Antigua to Leon Bus
Overall travel time: 18 hours and 12 minutes (7am departure, 1:12am arrival)
Overall cost: usd$69 ($50 transport, $2 tax, $3 Honduras border, $14 Nicaraguan border)
After an incredible week exploring Antigua, the time had come to move onto the next place – Leon, Nicaragua. Antigua was one of my favourite places in Central America and I can’t recommend it enough if you’re in Guatemala! Finding transport from Antigua to Leon proved to be less straightforward than I had originally anticipated. After reading a number of blog posts, and speaking to people in my hostel, I made the journey across both borders and wanted to detail my experience to anyone else thinking of making the journey.
My first point of call was looking at flights from Guatemala City to Manague – Nicaragua’s Capital. However, the high cost of these made it impossible to commit to on my backpacker budget. The average price being between £300-400! Additionally, all bus/shuttle companies I found online required a night stop in San Salvador, or departed Antigua at 2am. A quick Google search on the latter only brought up horror stories, involving robberies and ‘van takeovers’, in the middle of the night. I’m sure these aren’t a regular occurrence, but it still put me off doing the journey at night – particularly as a solo backpacker.
Eventually, I found a shuttle company whilst walking past the ‘Lemon Tree Hostel’ in Antigua. $50USD later, I had a place on the 7am bus for the following morning. The shuttle company was called Roneey Shuttles and they collect you from your hostel.
This isn’t the most exciting read! But hopefully it’ll be useful to anyone looking to travel from Antigua to Leon – mostly during the day and without any overnight stops. Journey times and prices included – but be mindful that these prices might have changed since I wrote this post.
Antigua to the Guatemala/El Salvador Border
Guatemalan Border (exit)
An early morning wake up, a very sad goodbye to my sister (who joined my 7 months backpacking for a month) and a quick pack-breakfast later, I found myself on the cobblestone-roads of Antigua, waiting for my shuttle. The driver was lovely and he spent the first part of the journey collecting all passengers from our individual hotels and hostels. With all 7 passengers on board, we had a quick briefing on the three border crossings and paid the driver 16Q/US$2 per person for tax. Our driver handed us immigration forms to fill out for exiting Guatemalan.
Leaving Antigua at 7:23am, it took two hours to reach the Guatemalan border. Here, we handed in our immigrations forms and received exit stamps in our passports – this took less than 10 minutes. As with most borders in Central America, it was really easy to change currencies here too.
El Salvador Border (entry)
Once we departed the Guatemala border exit, we had a very short drive away from the El Salvador border entry. A healthcare professional immediately came to the van and thoroughly checked us and our passports. As this was February 2020, I imagine this temperature check was due to the big C virus outbreak and potentially not standard procedure. We had our temperatures checked with a blue forehead light and were all question on our travel movements. Once we got the all clear, we left the border (9:48am) and made our way to El Tunco, El Salvador.
Related Post: Tulum to Flores – 3 buses, 2 borders and a Tax Scam
El Tunco, El Salvador: Drama 1
The beach town of El Tunco was two hours from the EL Salvador border control (11:48am). We were given 1.5 hours to chill here, whilst they swapped vans and drivers. El Tunco seemed like a cute surfers town, with a nice beach and several cafes. We didn’t have much time to explore but this seems like a big base for backpackers in El Salvador.
Our initial departure time was 1:15pm, but in true Central American style, our bus was late. Waiting in the 37 degree heat by the meet-up point was less than ideal. The upside of these dramas is you end up bonding a lot with other travellers, so by now, we were all very friendly with each other. Twenty minutes later, a new bus and driver appeared. Our bags had been taken out of the original van and strapped to the roof of the new one.
Drama 1 of the trip began to unfold. Three people had left belongings in the first van that hadn’t been moved to the second van – including clothes on the bus and a phone that someone had left on the seat thinking we were coming back! Understandably, they wanted to contact the original driver to retrieve their belongings. This heavily delayed our journey time, which was fine, until the driver decided to leave us in a boiling hot bus, with only a few windows open. Luckily they all got their things back. Finally, we 9 new passengers on board, we left El Tunco at 2pm.
Lesson 1: ALWAYS take your belongings with you when you leave these shuttles. The big bags are usually fine but all valuables should be kept with you.
El Salvador to the Honduras Border: Drama 2
An hour after leaving El Tunco, we stopped off at a petrol station. I highly recommend you break up any large USD notes here, by buying a bottle of water or something to eat. No border gave out change – despite blatantly having it!
El Salvador Border (exit) – 6pm
Three hours later we finally arrived at the El Salvador border (6pm). Our passports were thoroughly checked from inside the bus by an officer. El Salvador doesn’t charge an entry or exit fee, and as with other borders that day, we had the forehead temperature checks (assumingly for the C outbreak).
Drama 2 then began. A girl on our bus didn’t have an entry date included on her Guatemalan stamp. You’re entitled to a combined 90 days in Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua. However, you must make sure your passport stamp includes an entry date and the word ‘90 days’, particularly if you’re crossing borders via land.
She was taken off the van and into an office. We had to wait for 50 minutes in the hot van. It’s one of those things where you feel bad for you new found bus-friend but equally frustrated at the conditions – a little AC or open window would have been great. Eventually, our driver decided to take us to the Honduras border and come back for her later. Sundays are notorious for being especially busy at the borders and he wanted us to start queueing as soon as possible.
Honduras Border (entry)
He wasn’t kidding when he said the queues were bad. After over an hour of waiting, we finally got to the front of the queue. We gave finger prints, and paid the Gringo tax of USD $3, we got back on the bus at 8:08pm. Some people ended up paying $5 or $10 for not having the exact change! If you’re on a tight budget, be sure to have small change with you. As said above, you can get small change at the petrol station or exchange money ahead of time.
Halfway through our queueing, the girl was reunited with our group. it was great to be back as a team after the nightmare we were having. However…she was made to pay USD $45 for not having the date by her Guatemalan entry stamp and was told to leave the country within 5 days. It was unfair to her as it sounded like a complete mishap on whoever stamped her passport. Understandably, she didn’t realise you had to have ’90 days’ written in your passport.
Lesson 2: Be sure to have ‘90 days’ written in your passport if you’re planning to move between Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras or Nicaragua.
Lesson 3: Have the exact money at each border as they don’t give change. Coins lower than $1 aren’t accepted.
At 9pm we stopped in a petrol station to pee, buy snacks and swap drivers again.
Honduras/Nicaragua Border Control
Honduras Border (exit) – 10:21pm
The Honduras border was a breeze. With no queues, we were back on the bus within 15 minutes. Very quick and easy process.
Nicaraguan Border (entry) – 10:42pm
The Nicaraguan border was a different story! Our driver collected our passports, 14USD and went inside to sort out immigration. I sat outside the bus to get some air and connect to their free WiFi.
I have no idea why, but this took over an hour – despite us being the only ones there!!! It was definitely getting quite frustrating and all of use were very ready to be in Leon. Eventually, we were back on the bus for what felt like the 100th time and tackled the last leg of the journey. Again, this whole experience REALLY bonds you as a bus as you’re all going through it together. Which is why i’m such an advocate for solo travel, as you’re never really alone!
Leon – 1:12am
Finally, more than 18 hours after leaving Antigua, we reached Leon!! The driver dropped us individually at our hostel and hotel doors. I really appreciated Roneey Shuttles for doing this. Arriving in Leon late at night was quite scary as EVERYTHING was boarded up and shut, given it quite an unwelcoming and unfriendly vibe. I wouldn’t have liked to walk alone here trying to find my hostel.
Wrap Up of Travelling From Antigua to Leon
I hope this helps anyone looking to make the trip from Antigua to Leon by bus, without any overnights stops. I was glad to get the whole journey done in a day, albeit a fairly unpleasant experience. My biggest tips would be to take the exact change for borders, have the correct passport stamps and don’t leave anything in the van during the bus swaps. Both Guatemala and Nicaragua are incredible places to explore, so this whole bus ordeal was worth it!
My absolute favourite places to visit during this was Antigua, Volcano Pacaya, Volcano Acatenango and Semuc Champey, so I highly recommend these places if you get the change to visit them!
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The Ultimate Guide to Travelling in Guatemala
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