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We are going to be in Liberia Costa Rica in July and are planing to drive across the boarder to Nicaragua. Has anyone had experience doing this? Is it safe and easy to cross the boarder? We are Americans. Can you take a rental car across the boarder? Any info would be greatly appreciated.
I do NOT think you can but would check with your rental car company…
Scott Oliver – Founder
WeLoveCostaRica.comMacfarlane: You can’t drive cars over the border if they are rentals. The rental car companies cannot get Nicaragua insurance for the cars, so they do not permit those to go over the border. I drove to Nicaragua with my own car (that at the time was registered in the USA) and it was a headache. Had to do it to renew my entry for 90 days for purposes of putting off registering the vehicle. If you drive a car with Costa Rica plates that is NOT a rental, you have to get a Permiso (permit/permission) from the government to go over the border. You then will take 2-4 hours at the border doing the paperwork for yourself and the car to cross over into Nicaragua. You will have a ton of little kids running up to you saying they want to ‘help’ you with the process and it can be overwhelming if you don’t speak Spanish. You have to also purchase Nicaraguan Auto Insurance for about $12 US. You will need the original title of the car, your passport, and insurance documents. If I had to go to Nicaragua again, I would fly Nature Air (commuter flight) or take a bus. Much, much, easier option! Good luck.
Edited on Jun 22, 2007 13:21
Macfarlane, as others have noted…this is not as simple as crossing from the US to Canada or anything of the sort really. Unless you are fluent in Spanish don’t even think of doing this on your own. And you can not take a rental car across. We went with a group and a guide. Knowing very little Spanish, I could have not done this on my own. In fact I would not have know how to fill out the paper work properly.
Navigating from the CR side to the Nica side is also a little confusing. You actually have to drive your vehicle through some sort of sanitary spray before you are allowed in the country. I found this fairly amusing considering that Nica is smothered in garbage and filth in that area, to the extent that I felt compelled to write my minister of foreign affairs asking for aid.
Once on the Nica side I have no idea what happens. We stayed on the bus and sent out passports in with our guide. We though he was trustworthy, and he was. The whole crossing seemed a little shady…but went smoothly.
Safety? Well, I don’t think I would classify the area as SAFE. We encountered no issues but we had a well respected Nicaraguan guide that took care of everything. It may be unfair to say that it is not safe but there is an abundance of unique individuals loitering around the Costa Rican side. It looks nothing like the rest of Costa Rica. My wife said that she did not feel safe. But again, we did not encounter any issues. There are plenty of police officials on site but probably not enough to control a crowd. Advice: don’t wear expensive jewelry or show off electronics.
Traffic is pretty crazy there as well. You will likely be waiting in line at the CR side for an hour. Coming back into CR for some reason didn’t take as long although the traffic was crazy. It seems like people, including the semi truck drivers, totally disregard the rules of the road in that area, driving on whatever side of the road they deem most suitable. The road is also very small so not really much room to navigate around them. To further complicate matters there was a sizable fire at the crossing as well.
One thing we all noticed was the stark contrast between the CR and Nica people. CR people do not typically get in your face where as the Nica people were running after us and plastering themselves across our bus. It didn’t bother me but some of the ladies were quite intimidated by this.
Overall we rather enjoyed our short stay in Nica but it certainly isn’t on my top 10 places to revisit.
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