The quick and dirty summary of the past five days is as follows: hours upon hours driving in beautiful highlands; simple but unique Mayan ruins; and rain. Lots of rain.
If you want more details, continue to read.
Before I begin though, I feel inclined to talk about Honduras, the country we've lived in for two weeks now. When Micah and I would talk about traveling Central America, as the conversation shifted to Honduras I would say something to the effect of "oh, the place we won't spend much time in, besides the isolated and safe island of Roatán". I've been nervous about Honduras the entire time and the few travelers we met with horror stories about buses getting hijacked didn't help my situation. But we've heard scary stories about every country we've visited thus far and we have yet to have a scary story ourselves. Reality is, if you don't flaunt your stuff and you stay out of the big dangerous cities, Honduras ain't that bad. I wouldn't travel here alone but I also wouldn't travel in Belize (the country I initially thought would be the safest) as a single female... unless you enjoy feeling like a walking piece of meat. I'm amazed and saddened that Central America is perceived as such a dangerous place when the people, for the most part, are friendly and helpful and the land is beautiful.
That being said, we might have witnessed a murder on Tuesday. We had survived the 90 minute ferry ride from Roatán to La Ceiba without feelings of nausea, bussed to San Pedro and were now on a bus from San Pedro to Copán Ruinas. We were pulling out of the terminal and our bus began to slow down before taking a left turn onto the main road. I heard commotion out the window and when I stuck my head out, there were about 5 local men crammed in a small space bordered by two collectivos and our large bus. It was obvious within seconds that there was a fight brewing between two of the men, the drivers of the collectivos. The collectivos didn't appear to have been damaged but from the position they were parked, must have almost hit. There were some punches thrown, a few cheap kicks to the ribs, and then the younger guy turned and walked back to his van. I was doing some quick math in my head: the murder rate in San Pedro Sula is 187/100,000 people, which breaks down to 1 in every 54 people are murdered. Those are bad odds! As our bus drove away, I kept my visual and saw the driver that I had thought was retreating back to his van instead pull a long machete out and showed off his weapon by jabbing it in the direction of the other driver. I think your odds of being murdered change significantly if you piss off a guy with a machete. We drove away before we saw it get ugly(-ier).
We set a new longest travel day record on Tuesday, starting with a taxi at 6am and arriving in Copán Ruinas at 7pm that evening. I always feel like we should be energized after simply sitting in a bus all day and ready to explore after traveling, but it's not the case... we're pooped the next day. Wednesday was our recovery day; we read in our room, swung in the hammocks on the terrace, and Micah made a scrumptious chicken curry for dinner in the hotel kitchen.
Taking advantage of the terrace which also included a small soaking pool (which we didn't use)
Thursday we got an early start and walked the 1 km to Copán Ruins. I'm becoming a pro at writing about ruins, as this was our sixth of the trip. I'll summarize its differences from the others and let the pictures do the rest of the talking. Copán covers a much smaller area and doesn't boast the grandiose temples that reach the sky, as the others have. But it does have macaws in the trees, beautiful backdrops of hills and valleys, and the largest Mayan hieroglyphic known to date. It was also discovered that the Mayans built temples on top of existing temples, so underground tunnels were constructed that link the older temples to each other for tourist exploration. The park entrance was $15 and to see the tunnels was $15 more, so we opted to stay above ground.
El Cementerio- for residential living and inhabitants were then buried next to their home when they passed away so it doubles as their cemetery
Copán is best known for its sculptures, pottery and hieroglyphics
On our walk back to town we hiked up a steep cobblestone street for a lookout of the small city with red-tile roofs. We enjoyed the left-over curry for lunch and again for dinner. Between the meals, we hung out on the partially covered rooftop terrace for the best view of the afternoon thunderstorm. The rain hit the scrap metal roof with such power that we couldn't hear each other speaking and the loud clapping of thunder made us question our choice to be on the highest point in the city, surrounded by metal. At one point, we were thankful we weren't still at the ruins. And then even more thankful we weren't in the tunnels at the ruins.
8am the next morning, we caught a collectivo for a windy ride through the hills to Gracias. For the second time since our travels began, a little girl got motion sickness and threw up in the van. I, for the second time since our travels began, felt like the super hero when I handed baby wipes to the parent to clean the child and the unfortunate person sitting next to them. We walked in search of the perfect hostal in Gracias, which doesn't exist as they were all very expensive or dirty and small. We chose the second dirtiest one we found that had a shared bathroom with a door on the single toilet that didn't latch, two very used twin beds in a small room and to our horror, more cockroaches (who didn't show their faces until that evening). It was also our second cheapest hostal of the trip at $9.10.
We had arrived early with plenty of time to explore, so we threw our packs down and headed out the door. Had our typical plate lunch which included rice, small baked potatoes, salad, beef for me and chicharron for Micah and a drink, each for $2.55. As we were pondering whether to walk to the fortress after lunch, another downpour began. We ran back to our room and spent a couple hours playing online and reading until it let up. With our rain jackets on, we ventured out in the light drizzle and tried to walk to the fortress but decided against it when we were unexpectedly told it cost 50 lempiras each. We noticed that carts were beginning to pop up on the corners and planned to find our dinner here. The Central Park had 3 stands and we chose the one where the gal in charge asked "que quieres, mi amor?" (what do you want, my love) when we walked up. We sat under the tent to take cover from the constant shower and indulged in tacos, baleadas and pastalitas, all plus a drink for 100 lempiras or $4.50.
Arriving back to our room, Micah rearranged items on the nightstand between beds and jumped when something moved on its own. Convinced it was a large spider, his search began and I stood as far away from the nightstand as possible. Once the nightstand was cleared and upside down, the antenna of the momma cockroach and all the baby cockroaches were visible. The next five minutes were spent with Micah and the nightstand outside, flip flop in hand, and I documented from the safety of my bed. See below.
Micah asked if I would hold the flip flop while he moved the nightstand. I would not.
Saturday morning we again boarded a collectivo and arrived in La Esperanza after 2.5 hours. We decided the rain wouldn't start before 2pm when we would arrive, so Micah didn't cover his pack with it's rain fly. I am without one since I accidently left it in Nicaragua and have paid the price with a thoroughly soaked bag numerous times. As it began to rain AGAIN with our bags on top of the van, I apologized to Micah but hey, misery loves company. Luckily we were both saved since at some point, the attendant guy had put our bags in the covered back of the van and they were perfectly dry. We got out our rain jackets and put garbage bags over our packs to walk in to town.
We went with the first hotel we could find to catch the end of the UEFA Champions League Final (European soccer match). Feeling our options were to stay inside and be dry or chance the rain, we put on our big kid pants and went for a walk. We meandered through the street market and managed to make it to the top of a hill overlooking the town before the rain resumed. At the top of this hill was a cave that had been made in to a chapel, so we glanced in and then headed back to the safety of our room.
Our room at Hotel El Rey. No standing room, curtain for a bathroom door, but there is a flat screen tv!
From the quiet of our room, we heard some chanting and ended up watching a crowd march down main street in protest of the government. It's been on the news here lately so we knew it wasn't against the U.S. and we were safe to stand on the porch and watch. Apparently the government used some social security funds for a political campaign and that's recently been brought to the public's attention. No Bueno. Afterwards, still raining, we walked to the closest restaurant we could for dinner before it was lights out.
Today, Sunday, we continue this trend of finding a new town to explore each day. We are heading towards Lago de Yojoa, a lake high enough in the mountains to require a long sleeve shirt in the evening and there's likely another thunderstorm there waiting for us. We loved the heat of the Carribean but we still welcome this change with open arms.
The road has treated us well but has begun to take its toll. We both agree we could live out of hostals and backpacks for another few months, but since we know that we will soon return to Nicaragua, we are tired. Our bodies crave well rounded meals, our backs crave good mattresses. We safety pin our shorts to keep them on our thinner bodies and we smell our clothes to determine if they are clean enough to wear. In days, we will be reunited with my sister and her family. I look forward to smothering my nephew in hugs and drinking a glass of wine with my sis and bro-in-law while Micah and I divulge them with our favorite travel stories. It will be good to have a break from the road, but I will anxiously await the day this fall when I put my pack back on.
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