I left Tegucigalpa at 0805 this time taking the ring road around the city no traffic being Sunday took the Danli exit after watching my Nokia N8 closely, should have used the ring road when arriving, good road winding through the mountains cool had my inner jacket on top of my riding shirt, road deteriorated after about 60k’s not by much though, saw another section of road that had disappeared got stopped at Danli by cops they checked my papers and DL chatted about my trip for a while allowed me to take their pics and rode on.

Arrived at the border at 1005, both Honduras and Nicaragua Immigration and Customs were in huts and close together, this is an out of the way border crossing, parked and refused help at first there seemed to be only one guy and he started telling me what to do so I gave him my documents and he did the rest going into the offices and getting things stamped etc, Immigration was $3 and TVIP $10, he then took me across the border, bike had to be sprayed $3 and introduced me to the Nicaraguan Helper, the Honduras guy said his services were Gratis but I gave him $5 and my last Lempira 50 ($2.50), next Insurance done by an Agent $12 for 1 month, then Immigration $12 again bypassing the queue and Customs TVIP Free, the Honduras guy wanted $20, I gave him $10 and he shook hands and gave me a hug hahahaha, all done by 1045, changed $20 for Cordoba the rate this side is better 22:1, the Honduras side the guy was only offering 20:1 (official rate is 22.8:1), out of there at 1055, had to buy a National Park Donation Ticket for $1. Cost Honduras side $21.50 and Nicaragua side $37, Total=$58.50. This was the easiest and quickest Border Crossing so far only 45min, a bit like the Priority tickets you buy at Universal Studios and jump the queues hahahaha, capitalism at its finest.

Straight away onto a new road, very smooth no traffic and no speed bumps great ride gradually descending to the plains, 3 police check points I got waved through all of them cars had to stop, roadworks actually had traffic control with stop signs and two way radios, whoever is in charge of the Roads in this country knows what he is doing, more towns as I got closer to Managua which slowed things down but still way ahead of schedule arrived in Managua at 1400 stopped and filled up then followed the road until I thought I had gone too far then saw a sign for the National Assembly and turned left got to another major road and turned right and saw a Texaco stopped and asked the gas attendant for directions the hotel was about 300m away around 2 corners, what a fluke all the roads I had been on were broad and 4 lanes and very little traffic, checked in at 1435, 382km and 6:30hrs.There is a big modern Shopping Centre across the road and the ATM’s dispense USD$ as well as Cordoba.

The following day visited the Crazy Cathedral, Lake Managua and the National Palace / Museum, lots of rubbish lying around everywhere, the Cathedral is very unconventional and modern unpainted grey concrete weird no colours and not one bit of stained glass, stopped at the lake, the shoreline looks like a rubbish dump and the lake stinks, the National Palace and Museum not much in there, a few artefacts on one floor and some paintings out of there in 30min. Granada tomorrow only 45min away.