December 31
Ok Brad, I'm getting closer. I'll be there tomorrow night. I'm having New Year's right here in Leon, Nicaragua, but I'll be there soon. No need for a hug, you'll want to send me straight to the shower when I get there. I can't even stand myself at present. The road grime is starting to add up.

We made great time going through the two border crossings yesterday, although it wasn't simple. The first one (El Salvador to Honduras) was a little expensive ($85), but the second one (Honduras to Nicaragua) was only $7. The first one was much more crowded and they were going to close down for two hours for lunch. Plus the fact that it was New Year's eve and a Sunday. Dick got us pushed through with a little persuasion here-and-there. The timing was just much better than it had been previously. It took no more than an hour at each place. we stayed on schedule real well today.

The one thing that kept us from making up any lost time was the condition of the Nicarguan roads. They were in terrible shape and I might have gone another route if I would have known. Regardless, we've got the equipment to handle it, I'm just glad it wasn't raining. The roads started out as being a bad potholed but paved road. You had to go fairly slow, but then it turned to gravel. The worst part was, they don't even maintain their gravel roads. It was somewhat rough, but fortunately it didn't go on for too many miles? Nicaragua became apparent as the poorest country so far. Be real happy with where you live.

We entered Leon not knowing what to expect, but we have found great accomodations only a block from downtown. I think the population is about 150,000. They had plenty of festivities on the town square last night. Fireworks is going off continously. Oh, and they have wireless internet in the room. The place is called Hotel Austria.