Day 15 - Honduras (San Pedro Sula)

Ok, so this is the big one. The apple of every drug lords eye, the grand fromage of bandito towns. SPS. 

All I can really say by way of a headline is, what a load of old cobblers! SPS is just another big city with stuff in it. Well the bit I'm in anyway. There's no late night gunfire, no burning vehicles, no wading through rivers of blood. There's a TGI Fridays on the corner and a guy watering his garden over the road. You've got to be lost, unlucky or an idiot to get caught up in the violence as far as I can see. I'll guess at a comparison from my few hours here. You wouldn't fly into Los Angeles and catch a cab to LA South Central to take a few pics would you? No, you'd go to Beverly Hills or something because that's where there are things to see and it's safe. Same here. Simples. SPS doesn't have a Beverly Hills in fairness but it seems fine from where I am. 

The journey to SPS was about as much fun as a 12 hour bus ride can be and I do kinda get what some of the fuss is about. We went through about twenty police/military checkpoints, and were boarded three times for them to check things over. 

We did get attempted 'hold-ups' on six or seven occasions (I was in the front seat of the coach so had a good view of what was going on) but these were mostly halfhearted affairs by kids in the middle of the road swinging spades around their heads. I saw one machete but in each case, the driver just ignored them and they either shifted or got run over. They shifted. Frankly it was all very speculative on their part and you've got to be a special kind of lemon to stop and get turned over by them. Maybe there are some more serious gangs of highwaymen out there but I didn't see them. 

Still, it's more road grief than you get in most countries, so I can see why the media pick up on it and why I've been warned by other travellers not to go to Honduras. I've seen a bunch of civvies tooled up but none of them appeared jumpy or ready to blast away at strangers, just their own form of risk mitigation in blued steel and brass cartridge. 

I suppose it's as much down to being organised as anything. I invested much more time in preparing for this bit than any other. Booked ahead, arranging for taxis to and from the bus terminal with the hotel, found the nicer part of town on he net. All of this has paid off in the end. 

Honduras is, or looks to be at least, poor, dirt poor. As ever, nothing wrong in that. It's pretty much what you'd expect a cliched banana republic to look like. Lots of.....bananas and pineapples and avocados being sold from shacks at the side of the road. I passed through the capital and it is as run down and slummy as anywhere I've seen. Think india but with tropical fruit. The roads here are the worst I've come across and the coach must have done twice the straight line mileage just trying to avoid potholes. 

The scenery is quite beautiful if you look past the shanties and more diverse than I'd've guessed. It gets quite brown in the South, moutainous in the centre and greener and more lush the closer you get to the Caribbean. 

I got so cocky last night I went for a beer and Honduran BBQ last night which was terrific. 

Honduras side of the border

Ticabus

Day 16 - Honduras (La Ceiba)

La Ceiba is the gateway to the Bay islands of Utila and Roatan. I was headed for Utila, the smaller and more backpackery of the two. I'd arranged for a taxi back to the central bus station in SPS and upon arrival I booked onto the 10.10am Hedman Atlas bus to La Ceiba. The journey was about four hours or so non-stop and it was a pretty comfortable $20 trip. Air-con, reclining seats etc. La Ceiba is a decent size town by Honduran standards but Ive found little to recommend it beyond it being the place where you get to the islands and didn't spend any time there. Once you get to La Ceiba bus station, it's a ten minute, $5 taxi ride to the port, which is basically a couple of shacks and a docking area, and then the one hour boat to Utila ($27). I finally arrived around 5pm.

I walked to the place I'd booked into, a dive shop plus accommodation, dumped my bags and set about emptying their bar of beer. I was somewhat encouraged by the other patrons and owners of the place who had apparently embarked upon the same mission themselves, sometime earlier than I. Apologies for the brevity of this post but what happened to the rest of the evening is a complete mystery to me. 

Honduras countryside

Day 21 - Honduras (Utila)

Just diving today and I thought I'd give everyone a short break from tales of the deep. It does gives me a chance to catch-up on some general admin.

Gerald is not well. In fact I think he's dying. He can barely stay awake for eight hours without talking before needing a lie down to recharge the old batteries. If he's feeling chatty, that goes down to four hours or less. He's also started to behave very erratically. We've had some good times, some damnably fine moments. He's kept me sane and kept me laughing when I've needed it most. Not all of our conversations have been a roaring success, particularly when alcohol has been involved but I accept most of the responsibility for that as Gerry is tee-total. 

Anyway, if he can hold out for just another couple of weeks, he'll have had a terrific innings and finished his long long life in fine style. Hang on in there Gerald! 

A word or two on Central American transport. Flying is a good way to get around but it's generally not cheap and it often doesn't take you terribly near where you want to go, meaning a sometimes lengthy bus ride at the other end. 

Taxis are easy but reputable firms are the only sensible option - you don't want to risk anyone without a shirt and badge - but they cost more, even once you've haggled. And they know when your options are limited, so can strike a good deal for themselves if they are the only guy picking up in the vicinity.

Buses come in three basic flavours, old American school buses (for local routes on the whole) ex-Greyhound buses (often for domestic long distance journeys) and new-ish air-con coaches (for international or even intercontinental routes). Buses are the primary method of getting around Central America. They are pretty cheap, even for the posh ones. I paid $41 for the12 hour ride from the middle of Nicaragua to the top of Honduras using Ticabus, the biggest of the available carriers. 

Hotels and hosels can arrange shuttle runs from one tourist town to another in an SUV or mini-bus and that works out pretty reasonable if that works with ones schedule. I paid $15 for my trip from Granada to San Juan Del Sur which was about an hour an a half away. Given the convenience factor, it was well worth it. A trip from San Juan to Leon, which I was considering, would have been five hours and $25. 

The bits of the Pan-American highway that I've travelled on have all been really good roads. Much better than Central Asia, Southeast Asia or even some parts of Eastern Europe. Outside of the PanAm, it's pothole luck.

There are a few train lines here and there apparently, often built by the likes of banana growers to move produce to port but they don't really get a traveller where a traveller would want to go. There are other options depending on where you are. Small hopper planes in Belize for example, one way car hire is doable if that's your thing (not very economical or safe when travelling solo) or even hitchhiking if you've gone completely doolally. 

In all cases, schedules are......flexible. 

Finally, knowing a bit of Spanish (oops! In my case) reeeeally helps getting around. You also MUST ask at least five different people before deciding what the real story might be. If you don't get five different answers, you're doing very well indeed. 

Onto morale. It's not difficult to have a good time in Central America. The basic ingredients are all there, all the time. I've found no shortage of busy and quiet bars (which one I go for depends on my willingness to be sociable at any given time). Hostels are always busy, so company is never far away. The sun shines most of the time and even when it doesn't, the temperature stays warm. The rain pelts down for a bit every now and then but once its had a good go, it stops as if its got bored and found something more interesting to do. There's oodles to do and plenty of beaches for when doing becomes too much. 

The point is, you have to work pretty hard at being miserable. That's not to say there are never any moments of quiet reflection, particularly true when you're travelling solo. If I look back at Central Asia as a comparison though, they were all hard miles and you had to find your own fun. There were many more quiet times, without company, with fewer things to do. It was much more of a physical and mental endurance test than Central America and with fewer opportunities for contact with anyone from home to keep spirits up. 

Lastly, food. There are all sorts of national and regional specialities available wherever I've been so far but if you boil it all down, it's basically Mexican with a twist. I'm sure someone will find that highly offensive but what I mean is, the stuff grown in this part of the world ultimately gives you rice, tortillas, tacos, meat and vegetables, the same as Mexico pretty much. The only real variety comes with how you fold the stuff together. None of this is in any way complaint. I love Mexican/Central American food, so I've really had a good time eating so far. Being on the American and Canadian backpacker trail, you can also live on burgers and fries if you want to, although I haven't (actually, just writing that has made me want to find a McD's!). A dinner will cost you somewhere between $6-10 but that's tourist prices. I haven't really sat down at many out of the way local eateries. Street food costs next to nothing but is mostly of the snack rather than full-on meal variety. I guess you could just buy a hatful of snacks and pig out on that. I hadn't thought of that. Anyway my budget allows for knife and fork dining. 

Just so there is some pictorial content, I snapped these from the dock of a Caye (small island) where we stopped for lunch today.

Very large Barra and a Lizzie, (Barracuda and lizard fish. I've very clearly been hanging out with Aussies for way too long).

The bathroom facilities at the dive shop can be seen just to the left of the green kayak.

Day 14 - Nicaragua (Managua)

The next few posts aw likely to be a bit shorter and more boring. I'm on the road for a bit and hopefully not too much will be newsworthy.

I started out from Ilas de Ometepe. Caught one hour ferry across lake Nicaragua to San Jorge and waited for a bus to Managua. It was one of the old US school buses and it took about two hours to get to Managua. By the time I'd waited for both ferry and bus, it was 3.30pm when I arrived in the Nicaraguan capital. Reputable taxi to the Ticabus terminal and booked a ticket to SPS (I was relieved they still had a seat available!! I tried and failed to book online). Ferry was $2.50, bus was $2, taxi to Ticabus $7.50, Ticabus ticket $41. I stayed in a hotel just around the corner from the terminal. I decided not to skimp on accommodation in Managua. It's not a great town to be in if you don't know what you're doing, although not on the scale of SPS, or many other Central American cities in fairness. Anyway, I needed to check in with Ticabus at 4.30am for a 5.30am departure and despite the short distance, the hotel owner provided his armed security guard as a bit of company for me en route. 

Here's a point that might have been missed by some. Solo travel needs more thought than group travel. I wouldn't go as far as to say that it's more dangerous perse, but you're the only one who can keep an eye on your bags. If you go to the loo, you have to take everything with you. If you're walking down the street, you have to have eyes constantly scanning. If you're looking in a shop window, or stood at an ATM, you have to be more careful. If the bus gets stopped, you're no better or worse off alone than in a pair or more but you ARE more of a target for mugging or worse if someone with a mind to, can't find anyone better. This is all meladramatic of course. The actual chances of falling foul of such trauma is slim but better than on the streets of Reading and being aware of that is probably a healthy mindset. 

My bus to Managua

Ironically, the best room I've stayed in so far was the Managua hotel

Day 12 - Nicaragua (Ometepe)

Well today has indeed been quite exciting! I was expecting a quiet pony ride along some dusty roads and then home for tea and scones but what I ended up with was MUCH more fun. I've never been on a horse before outside of a paddock and then only twice that I can recall.

Prep;

Itinerary briefing - none

Safety briefing - none

Horse operating instructions - none

Equipment check;

Helmet - none

Long trousers - none

Riding boots - hiking sandals only

That was that, so with a swift slap on horsey's rump by my guide, we're off into the unknown. The faint shout of, 'Don't worry mister, everything will be bueno' from the hotel owner caught in my ears, before us dos amigos got eaten up by the jungle trail. 

And so we started climbing the larger of the two volcanoes that make up Ilas de Ometepe (I neglected to inform that there are two, didn't want to confuse but Nicaraguan volcanoes appear to come in pairs). 

My main concern was not falling off. My second worry was not looking too much of a dick, so after about 20mins and once I'd found my stirrups, I began to showboat and rode one handed. I discovered that this was about twenty times cooler looking than two hands clinging onto the saddle horn thingy. And as it happens, actually helps with balance. While I'm generally pretty comfortable with ball or hand/eye coordination stuff, I am legendarily poor at balancey things. Anything that kept me in the saddle AND improved coolosity, was fine by me. 

Unfortunately, this also had the effect of erroneously improving the confidence of my guide in me. And so he gave my horsey another slap and we leapt into something of a canter. He 'Yeee Haaaar'd', I, being British, did nothing of the sort. As the pace quickened, the scenery started to blur and my worries began to turn to oxygen deprivation and asphyxiation. At those speeds and those G's, the human body can only soak up so much. We MUST have been hammering along at 8mph, possibly more. 

Thank goodness my canny old nag detected my discomfort, or he was just fed up of my arse pounding his spine to ruin because after a few miles, he slowed to a trot and then walk. In addition, we'd reached the base of the volcano and he knew what lay ahead. 

We began the climb - and here I need to make a point. This is a densely forested steep ole volcano we're talking about here. There is a trail of sorts but it's not exactly Disney Main Street I can tell you. Cutting to the chase, we wound our way up, stopping periodically to machete our way through and on occasion, dismounting. Poor old horsey couldn't mange himself AND fatty on his back in some places. I did get given a stick with which to encourage horsey along but that just didn't seem like cricket and I avoided using it as much as poss. Carrying me on his back all day felt like punishment enough. 

In the end we came to a place where we simply couldn't go any further. So we parked the ponies and hiked to a viewpoint some distance short of the summit and took a break and a look around. It took us about two and a half hours to get there. Hopefully the pics will give you the sense that it was all worthwhile. 

By the time we got back, I was covered in bruises, cuts, and ripped apparel but had a really really excellent time doing it. It was a complete adventure and something very new for me. It was just an hombre and his trusty steed - and another hombre and his trusty steed too I guess - blazing a frontiersmans trail through an untamed and unforgiving jungle/volcano. Very romantic really. The notion, not me and the other hombre you understand. It wasn't Brokeback Mountain or anything. 

Damage report;

Plums - badly bruised. Additional offspring now highly unlikely.

Inside calves - skin completely abraded away.

Thighs - unnaturally and irrevocably parted.

Arse - missing, presumed killed in action. 

T-shirt - ripped beyond the talent of any tailor.

Head - hurty. Mucho low branches.

Overall - completely worthwhile. 

Me and horsey when I'd gotten around to riding one handed. I was shooting out of the saddle - YEEEEE HAAAAARR! 

View from upon high

Horsey and I 

The jungle did leap out and attack me frequently. Still, no gain without pain

Just a couple of semi-serious points to close on. 

I honestly don't think it's a trip for every first time rider. On this occasion, I did find horse riding fine and balancing myself on horsey throughout not a problem but that wasn't a dead cert and I could have come off onto some volcanic rock pretty easily. It's tough terrain, not a walk up and down Blackpool beach on a donkey. I'm glad they didn't ask many questions, as any responsible tour operator wouldn't have let me near it and I'd have missed out. Hey, one of the benefits of touring Central America. 

As far as I could tell, and I'm not a vet, the horses were in decent enough nick and I saw no evidence of maltreatment by the guy, in fact he was pretty on the ball and kept adjusting straps etc. to keep them comfortable. Mine was responsive and mostly(!) willing. Overall, I didn't have any welfare concerns for them at all. If I had, I'd've thought twice about going. 

Day 13 - Nicaragua (Ometepe)

Woke up this morning with a J-Lo booty. I'm SURE my arse wasn't this big when I went to bed. The swelling is temporary, I'm sure. I also lost a lot more skin yesterday than I thought. And that's a sensitive place to be without adequate epidermis, trust me. It looks a bit like I've nailed two skinned water melons onto my rear. So I had to retire to a hammock for breakfast as it was the only seat that wouldn't further damage my fragile seat. Still, all in a good cause! (No pics I'm afraid, one should always avoid being overly graphic I feel(!). In this case a pic really would have been a bit much but it does look quite funny though).

Before I get onto today, I ought to say that I had a superb night last night. The pizza I finally managed to find was bloody marvellous and then I went to see a local band playing nearby. To be honest, I thought it was karaoke it was so bad but there were instruments involved, so I figured they were an proper outfit. I think it was the vocalist that stood out. She was flatter than a Paris catwalk model after breast reduction surgery. I laughed out loud at one point, rather unfortunately in a sound break. I shifted position as the adoring local crowd seemed confused by my reaction and I didn't want to generate an atmosphere. 

I've invested a good proportion of today in planning my trip into Honduras. There are several bits that need to come together right and my recent, 'turn up and see what happens' approach to travelling simply won't wash where I'm going. Local buses are frequently stopped by pop-up toll booths, manned by unshaven men with crossed bandoliers, droopy moustaches and sombreros I'm told. So an intercontinental bus is essential (stopped less often for some reason apparently). I CAN'T just turn up in San Pedro Sula and wander around looking for a hotel. Everyone I've spoken to says that's tantamount to suicide. So I've basically had to stitch together a programme which includes advance bookings at each waypoint and bus tickets bought and paid for where poss. Remember Penn, 'We are not at home to Mr. Cock-up' for this bit.

All any of this means is that a bunch of things will fall apart if one element fails to deliver. We're just talking about sensible risk management here but I've rather enjoyed, 'turning up and seeing what happens' up until now. 

I did take a long walk along the main road today and passed through small villages which were perfectly authentic, not touristy fake and it was refreshing to see some real Nicaraguan life for a change. 

The main road cut straight across the aeropuerto runway - something I've not seen before - so I was able to take this shot from the middle of the runway. 

I do wish they'd print these signs in English too. I'm sure they have something important and helpful to say if only I could make it out. 

Ever wondered what happens to the old school mule that becomes too ancient for US service? It'll still be going strong in Latin America. There are thousands of them coughing up and down the highways. And they do pack them in I assure you. 

Day 11 - Nicaragua (Ometepe)

Left San Juan Del Sur and the surfer crowd with no particular regret (I doubt they'll mourn my passing either) and caught the shuttle bus to San Jorge and the ferry to Ilas de Ometepe, a volcanic island in the middle of Lake Nicaragua). Ive already exhausted my knowledge of volcanoes in a previous post, so I won't go all National Geographic in this one. Big tall volcano that is also an island. Very very imposing and beautiful place all told, although a little rustic in places. After my last hotel, I promised myself something a bit special so I could get over the bathroom trauma and have a decent nights sleep. Having asked for the best hotel in town, I arrived at a $35 p.n. chill out b&b and was lucky to get it apparently. It's not bad actually. I was just rather hoping to spoil myself with a brand name rather than another, 'best of the worst' hotelio. Not to worry, I know there are some nice places on the horizon. Plus, anywhere that doesn't have a massive turd on the bathroom floor, is beginning to feel like luxury now anyway. There are mango trees in the garden, hammocks, no young people, and the owners are very welcoming. I do feel more relaxed here I have to say. I've been tempted by the horse ride/volcano trek tomorrow and will advise if that comes off or not. In the meantime, the shanty town that passes for a capital in these parts has at least two pizzerias - and I haven't had a pizza in I don't know how long. So Ometepe is already scoring highly in my book. 

Great sight as the island came into focus.

I watched a girl retch for 90mins straight on the ferry before collapsing exhausted onto the deck. Poor thing. It was impressive in its own way though. 

Must remember to shave occasionally. 

The latest in my occasional series of wildlife shots. Today, a pterodactyl.