we're back

We've been in Nicaragua all week. We left early Monday morning with a couple we've grown to love here in Costa Rica and headed to a small beach town about half an hour from the Nica border called San Juan del Sur. The town itself is less than three hours away from Villareal, but with the border crossing, you can never tell exactly how long the trip will take. Our border crossing Monday took 3 hours!!!!! UUUGGGHHHH! But, we had good company with D and T and and Eddie, one of the youth of Calvary church. We all piled in D and T's SUV and drove to the border, parked the car in "secure" parking (that is a whole other story)...and then walked across the border! It was so much fun actually! (I cannot believe that I just said crossing the border from one Latin America country to another was fun). All in all, aside from the long wait to get through Immigration on Costa Rica's side, it was super easy! Then, we met up with our friend Carlos from Nicaragua who picked us up and drove us to San Juan del Sur. We had driven through this town several times while in Nica, but never stayed there. It is a super quaint little town with a cozy, warm atmosphere. We stayed at the Hotel Villa Isabella, which was fun for our Izzy. It is this cute little B & B owned by an expat named Mike from the US. He's been there 20 or so years and has that hotel and a larger condo on the beach front. It is a great place and we'd recommend it to anyone traveling in the area. We sampled food from all over the little city from a fabulous jalepeno steak to fish tacos to roasted chicken and beans and rice. the hotel had complementary breakfast and it was FANTASTIC!!!

Above all, we were greatly encouraged by our friends and it was a wonderful time of fellowship. We really love Nicaragua and the people and have since our first trip there. This trip gave us a much greater glimpse of the culture. Yesterday, we went shopping and went to the central market (think flea market) and had a blast making special memories together :)

We have heard from several people that the laws have changed in CR and we now can leave CR, enter Nicaragua, then return to CR the same day. We had also heard that we could go to Nica and return on the third day (if we left on Monday we could return on Wednesday, for example) and did not have to wait until 72 hours, which is what we have always known the law to be. We, Matt and I, want to make sure we are following what the law says and not doing anything illegal (imagine that- missionaries wanting to follow the law ;] ) and so do our friends, so we stayed the fourth day to complete the 72 hour law. We have been told the law was changed recently...so today, I asked several border officials of both sides (because Nicaragua is said to have the same law for tourists). We were told that we can return on the same day as we leave, but we are going to do further research on it...All of this stuff is so wierd and we want to be sure we are following the law, but it sure would save us a ton of money if we did not have to make these trips and stay overnight- even if we could cut out one night would be better....vamos a ver (we'll see!)

I will post some pics soon...maybe later tonight...