Telling someone that you are going on a vacation to México City and Nicaragua is likely to elicit negative reactions. I know this because Nicole’s parents (Gath if you recall) flat out told her not to go to Nicaragua. The U.S. Department of State had given Nicaragua a Level 3 travel advisory — not a new thing for us and also not really based on anything substantial other than occasional government unrest and police corruption — issues for which the U.S. is very much above board.
I think there’s this notion that we, Bricole, everyone’s favorite celebrity couple, are just out adventuring through the bush with machetes in hand — ready to take on snakes, malaria, and maybe pirates. I can assure you, nothing we did is particularly trail-blazing. While we may not have enjoyed much air conditioning or creature comforts while in Nicaragua until the final night, we were very much not alone on our adventures. Hotels were selling out, boats were standing room only, motorbike gangs of European women zipped around us with wild abandon as they headed to their yoga retreat. In fact, we had also wanted to go to the Corn Islands off Nicaragua’s other coast, but both hotel availability and flights were a problem, so Nicaragua isn’t suffering for a lack of tourists.
Nicaragua is in many ways like its more popular neighbor Costa Rica, but cheaper. The fact that we can fly from LAX to multiple cities in Costa Rica on about 6 different airlines, but none to Nicaragua speaks volumes. Perhaps the most insightful thing about the other travelers we observed is that very few were American. British and German tourists seemed to make up probably half of visitors, with some French, Dutch, and a smattering of others filling out the rest. Any time we heard someone sound vaguely American, they ended up being Canadian. **
**Speaking of Canadians — this is just a wild interaction we overheard on the ferry returning from Ometepe. One woman walked up to another and said, “I like your shirt!” The other replied that she got it from a thrift shop. Then the other asked if she was from Canada. She replied that she was and they found out they were from the same Canadian town. So as it turned out, one of the women was wearing the shirt that the other woman had thrifted. Now back to my previously scheduled ramblings…
The logistics of getting from Europe to Nicaragua are quite involved as you could imagine, but perhaps to Europeans, Central America sounds quite exotic. I could level other theories as to why this may be the case, but in my experience, Americans tend to be a bit more fearful. They stick to what they know or follow in the footsteps of other American tourists. Americans like to go places like Cancun, or the Dominican Republic, or Las Vegas. None of those are particularly safe — having their share of scams, armed robberies, occasional kidnappings, and overpriced buffets. Both Mexico and the DR have a level 2 travel advisory (a sort of standard advisory basically saying “don’t be dumb,”) and the state department doesn’t issue a travel advisory for U.S. destinations. If it were objective, we should probably be a level 3 ourselves.
The problem is, our government does not seem objective these days. The people running the travel advisories for the last decade are more likely a group of elder Canasta players who simply sit around discussing different countries. “Croatia? Is that scary?” “No no, Gertrude and Melvin just got back from a nice tour there and loved it. Met some nice folks from Virginia there. I think the fellah was a dentist, so you know…good people.” “That’s lovely. Level 1 travel advisory it is.”
Now, to be fair — I myself was mildly concerned about some scams or police bribes. The lady working for National showed me where the registration and documents were in case “la policía” asked for it. There is much talk of police checkpoints where they wave you over and make up some offense, take your license, and make you pay to get it back. There were many checkpoints, but like ICE at an airport — they were mostly just on their phones. I was bracing myself for extra charges upon return of the rental car, but there were none. In fact, I have had far more issues with rental cars in the U.S. or in well-traveled places like England, yet those don’t get an elevated travel risk.
Of course Nicaragua isn’t perfect. Their driving leaves much to be desired — like I desired a passing lane, or more paved roads, or education on how to use turn signals, or giving pedestrians the right of way. But the issue I’m trying to point out is that perceptions poison places. We started our trip in Mexico City, which as Mexico’s capital city gets lumped in with irrational fears of cartels, gang violence, and kidnapping. Does it happen? Sure. Is it widespread? Nope. We stayed in one of the most posh neighborhoods in the city. The only time our wallets were at risk was from paying L.A. prices for our meals.
We both have some unfinished business in Mexico City and Nicaragua. With our time constraints, we never made it to CDMX’s main plazas or Teotihuacan. And Nicole would still like to get to the Corn Islands on Nicaragua’s Caribbean side. So this wasn’t a trip where we’re wiping our brows and saying, “Phew, we did it. We’re ok. We’re safe! Never again!” With unpredictable schedules and standby flying, it is hard to say when we will be back, but we won’t have any apprehension about it. We’ll just be more likely to be sharing a plane ride with Europeans.
passports & pepto bismol 