The End Game

We probably could have done a little more research and would have known how hard it would be to sell the Sandhog in this country where, a few years ago, they arbitrarily made a law saying no vehicles older than 10 years could be imported. 

We carefully selected an old Toyota with the famous 22R engine because we know how common they are throughout Central America. But, Nicaragua is trying to break the old-Toyotas-run-forever mold. 

It's hard enough selling a car in your home country, so just imagine adding foreign laws, strange cities without roadsigns, not having a local telephone number, and, oh yeah, a language barrier. 

With surf wax, I scratched a "S/V" (Spanish car code meaning "FOR SALE") on the windshield, and we tried our luck at surf destinations on the coast for a while.  When we realized that if we want to leave Nicaragua (and we do), we would have to do less surfing and more selling, we liquidated the surfboard quiver and drove to Granada, the country's nicest city. 

With Nicaraguan plates (something we don't have), Sandhog would be worth about US$6000 here. Since it's a 1995, the plates cannot be changed legally, so we start the conversation at $3500. We stop at mechanic shops, figuring these are people that know people that might want cars. 

Our first day in Granada, we pulled up next to a group of six guys painting a small car way older than 10 years. On hearing our price, one of them immediately got on the phone. Then he pulled out another phone. He was making calls on both phones, alternating ears. After a few minutes, he climbed in the backseat of Sandhog and said "go."

We drove to his hombre, Roger's, house and negotiated with him for a bit and he said to call back in the afternoon. We drove back to the car paint lot and the guy in the backseat told us to wait. We hung out for 15 minutes and another guy pulled up. More negotiations ensued-- no deal. 

We said thanks and drove down the road with Roger's number in our pocket, planning to call him later if we still had the truck. 

Ten minutes down the road, we start to hear honking. This noise is as common as breath in Central America, so we hardly notice. More honking, and then a motorcycle pulls alongside us at 50mph. The rider pulls off his helmet and starts yelling. We roll down the window and decipher that he wants us to follow him... back to Roger's house. 

It turns out that Roger had heard about our continued negotiations and got nervous we would sell, so he sent the biker to chase us. He claimed he had a buyer. We would just have to wait for him to drive the money down from Managua (about a 45 minute drive away).  He told us to come back in an hour. When we returned, he told us to come back in 2 hours. When we returned, he told us that he wasn't sure where his guy was, but when he got there, he would bring him to our hotel-- and since he found us a buyer, we would pay him a commission, right? We agreed. 

Just before dark, Roger showed up in front of the hotel with a towel and began polishing the hood of Sandhog. He showed it to a guy wearing a huge gold chain around his neck. They took it for a test drive and the guy left his wife with us as collateral. When they came back, the guy negotiated a price, but then revealed he had no money with him. Maybe tomorrow. 

Roger looked at us and said he had another friend. One with money in his pocket. He would be back in one hour. We never saw Roger again.

After a couple days, we decided we needed a bigger city. In Managua, we changed our tactic slightly. We lowered our initial price and said we were just selling it for parts, trying to weed out some of the criminal, chain-wearing element. At the first shop, we found a guy, who called a guy, who had us follow him for 45-minutes through the sweltering city to a lot to meet his cousin, his lawyer, and all their friends. The cousin offered us $2800, we accepted, and then the lawyer said this won't work-- this car is more than 10 years old! This had been advertised from the start. They all jumped in a pick up truck and drove away and left us to figure out where we were, and, more importantly, where was the closest place to get a mango smoothie?

Smoothie fortified, we gave it one last try. We stopped at a corner used car lot and I approached the guys sitting in the shade chatting. A fat guy in a white t-shirt got up and told me to follow him. Forrest pulled Sandhog behind us down the block. At the garage down the way, White Shirt talked to a guy in a purple shirt who called a guy who arrived shortly wearing an orange shirt. They made a plan. We would come back on Monday, and Orange Shirt would ride with us to the Costa Rican border (about 200km away). We would cross into Costa Rica, then orange shirt would buy the car and we were free to go, while he would use fake papers to re-import it back into Nicaragua. They repeated again and again that after we sold them the car in Costa Rica, we were free to go, and this was always accompanied by a hand motion of clapping and then the right hand shooting into the sky like a rocket ship. I translated the plan for Forrest, complete with hand motion, and he looked at me like I was the crazy one. We said thank you, we would think about it, since Monday was a couple days off. White Shirt got into the back of Sandhog and directed us to a parts shop where the owner offered us $800. We declined, dropped White Shirt off at his car lot, and drove back to our hotel defeated, and started talking about donating the car to a charity. 

We have considered driving Sandhog back to the States and keeping her. We have considered driving further south and trying to sell her. We have considered just giving it more time in Nica. But, it's 100 degrees, we're short on surfboards, and the prices in Nicaragua are running down the adventure funds.  Nicaraguan police stop us twice a day looking for a stupid reason to give us a ticket or get a bribe.  On top of all this, Forrest picked up some nasty bedbug bites at a hotel in Managua, and I tore most of the skin off my right calf in a flip-flop induced fall -- we are ready to go home. 

In Managua, the closest thing to the USA are malls with air-conditioned movie theaters, which is where we decided to spend our Sunday, since all car shops and mechanics are closed anyway. While waiting in line for tickets, Forrest got a phone call from a friend of a friend that we had contacted through Facebook to try to volunteer for his organization in Popoyo, Nicaragua. We had never ended up meeting, but now, he says, he is interested in our car. We offered to donate it for his kids programs and technical school. No, he says, he wants to use it himself, so he would like to pay a fair price for it. And, he's an American, so he thinks he can just transfer the US plates. Anyway, leave the truck with the keys at a hotel in Managua and he'll Paypal the money. It seems too good to be true, but God is good, and we're headed to the airport tomorrow morning. 

Surf Spot: Popoyo, Nicaragua

various surf breaks near popoyo

Nicaragua is most famous in surfing for its off-shore breeze. After a week of what I would call an "off-shore hurricane," I'm calling it over-rated.
Because of a huge inland lake (Lago Nicaragua), the prevailing wind here in Nica is constantly blowing from the lake to the ocean (off-shore). This means you can surf almost any time of day and not worry about the wind ruining the waves. Timing the waves with the tides or just with sleeping in is no problem.

catching a wave at sunset

But,  the wind actually blows little waves from the beach at you. Sometimes, when you stand up on a wave, you will literally be blown off your board. Between sessions, while relaxing in the shade, the wind will blow sunglasses off your head and tear pages out of your book.

overlooking Popoyo from "Mag Rock"

This wind also creates a natural phenomena called "upwelling" (the science of this was described to me late one night by one of our bunkmates in the dormitory at our hostel, I don't understand it any more than I do basic math, so if you are curious, I suggest the Internet).
Upwelling makes the ocean water a lot cooler than anywhere north of here that we have surfed on this trip. We did little-to-no research, and just assumed the water would keep getting warmer as we went south--silly us. Most people surf here with a long-sleeved rash guard or even a spring suit. But, if you have ever waterskied on Memorial Day Weekend in a lake in Minnesota, this water will feel great by comparison. 

Take me out to the Beisbol Game!

Central America is a land of fierce soccer rivalries. Nicaragua is slipping behind in the soccer stats because most of them are on the baseball field. Baseball has been popular here for over 100 years and growing all the time. Kids wear baseball hats and practice pitching in the street in the evenings. Every small town has a baseball diamond and games are played on weekends. We stopped at the game in nearby Las Salinas on Sunday to watch the local talent.

A few things were different than going to a game in the United States. 

*Instead of arriving in their brand new Hummers, players get to the field by bicycle, motorcycle, or horseback.

*The bullpen- a simple abandoned soccer goal in the outfield, outside the baseline- is not for warming up for pitching, but rather for the players to have wrestling matches and perform monkey bar routines.

*It is 100 degrees (38Celsius) and dusty. There are a few trees around the field, but the only real shade is the dugouts. This is taken over by fans, displacing the players to wander around while waiting for their turn to bat. 

*The players all wear complete, professional-looking, uniforms. Most of them don't match, but baseball is a sport where matching uniforms are not really required to tell which team is which in the midst of the action. 

*On the backs of the jerseys, the players may have their name, the name of a business, or the name of the town they play for. My favorite player, the catcher for Las Salinas, had "SHRIMP BASKET" in capitol letters across his shoulders. 

Honduras to Nicaragua

Just a couple more notes on border crossings for any of you that may be attempting a similar feat.
When you leave Honduras, do not arrive at the border anywhere near lunchtime. If you are thinking that lunch could be eaten any time between 10am and 2pm, you are on the right track. Add 30 minutes on either side of that window for safety.
You will have to pay US$3 for the privilege of having your car smogged at the border, just like you did in Guatamala. I don't know if they are trying to kill bugs that carry Dengue Fever, or just like laughing at gringos coughing from the smoke as they drive away.
Then you will have to pay US$3 per person for the privilege of exiting Honduras. Make sure you get the vehicle stamp in your passport canceled. This will take extra long if the customs official is at lunch. Once he cancels your import certificate, you will have to make copies of it--it's a border crossing, of course there are copies to be made!!-- and then deliver them randomly to other people you have talked to since being smogged.
They charged us US$12 per person for the privilege of entering Nicaragua. I am not sure why, as supposedly the CA-4 Visa is a one-time thing for all of Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, and Nicaragua. But you give a bureaucrat a uniform, a little office with a movie theater ticket window, and a spot at the border and they can charge you whatever they want, international rules or not. They did make a point of telling me how much more they were NOT charging me because of our CA-4 visas.
As soon as you get to the Honduras/Nicaragua border, men will run up to your car and try to sell you Nicaraguan car insurance. They will tell you that you HAVE to buy this insurance. The border agents ignore them. It is really difficult trying to find your way through the maze and bureaucracy of the border crossing with insurance agents constantly harassing you. They are even more persistent than the "helpful helpers" that try to charge you for guidance through any border.
If you avoid the insurance salesmen long enough, one of them will go get a cop, that I'm sure is on the insurance company payroll, and the cop will take all your paperwork and insist that you buy insurance before you can proceed. I suggest you pay attention to whichever insurance agent tattled to the cops, and make a show of buying insurance from one of the other parasitic agents running around.
The insurance costs US$12. The insurance guy will write your car information on a form and then use his pen to write a phone number on the same form. He says, "If you have a claim, call this number."  The one you just wrote on the supposedly "official" insurance form with pen? Right.
(**An afterword: we have been stopped by police in Nicaragua more than any other country and a couple times they actually did ask to see the insurance document. Whatever we paid $12 seemed to satisfy them.
**We crossed at the border just West of San Marcos de Colon-- supposedly this crossing is pretty chill compared to others.)

Mission Lazarus

We stopped outside San Marco de Colon in Honduras to volunteer at Mission Lazarus. We heard about this place through a friend at home who said they can always use help.

maneuvering a culvert downhill

Mission Lazarus headquarters is a beautiful ranch where they have a children's home, a large farm, a coffee plantation, and hotel and restaurant. The proceeds from the hotel and restaurant go to support the mission work. 

They are a christian organization practicing "no strings attached" assistance to the rural communities around them through the building and staffing of schools and medical clinics. 

winching a culvert into the hole

We arrived in time to help a college group from Tennessee install latrines for rural families that have never had any sort of outhouse or bathroom. 20% of people in Central America have no sanitation facilities (not even simple outhouses) at their homes. This obviously leads to any number of parasites and diseases. Honduras has a rainy season to be reckoned with, and just digging a hole will not an outhouse make. As soon as the rains come, the holes collapse. So, Mission Lazarus has collected funds for and using truck winches to install large cement culverts in holes that people have dug at their homesites. Each culvert weighs 1500 pounds. Each latrine requires 3 culvert pieces. 

assembling an outhouse

There was a slight break in communications in briefing the families on where it might be appropriate to dig the holes. Even with excessive man power of a bunch of American college kids, it is not easy to maneuver a 1500 pound culvert down a loose gravel hill and around trees and walls. The ropes holding the culvert snapped a couple times, but luckily no one was hurt. It takes a full day of labor for about 10 people to install one latrine in these tricky spots though.

We also got to help with roofing a school building in the remote village of Las Pitas. I'm not sure how efficient it is to use unskilled labor at these projects, though extra helping hands are useful almost anytime. I do see the benefit of getting over-privileged Americans on site to see the plight of those they will hopefully donate time and money to help.
Being with locals in the mountains also afforded us the opportunity to see how they make a living. We got to stop at a sugar plant to watch them use oxen to press sugar cane into juice and boil it down to blocks of brown sugar. It is not uncommon for men to lose their arms in the grinder as once they are moving, the oxen are difficult to stop.

grinding sugar cane

Mission Lazarus was a great stop for us to get involved and meet people in rural communities. Sometimes volunteering can be a great way just to get off the travelers' circuit and see what life is like for people who actually reside in the country you're visiting.

Border crossing to Honduras

This guy told us to follow him. Commence parade speed.

We have read and heard a lot of horror stories about driving in Honduras. I have driven here before and remember pot holes the size of moon craters. People say to expect to be stopped by the police every 15km. Cops will ask for a laundry list of items supposedly "required" for driving in Honduras. Besides the usual, you supposedly need to have a traffic cone, a fire extinguisher, a reflective triangle and who knows what else.
We haven't been able to find an actual list from the Honduran government. They, of course, don't offer it at the border. The only thing we could find out while crossing the border is that you are required to have 2 license plates-- one on the front, one on the back. In Arizona, where we got our truck, they only issue you one. We asked what we could do about it? Nothing. But it's illegal to drive without it? Yes. But we can enter the country without it? Sure. Hmmm...

Waiting in one of many lines

When you approach the border from El Salvador, any number of people, from children to old men, will approach offering help to assist you through the border. Some will just start "helping" you until you make them go away. This "help" is for an unannounced fee and is totally unnecessary. Every official you have to talk to at the border crossing will tell you where to go next. Avoid the helpful helpers.
The financial logistics are these: you will have to pay US$3 per person for the entry fee. The Permiso de Importacion for our vehicle (1995 Toyota 4Runner) was about 685Lempiras (US$36). You will probably need Lempiras to get through, but there are lots of muchachos standing around with wads of cash ready to exchange money. They actually offer a pretty good exchange rate (they gave us 19L to US$1).

Discussions about copies at a window made for Lilliputians

They will put a big stamp in your passport describing the vehicle you brought into Honduras. If you do not leave with the vehicle, and get the stamp in your passport cancelled, you will have to pay a fine. The Importacion lady said the fine is about US$350.
So far, we have only been stopped by cops once and the roads have been decent. When we told the cop we were staying in Honduras to volunteer rather than just cruising through to Nicaragua like most gringo traffic, he let us go without even asking if we had any required gear.
One piece of advice we have heeded was to do most of your driving and border crossing on Sunday. Honduras is a mostly catholic country, and the cops that are looking for bribes the rest of the week take Sunday off to go to church. 

Surf Spots: El Salvador

Surf Spot: Playa Los Cobanos, El Salvador

I only say this was a "surf spot" because our Storm Rider Surf Guide told us to stop there for a long board wave. Lies. No one in the town remembers anyone ever surfing there. We camped in the dining room of a restaurant on the beach. The tides come right up into the restaurant dining rooms. The rocks in the bay are beautiful. A big meal can be had for US$3. We arrived on Ash Wednesday and the town's residents chase eachother around in the dark throwing eggs, ash and water-- lots of screaming and laughing, especially from the children.

Surf Spot: Mizata, Km 81, El Salvador

All the surf spots in this country seem to be clocked by kilometers on the CA-2, the coastal road. We spotted this one from the road and parked in the sun by a barbed wire fence to walk out on the black sand to the beach break. The waves were overhead and the paddle out was treacherous if you didn't walk out the point and paddle around. It was a fun, deserted wave, but as we drove out of town, we saw a right point break wave at the river mouth that looked even better. There's a posh little place to stay called “The Last Resort.”

Surf Spot: El Tunco & Zunzal, El Salvador

Hori-zonte hostel deck-- dorm beds $12

Crowded. I mean, really crowded. Minimum 30 people, up to 100 people, on the break at Zunzal. Zunzal breaks in multiple spots, so that supports the crowd a bit, but it's still a crowd. Lots of beginner surfers. There is a beach break (Bocana) right in front of El Tunco. It wasn't good when we were there. El Tunco is a gringo-packed beach town with bars and restaurants. All levels of accomodation are available. They try to charge you $1 to drive into town. Forrest refused to pay it. They let us in anyway, realizing they would lose more than $1 in tourist spending.

Surf Spot: El Zonte, Km 53, El Salvador

Great right hand point break packed with gringo surfers and a handful of local boogie boarders. The wave is slightly tide effected, and a higher tide is better. There are still kids surfing at lower tide, but watch the rocks at the point! I got smashed and crashed on my first paddle out, and I'm pretty intimidated by the crowds, but Forrest caught a bunch of good waves. There is a great hostel with a breezy deck overlooking the surfbreak. Two pools and gardens make this a great base: Horizonte Hotel (they seem to love pun-ny names here).

Surf Spot: Km 59 or K59, El Salvador

Just west of El Zonte at the kilometer 59, there is a fun right point break. (It should be noted that the roads don't actually have kilometer markers. You have to judge where you are by the names of restaurants and businesses or ask.) The only places to stay here are private houses for rent. There are a couple guys selling beer on the beach that will watch your car if you park it by their stand. The road down to the beach is horrible. It's as if the local homeowners rip up the road in order to keep the wave more private for themselves and their renters-- not something I would put past territorial surfers.

Forrest catches a wave in a windy session at Punta Mango

Surf Spot: Punta Mango, El Salvador

On the first day, Forrest claimed: “Best wave I have ever surfed.” Punta Mango, which is just west of El Cuco and Las Flores, is reached by a dirt road. The guidebooks tell you that you cannot get there by road. This is categorically untrue. It is a 30 minute drive from El Cuco, outside the rainy season, a 2WD vehicle would be fine. There is a hostel just shy of the town of Agua Fria called Rancho Mango. The accomodations are basic but the food and hospitality is great.

The wave is a right point break that can line up perfectly and produce clean barrel after barrel. This is how it was the first morning. Boats bring international surfers in from the resorts at El Cuco and Las Flores by 6am. It pays to get up early and walk down to the ocean in the dark so you can have the wave to youself for 45 minutes. The wind picks up by 9am and sometimes doesn't die down for an evening session. It is possible for the morning session to get blown out and then the beautiful lines of barrels go away and it feels like you are paddling around in a washing machine.  

Voting-- it brings up a lot of issues

Last weekend in El Salvador, there was a presidential election. During the voting process, no one is allowed to sell alcohol. All the bars are closed or only sell virgin drinks. The beer aisles in the super markets are covered in black trash bags. If police see anyone with beer, they take it away. In surf towns on the beach, this keeps the cops very busy. 
In the US, this alcohol ban would probably be argued as a violation of constitutional rights. However, the election ended up very close and with a civil war only 20 years in the past, worries that conflict between the parties might flare up are very real. No reason to fuel conflict with rum and cheap beer. 
Voting ended Sunday night, but the official results weren't announced until Thursday.  The election required a recount, and the winner, Salvador Sánchez Ceren, a former rebel leader, obtained victory by just over 6,000 votes (in a 3million vote election).  Mr. Sanchez Ceren represents the FMLN, the leftist party associated with the guerrillas of 1980's civil war. 
The closeness of this election perhaps shows how divided Salvadoreñas still are along lines reminiscent of their civil war. 
We are finishing our time in this country of great waves and bad food in the northeast corner-- an area known as Morazan. This area, full of farmers, is infamous for some of the worst violence and atrocities of the civil war. 
In the midst of the so-called Cold War, the leftists of El Salvador attempted to push forward land reforms and trade unions to break free from years of slavery and oppression of indigenous peoples begun by the Spanish colonists and continued by the landed gentry they left in place. Even the Catholic church spoke up against the people's oppression. The government responded by assassinating the archbishop and murdering priests. The United States, fretting about another country going socialist, pumped $6 billion into buying arms and training the military to aid the El Salvador government in fighting the guerrillas and continued slaughter of civilians and indigenous tribes.
Today, El Salvador stands out from other Central American countries because you see no people in indigenous dress-- a wardrobe that would get you murdered by your government in the 1980s. The region of Morazon should be filled with people in colorful traditional dress. They are all in normal, Americanized street clothes. 
As we drive around, I ponder what it means to be an American here. I pay taxes that fund the actions of my government.  75,000 people died and entire villages were wiped out in one decade because my country would rather these people live under a military junta (that Americans would not have tolerated themselves), as opposed to having a socialist government. Peaceful years later, the people are still democratically choosing the party that many of them died to support. 
Things besides temporary alcohol bans make traveling difficult. "My family paid for the weapons to have your family massacred-- will you please sell me a cup of coffee?" The grace with which Americans are received in El Salvador is truly amazing. 

Border Crossing and Other Hassles

Crossing the Guatamalan/El Salvador border is kind of like ordering an engine for an airplane. They are both exercises in patience that would challenge a Tibetan monk.

We drove up to the border from Guatamala at about 2:30pm. Everything we have read told us to anticipate this crossing taking about 2 hours. Our passports were quickly stamped and we were out of Guatamala. A man was standing at the middle of the road at the “Bienvenidos a El Salvador” sign. He asked to see our passports. He asked if we were married. He asked where we were from and then exclaimed that it must be cold there. Then he waved us through. Too easy! I thought. “Es Todo? Is that everything?” I asked him as we pulled away? No, he said, go see immigration.

We parked the car and walked up to a window labeled “Imigracion.” They stamped our passports and handed them back and pointed us to another doorway. A man at a desk asked to see our Permission to Import our vehicle. He said we didn't have the right stamps. He pointed us back to man standing in the middle of the street. We walked back to the border but the man we had talked to before couldn't give us a stamp. We talked to his colleague and a bus driver before we discovered the man we needed to talk to was standing in the ditch, in the shade, cleaning his fingernails. He said, “I didn't see your car come through, but I'll stamp the form.” Great. Form stamped, back to the desk, and they point us inside the building.

Something reminiscient of air conditioning exsists in this seat of bureaucracy, so the next couple hours weren't as misable as they could have been. An armed guard told us to wait in line, which we did, until we saw no one else was waiting in line. Then we walked up to the counter and pushed our papers at someone with a computer. The man asked for a copy of a drivers license-- no, not the real thing, the car title, and the permission to import paperwork. Good. That's everything. Wait.

After about 15 minutes, the man called us back and asked for a copy of our passport stamp. There is a little office next door that makes copies. By the end of the border crossing, you are on a first name basis with the man that works there.

This is like an elaborate scavenger hunt where they pretend they have never imported a vehicle into the country before, and you pretend that you are on a video game collecting the right number of coins, jewels and weapons to advance to the next level.

Next the man at the computer asked to see our car. He had us unlock it and he checked the VIN (Vehicle Identification Number) against the title. He asked how many cylinders and how many cubic centimeters is the motor? I made up answers. He said, ok. Everything is good. Now this paperwork is ready to be checked. We went back inside and he told us to wait.

After about 20 minutes, a different man came out and called our names. He asked for a copy of the vehicle registration. 15 minutes later he asked to see the car again. He checked the VIN and checked under the hood-- I got the number of cylinders correct! He asked if we had anything besides clothes and surfboards. Then we went back inside. The man disappeared with our paperwork.

Thirty minutes later, the first man called our name. He asked for 3 signatures and another copy. I can't even remember what he wanted a copy of. We were running out of things to copy. But if he asked us to xerox our hands, we would have done it. He told us to wait more.

After about 20 minutes, first man was ready to see us again. He asked for another signature. He put a sticker on a piece of paper and said we were done. However, we must make a copy (of course!) of this piece of paper and never give anyone the original. We went to make a copy of the paper and he told us to have a nice trip.

As we pulled away from the border office, a guard asked to see our papers. We handed him the copy. He said, “No. I need to see the original.” We hesitated, and then handed him the sheet with the sticker. He walked away, leaving us in the middle of the road. Five minutes later, he returned and gave it back. Bienvenidos a El Salvador! Just over the two hour mark.

Now, that sounds complicated right? Well, the bureaucracy at the El Salvador border is comparatively efficient to an American aircraft company called Texas Skyways. I ordered an overhauled engine for my Cessna 206 on November 6^th. They told me four to six weeks for delivery. Christmas came and went and still no engine. They made excuses. They stopped taking my phone calls and wouldn't respond to my emails except on Fridays to say “Next week, for sure.” It was much like waiting in a semi-air conditioned room not knowing what to copy next. Finally, just as my fingers were hovering over the phone number for the Better Business Bureau, my mechanics called to say “The engine finally arrived!” This was on January 31^st, a mere 12 weeks after I ordered and paid.

January 31^st was a Friday, and the maintenance shop didn't open the engine crate until Monday morning. They called me and said, we have a problem-- Texas Skyways sent the wrong engine. Those pleasant folks in Texas sent me an engine for a Cessna 185. When I called them to sort out the problem, they immediately tried to blame their middle man where they had placed the order. I said I really didn't care who they blamed, but now I was 2 months behind schedule and in possesion of an engine for an aircraft I didn't own. They said they would expedite an order for a new engine right away and I would have it in 10 days. This was on February 4^th.

The weeks pealed by, and I made repeated international phone calls to check up on their progress. Again, I was ignored or told “next week” if I managed to get to talk to someone who knew anything.

My mechanic emailed on February 17^th to tell me that Texas Skyways had delivered a conversion kit. He could convert the Cessna 185 engine to a 206 engine if that was what I wanted him to do. No! They are supposed to deliver the correct engine! More expensive international phone calls ensued.

Finally, the correct engine was delivered on Monday, March 3^rd, just a month after the 10 day promise. This engine is a power upgrade from my previous engine, and requires something the FAA calls an STC to make it legal. Texas Skyways is one of the few companies that provides this STC, which is why I ordered from them. However, they still have not delivered the STC. When they shipped the engine. I asked again for the STC. They said they had already sent it. I asked them to confirm the date they sent it and they realized they had not. On March 3^rd, when the engine arrived, they promised to overnight the STC. They sent me a copy of the paperwork. The STC paperwork they sent was for a Cessna 210. Again the wrong airplane, but not the same wrong airplane as the wrong airplane engine. They are trying again. They currently anticipate I will have everything I need to install the engine by Tuesday, March 11^th.

Either that, or I will have so much patience between this and border crossings that I will have reached Nirvana.

What we learned in Guatamala: How to load a Toyota

A photo essay of Guatamala's favorite vehicle:

Any number or kind of fruits, and throw on some kids for good measure

Carry another car

from another angle, in case you don't believe me

Grass. Lots of it.

You sit on top and make sure the load holds.

This many people and actively passing the Sandhog

Load lumber until frame touches rims

Move an entire household set

Smelly sharks. a whole truck full.

***The photo that I missed was a Toyota pickup with a load of EIGHT coffins. You will just have to use your imagination.