivos would be around the area I was in and sure enough, two seconds later one pulled over and said 50 cordobas for the ride to the ferry.

Much better than $5 and I was glad to know they actually existed in Rivas.

I got dropped off at 2:30pm and just missed the ferry at that time. Anddddd unfortunately the next one wasn’t until 4pm. I had seen some people messaging on Hostelworld about going to the island today and actually ran into one of the travelers while buying my ferry ticket.

Stina, from Sweden, and I ended up sitting and waiting for the ferry together. Chatting made the wait fly by and after a snack at the port’s restaurant, it was time to board the ferry.

The ferry ride was an hour long and we met a couple other travelers who were traveling in a group trip organized for solo travelers. It sounded like a cool concept and was now in the back of my mind for potential jobs in the future (to be the group leader of one).

Stina and I shared a taxi across the island, which took about another hour. It was this or a 2 hour chicken bus ride… we opted for the $20 taxi ride instead as we were both tired and hungry and ready for the travel day to be over with.

Our hostels were pretty close to each others, Stina was dropped off first and I said see you later with her with full intentions of hanging out at some point. My hostel, Zopilote, was about 900 feet off the main road on a dark rocky path. But the walk was worth it as I entered the permaculture hostel.

For those who don’t know a permaculture is: developing an agricultural ecosystem to be sustainable and self sufficient.

When I arrived, the hostel’s pizza night was in full swing. I checked in, set my bags down, and then went to join the festivities and eat. The pizzas were relatively inexpensive and they even had vegan cheese options which I was looking forward to, to not deal with what dairy can do to me. It was okay, but the company was nice too. I met a number of different travelers and had some deep chats with them. A part of pizza night, at the hostel, is a fire show. It reminded me of my days on Koh Tao, Thailand and the fire shows there.

There was a guy who did fire poi, fire juggling clubs, and a fire leviwand. The leviwand was super cool, I had never seen one before… but it looked like the stick was floating around the guy using it.

The party went late and I went to bed much earlier than the others. Or at least tried to since the music was echoing through the hostel grounds.

It was a pretty hectic week, but we reached the end of it as I started Wednesday, December 10th. The hostel has morning yoga every day, but I was too tired and decided to skip it starting my day around 9am instead.

I had breakfast at the hostel and met Anne-Sophie and Angie, both from Canada, who I chatted with for a bit after breakfast too. I also had a very chatty blue bird wanting some food hanging around me while I ate.

The hostels morning activity today was a tour of the permaculture farm. Perfect timing since I would get a tour of the entire property and learn more about permaculture.

The hostel is on a pretty large piece of land that used to be only rice fields (monoculture). But an Italian couple bought it and returned the land to having more biodiversity and loads of edible plants scattered throughout the property. There’s also some areas that are more dedicated to growing vegetables, and even some plants that are used strictly for making bowls and spoons.

The whole hostel is run on solar power and even the toilet waste is bagged and eventually sold to other farmers as manure (they would use it on the property but they don’t think guests would love to find out that their poop was spread across the hostel I guess).

There was a small group of us on the tour and people were asking good questions about permaculture and the hostel. It was overall a nice way to start the day. Also it was very nice to see the hostel during the daylight, it’s really pretty!

After the tour, Anne-Sophie said she was going on a walk to the ATM. I needed cash as well, and Angie, Marcus from Sweden, and I joined her. It was a very hot 12 minute walk down to the nearby grocery store that had the ATM. And then it was a hot walk back up the hill. I was glad to have company on this little outing. When we got near the hostel again, Angie wanted to take an alternate route back to the hostel. There was a path that led through the forest more. So I decided to join her on that.

There was also a school bus full of artists handmade goods that we checked out too before heading back to the hostel.

On our walk back, we passed by one of the solar towers of the hostel that you’re allowed to climb the ladder up. It had a cool view of the forest and the volcano on the island.

I was very hungry and went to the hostel lobby to have lunch. Unfortunately, the hostel doesn’t have a kitchen to make your own food. But the restaurant here is on the cheaper side and the food is fully made using the ingredients from the hostel’s permaculture. Which is pretty neat!

After I finished eating, I met Renee from the Netherlands, who was my new bunkmate. We chatted for a bit and decided we’d meet up later for dinner. So I read for a bit in a hammock until then!

Renee had rented a motorbike, so we hopped onto it and went on a short drive to a nearby restaurant called Comedor Sunshine. This ended up being one of the most delicious meals I had in Nicaragua so far. On top of that, Renee and I had a really nice time chatting about travel and life. She had just finished up volunteering at, pretty much, a commune near San Juan Del Sur and had lots of fun stories to share from that.

We went back to the hostel after dinner and spent a while after chatting and then called it a night!

This week was all over the place. I really got thrust back into the world of solo traveling. But I’m very glad that I made it to Nicaragua, my bag finally arrived, and I’m back in traveler mode meeting really nice people! This leg of the journey can really only go up from how it started and I’m super excited to see where it takes me!

I decided to book one more night at Zopilote and then I’ll be heading to a beach town to get back to surfing! But you’ll find out about that next week!

See you then!

– Elie