What documents you need, how much it costs, how long it takes.
Let me tell you: this was a piece of cake!
I was expecting the same level of chaos and back and forth we’d experienced at Penas Blancas, but Los Manos was actually much better organised and quicker.
I am referring mostly to the Nicaraguan side, as our experience with the Honduras borders has been nothing but great so far.
I think most people cross at El Amatillo, so we were a bit apprehensive about Los Manos especially because we couldn’t find any information on the web on how to import the car, so hopefully you will find this useful!
Documents you need to prepare before hand:
- Nicaraguan car permit (original and copy)
- Passport, original (of course) and two copies
- $3 per person to exit Nicaragua (they ONLY take dollars, no Cordoba)
- Approved pre-chequeo from Honduras. This can be done online: https://prechequeo.inm.gob.hn/Login , it’s extremely straight forward and we got instant approvals (I also have to say that nobody then asked for it, but maybe they are able to check that you’ve done it online?)
- Proof of vaccination or PCR results (not older than 72 hours)
- Title of the car, original and two copies
- Driving license, original and two copies
- $4 per person for the Honduran visa
- $36 for the car temporary import permit
And now the steps.
EXITING NICARAGUA BY CAR
- Drive through and you will be stopped and met by the immigration police.
- They will hand you a form to fill in (same you had to fill when entering Nicaragua) and request original and copy of your passports, the Nicaraguan TIP, the title of the car and driving licence of the car owner, they will then inspect your car. The guy who did it for us was unsure about the tank of gasoline we carry for emergencies, but he checked with the police officer in charge and she confirmed it was ok, because it’s only for personal use.
- The police officer stamped and signed our form with the date and time (to be honest at least a couple of people signed it, I guess to confirm all checks had been done?) and asked us to drive forward.
- About 100 metres ahead there is a big parking lot to the right, you can leave your car there and proceed to immigration
- There is a series of rustic booths (as well as eateries!) we asked which one Immigration was and a very kind officer directed us to the one towards the end on the right hand side.
- A bit of a queue here but nothing major, the officer checked our passports, asked for the $3 each (we tried to pay in Cordoba but no joy), our jobs (we seemed to be asked about this a lot!) and then gave us a receipt for the exit fee as well as our passports stamped out of Nicaragua.
- Once immigration stamps the passport you can go to Aduana to close the TIP, this is in another little booth on the opposite lane. They will want to check the form you filled in at the beginning and ensure it’s been signed by the police.
- They will now stamp your TIP to cancel it. Keep it safe as you will be asked for it when exiting the country in a few minutes/metres
- Go back to the car and drive out of Nicaragua, they will ask for the cancelled TIP and retain it
It took just over 45 minutes to exit Nicaragua
ENTERING HONDURAS BY CAR
- Drive in and park your car….erm…wherever!
- Quite a few helpers will offer their services, I would recommend taking them up on the offer if you can’t speak Spanish, if you do, no need really
- First step is the COVID check, which is done in a little booth (counterintuitively AFTER the immigration booth). There were two super lovely ladies doing this. They took our temperature, asked for our passports and age, normally they would ask for a PCR or COVID vaccine proof, but we were simply asked which jab we’d done, they did not ask for evidence of it. They will also ask for your occupation (once again this seems like an important piece of information!) and where you are going to stay in Honduras (the area was enough in our case, they did not ask for hotel reservation or anything like that). Once all done they give you one little strip of paper each to show to immigration.
- Walk back to the immigration booth, they will want to see the little strip of paper and your passports. They will ask for the $4 each (we did not have the exact change but the officer was kind enough to get some change for us), and take your finger prints. Once done they will stamp your passports and give you a receipt for the fee. No queue here and the officer was very kind and friendly.
- Now that your passports have been stamped you can walk to the Aduana booth, a few metres after the COVID one, for the car TIP. Another good experience here for us, with an extremely kind officer and 0 queues!
- We were asked for two copies of the title, two copies of passport and driving licence of the car owner and the $36 TIP fee (this needs to be paid in cash in. Dollars or lempira, we paid in dollars and she gave us change in lempira). She filled in our TIP and then asked us to go make a copy of it and the Honduras entry stamp on the car owner passport.
- Making the copy was super easy, there is a small booth that fries chicken and makes photocopies next door, they take both dollars and lempiras.
- Go back to the Aduana desk with all your copies. The officer will staple some of them to hand to the police on your way into the country and give you the original TIP for you to keep ion the car until you leave the country. (Both the TIP and the entry visa are valid for 3 months).
- Now you can go back to your car and drive into Honduras, the police will take the batch of stapled copies and welcome into the country.
AND YOU WILL FEEL WELCOME! It’s a gorgeous country with extremely friendly and welcoming people 🙂
