Uncommon Adventures blog

1-22-09
Every morning at 9:15 am a guy rides a horse by my host family’s house shouting “MIEL, miel, miel, miel”—at first listen it seems as if he’s calling stray cats, but he’s actually selling wild honey decanted into old rum bottles.  This is a neighborhood called “sauce” where people sell cold coconuts from carts, honey from the saddle of a horse, yet the driveways in sauce are tiled and the one next door boasts two nice German cars. Honduras boasts many such contrasts that sit comfortably next to one another.  Its hard to have a bad day in a place where most strangers on the street will give you a broad grin and greet you like family. The police are corrupt, the streets are dusty, the drivers are terrifying and everywhere you turn someone will try to feed you or help you in some way.  I’ve been returning since 1995 for what I thought were beautiful ocean reefs and majestic mountain ranges, but I’ve since learned I really return here for the open hearted warmth of this country’s fine people.

1/17

Generally, when one says they’re impressed, it’s meant as a positive thing.  Impressions can run the gamut from positive to extremely unpleasant.  I’m going to dispense with the value judgments and just give some impressions of my first two weeks in Honduras.  Many things make impressions right away…the way families always spend Sundays with one another and the way my 34 yr old friend Leslie still calls her mother, Mommy.   She goes to work via a  “canasta”, a metal cart that crosses over a gnarly class V rapid suspended from a 25 year old steel cable that spans the Rio Congrejal.  How any stranger in a taxi cab will wonder that you’re not married or the oddness of being able to get good hot home-made meal at almost any shack along the roadway. Rain doesn’t fall here…it either gently mists or it plummets as if gravity suddenly doubled.

Another impression…this country is in love with sound.  It’s a very loud country.  Cab drivers play their horns like Tito Puente on drums.  Music plays in malls, restaurants and streets is always on 11 when the dial goes to 10.  Insomniac roosters with no sense of time and megaphones hide around the corner from every bedroom. They’re in competition with the neighborhood dogs.  Buildings here are constructed of concrete and tile, surfaces that bounce and echo sound into a daily cacophony of hard edged noise.  This makes our base at Marble Hill such a welcome respite.  The farm’s dogs, Bob, Raisin and Dulce announce all visitors, but the ambient sounds around our hillside along the sea all come from tropical breezes, waves rolling over the reef and the sighing of palms and tropical oaks.  Its really a beautiful contrast.  One I’m really looking forward to after the next two weeks spent in Spanish immersion school here in La Ceiba.

Rio Dulce Hotel view

1/5

I was expecting a 3 hour drive from Poptun down to Rio Dulce as I made like Rainman (I am a very good driver) all the way to Rio Dulce.  After an hour and 20 minutes, I was already flying over the bridge….like, I’m there.  Hmm, press on and get to customs late a day early or enjoy a stop over at this scenic town with the pretty bridge and sailors everywhere?  Hm, an otro Moza negro por favor…nice dark beer.  Seems to be a large expat gringo population and despite that the prices still remain pretty low.  I also walked up on the bridge for the view and played reverse tourist by offering to take pictures of Guatemalan couples with their cameras from this famous landmark.  I didn’t even charge them $5. They loved it and it was a blast.  I enjoyed a relatively quiet night in a nice $20 room (hey, sky’s the limit) before embarking on the last four hour leg…yeah, right.

The other boot fell.  Left Rio Dulce fueled and fed at 10 for the four hour drive to San Pedro Sula, HN.  I slowed to a stop next to the migration office behind a bus (never good), but found an agent and got my car checked out of Guatemala and cruised the last 20 minutes through Banana plantations to the real border…razorwire, big intimidating buildings..arrived at noon.  The only customs dude had just gone to lunch. So, I wait in the hot sun for a bit, go see the immigration guy and get my visa for 90 days, read, wait some more, eat a peanut butter sandwich and then el gato gordo shows up. He looks over my papers and motions a guy over who starts putting my passport, license, title and license plate all in a big envelope and says “must to to Puerto Cortes for vehicle permiso”…okay….its like 50 miles away…oh, but these two big guys are going with you.  Okay, now THIS is more like it!  Corruption, shady characters, elements of danger….hey, we’re having fun now! Yeah, no one spoke a word of English.  Off to Puerto Cortes we go all the way to the huge container shipping port where all of your t-shirts come from (really, check the tags) and wait in various lines, wait for the customs lady to return from, no one knows, no signs, nada. Finally, this 6ft tall blondish roller derby queen shows up and takes over my identity and ownership papers and says “no hay sistema”…no internet, no electronic paperwork, so….she types up a form, I wait in  two more lines, and Carla, the RD queen and I hope in the Kayakmovile head out on the docks to bribe someone to sign off on my papers, then I head to a bank and deposit strange sums of money into two accounts with people’s names on them and pay the amount I’m supposed to for the car permit ($39 for 3 months) and I’m free to go, 5 hours later.  Hey, I was done just in time, just in time to drive into San Pedro Sula with no map at dark during rush hour in the worst driving city in Central America.  All the roads go one way…seems to all be the same way, but after asking at a number of Shell stations I paid a guy to lead me there on his bicycle while I followed along with my flashers going…pure comedy.  Hey, I arrived at the right hotel in San Pedro Sula with no tire punctures, no robberies or accidents, no food issues, no killer spider bites or hangovers, no new auto dents, no dead batteries, 20 lbs of dirt,  no horrible stories and 5200 new miles on the Escape.  Speaking of which…05, excellent mechanical condition, 4 cyl, 4×4, auto, 2nd owner….11K or best offer?

So, that’s the story of the big drive….I’ll post here on a somewhat less regular basis as I’m now on duty to organize a travel writing course for Columbia College and will be getting the car ready to swing onto a ship soon to head out to Roatan….ah, maybe the fun is just beginning.

Cheers,
Michael

Hanging out at Finca Ixobel

1/5
Finca Ixobel, Poptun, Guatemala
I spent last night 45 feet up in a tree with a yellow Tarantula…something unexpected has happened on a trip where I’ve had very little expectation. As I was preparing to leave Flores, I met a pair of backpackers from Eugene who were heading toward Rio Dulce, so we stuff the two of them and their bags in the Escape and headed South. They wanted to visit this finca (farm) they heard about that had treehouses, huts and dorms to stay in with cave trips and jungle hiking.  So, for $8 I spent the night in a treehouse on the farm too to take advantage of the peaceful setting, the great birding and the wonderful home-made bread from the kitchen. I wasn’t really all that keen on the late night drawn down with the 8 legged Dude with biceps on the wall over my bed.  I tied to terminate his hairy ass with my water bottle, but he was just too fast. Fortunately for both of us, he either oozed out between a crack or hid somewhere out of site to let me attempt sleep in blissful ignorance.  This is a pretty cool place that has a variety of trails, swimming holes sin (cocodrillos—gaters), an awesome staff of cooks and travelers from all over…most of them Guatemalan.  They handle up to 150 people here and it seems like people oft come here for a day and stay a week or two.  Rubbing shoulders with all the Guatemalans, I can see why it’s a popular place to travel.  Beautiful countries full of bright, friendly people are pretty hard to fine anywhere…you just have to learn to ignore the serious looking, heavily armed dudes along the roadways.

Okay, I really am going to Rio Dulce now…really.  Isn’t that a Rufus-Throated Hummingbird over there just below the tree with all the Montezuma’s Oropendula’s nests?  Hard place to leave, despite the well-armed arachnids.

Here’s one for the bathroom wall

1/3
Flores, Guatemala
Now I’m really concerned.  Plan A is still working just fine. I must be using up all of my good luck tickets for something disastrous ahead. Yes, I’m an optimist.  I sailed through Customs with no line and only enlighted by about $25 then made my way to Tikal by noon.  I spend the whole afternoon hiking around the Ruins and chose to camp right there so that I could go check out the nature trails for birds in the early morning.  Nothing like a troupe of 60 Koatimundi’s nearly cruising through your tent at 6 am…that was fun. The air was filled with sounds of various Parrots, Parakeets, Tanagers and Kiskadees.  After walking about 4 miles I came back to my car to run into Nadav again (a car with sea kayaks really sticks out around here) and off we went together to Flores in Peten. This is a bit touristy island in a large laguna that is encircled with brick streets and small traditional hotels.  Its vaguely like Venice without the stench.  Frankly, it’s a pretty cool place and Nadav and I split a pretty decent lakeside room for $12.  Today, I head for Rio Dulce within a day’s drive of San Pedro Sula, HN where I plan to arrive on Jan 5, meeting up with the student group on Jan 6. So far so good…crap.