It was not all sunshine and roses. We almost died more than once, got sick from too much, too little, and just plain bad food, took a lot of horrid bus rides, and lost all our photographs but what was probably the worst was seeing many of the cultures of CA clammering to adopt the westeren overly capitalist and self indulgent mentality that we so dislike from home.

We will for sure be back, you can count on that!

Favorite moments:

• The overall fantastic people
• Gallo Pinto
• Bus rides through the countryside
• Diving in Honduras
• Making lots of new friends from all over the world
• Truck bed rides
• Motorcycle Rides
• Poking Lava
• Volcano Hiking
• Snorkeling in Honduras
• Antigua

Not so great:

• Trash everywhere
• Getting Robbed
• Costa Rican food
• Tourist prices

Total Money Spent Per Person: $1809

Average Per Day Costs Per Person:

• Lodging: $6.50
• Food: $9.50
• Transportation: $6.06
• Misc: $11.44 (Beer, Trips to the store, Padi, Park entrance, Guide Fees, etc.)

Total Average Per Day, Per Person: $33.50 (includes Padi course in Honduras)

Number of Days: 54

Unfortunately, there is a contrasting point to Honduras. The country is astonishingly beautiful but the people (generally speaking) disregard its beauty and litter without conscience. The streets, highways, and small country roads are lined on both sides with a constant white line of trash. Tossed from buses, taxis and police cars the trash piles up and leaves a stain on the otherwise unblemished natural beauty.

Be sure to check out the Honduras photo gallery here

Favorite moments:

• Saben got his PADI and did some awesome diving
• Truck ride to San Pedro Sula
• Lindsey’s Birthday
• Roaming the ruins of Copan and having Sepulturas to ourselves
• Snorkeling at the black rock
• The people
• Sunsets from our favorite dock
• Fish at the shack

Not so great:

• Trash…Everywhere
• La Ceiba
• Ants on the toilet seat
• Too cheesy pizza

Total Money Spent Per Person:

• Saben: $730 (includes $335 for PADI)
• Lindsey:$400 (includes $55 for beginner scuba course)

Average Per Day Costs Per Person:

• Lodging: $5.50
• Food: $10.00
• Transportation: $8.00 (Does not include flights)
• Misc: $8.00 (Beer, Trips to the store, Park entrance, Guide Fees, etc.)

Total Average Per Day, Per Person: $31.50 (Does not include PADI as it would skew the true daily cost)

Number of Days: 13

Got up really early (it’s totally worth it to beat the hordes of tourists who arrive about 9 or 10:00) and walked to the ruins (to learn more about the Copan Ruins click here for the wiki-link).

Takes about 15 minutes from the center of town. It’s a really nice walk on a stone walkway that runs alongside the road.

Nice walk to Copan Ruins

We arrived just after the park opened so we had the whole complex to ourselves for a couple of hours before the tour buses started rolling in. It was amazing! It’s very quiet when you first walk onto the grounds. The only sounds you can hear are the wild macaws, quetzals, and other unnamed birds and animals in the surrounding woods. Since Copan is an ongoing archaeological site, some of the structures are covered with tarps and scaffolding while they are restored or completely dug out from beneath the thousands of years of vegetation that have overgrown them. It’s incredibly difficult to capture the magnitude in photos or even videos. What an indescribable feeling to stand and look out over the Main Plaza from where the king would have sat high above in his Royal Palace. To think that such an amazing and complex civilization lived thousands of years ago and made such phenomenal buildings, games, ornate decor, complex cities is enough to blow your mind. It’s beyond description.

(Below is a small sampling of photos from Copan but you can find many more on the Honduras photo gallery)

Lindsey at the main temple structure at Copan

Carved statue at Copan

Ball game field at Copan

Statue "Old man of Copan"

Skull carving at copan

Over Copan

After spending almost 5 hours wandering through Copan, we walked the extra 2 km to Las Sepulturas. It’s very easy to get to and only takes about 15-20 minutes to walk to from the gates of Copan Ruins. When we arrived, we took a look at the big wooden map near the guide building and because we took our sweet time looking it over, we accidentally picked up a guide. Guided tours are not free but you will get a great deal of interesting facts about Las Sepulturas, in spanish of course. We politely followed the guide through the first little complex before he wanted to negotiate a price for the rest of the 3-hour tour. We were able to follow along pretty well while he gave us some info about the place but when he started to talk about prices and explaining the rest of the tour, we got really confused and our spanglish and hand gestures failed us. “Habla espanol?” We grin stupidly and shake our heads no. He laughs really hard and we deliberate at how much money to pay him for the 10 minutes or so that he guided us (which we didn’t want in the first place but we felt it would be really rude not to give him anything for his time) and, upon deciding a hopefully appropriate sum, we try to explain that we would rather guide ourselves but “muchas gracias” anyway.

We trekked through the rest of the complex and literally did not see a single other tourist the entire time we were there! It was nice though because it kind of feels like you are discovering it yourself. Las Sepulturas was the living complex for the middle class Mayans. The rich and the royals lived in the Main Complex and the poorest citizens lived in the mountains and were the ones who cut the large rectangular stones that partially comprise the Copan Ruins. The structures are made by stacking laying two rows of blocks, one for the insidewalland one for the outside wall, and then filling the empty space between with riverstones for solidarity. Apparently, the poor people who lived in the mountains would take the stone slabs they cut and put them on logs to move (roll) them down to the river to transport them to the main complex.

Most of the structures at both the main ruins and Las Sepulturas were originally painted, often white (the stones were white lime) and/or red. Red symbolized blood, or the life force. Near many of the structures in the royal palace there are little signs that are painted interpretations of the assumed reconstructions. These provide little more than neat ideas about the past but are still pretty neat. We spent quite a lot of time at Las Sepulturas enjoying the place to ourselves.

Lindsey Discovering Las Sepulturas

Las Supulturas

Took the long walk back to Copan to grab some lunch but were disappointed with another atrocious meal. We’re wondering if there is any good food in this town at all…

Travel Tip:

Las Supulturas is a travelers goldmine. The complex is outstanding yet it is not advertised at all so it is almost always tourist free. To get to Las Sepulturas walk out from the main gate at Copan and head to the right, down along the fence, past the touts and vendors. There will be a small stone path that will take you all the way there. Their is no sign for the ruins but the walk way ends at what looks like a farm gate. Walk right in and you will see down the lane a guide shack and a map of the sight.

Awesome bus ride to Copan! Amazing countryside, although the massive amounts of garbage lining both sides of the road is very depressing. Why won’t anyone take care of their beautiful home?

It was an interesting ride getting to the bus terminal though! We bought a ticket at the station but had to take a jeep taxi 20 minutes away to the actual bus terminal. Every time our driver came up to a speed bump, he sped up instead of slowing down! When we finally arrived at the real terminal, we waited for 3 hours watching 1940s Hollywood alien movies overdubbed in spanish with english subtitles.

When we first arrived, we took our first (awesome!) auto rickshaw to a hotel in the center of town (very cheap…ride and room). We weren’t sure if that little thing was going to make it up those steep hills! The town of Copan is extremely walkable and great to wander around. Pretty dull day but enjoyed just wandering the streets. Had a really really disgusting lunch at some restaurant. Not feeling so well now…

Spent rest of the day chilling out in the room trying to feel better before heading to the ruins in the morning.

Streets of Copan

Auto Rickshaw in Copan

Copan Main Square

Today we walked around the city and checked out the markets which sell everything from fresh fruit & vegetables to new clothing to construction & building supplies.

We found it pretty overwhelming to be here. It’s not a tourist draw so we felt a lot of lingering stares for most of the day as we walked around. Nearly every little shop, large department store, ice creamery, shoe store, etc has at least one (heavily) armed guard because the crime rate is so high (kinda why we didn’t take any pictures). When we were visiting with our friends’ family yesterday, we learned that all the houses and businesses are gated and locked up for the same reason. We didn’t have any trouble while we were out and about but we were advised not to go out after dark.

We had planned yesterday to get together with our friends before we all left on Tuesday to our respective destinations but we weren’t able to reach them. We were really bummed because we hadn’t properly said thank you and goodbye yesterday since we all thought we would be seeing each other today.

Today is Lin’s birthday (22!). We didn’t do anything special today because we had planned to go out tonight with our friends for a drink. But since it didn’t work out, we just headed back to the hotel to do some journal catching-up and watch a little TV. Lin was a little bummed that she didn’t get to have a celebratory drink or anything and Saben, feeling badly about it and being the awesome guy that he is, braved the mean streets in search of a birthday surprise. Without saying where he was going or what he was doing or for how long, he left our room instructing Lin to “Stay here. I’ll be back. Probably…” About an hour later, she heard 3 knocks at the door. He’s still alive! And there he was, holding a flaming birthday cake!

Lin's Rockin' Birthday Cake!

It took three bakeries and two mini-supermarkets to come up with a cake (with “Happy Birthday Lindsey” written on it), candles, and champagne (ginger ale) but he was able to spanglish his way through it. San Pedro Sula really is quite dangerous at night (in fact we were advised by our local friends not to be out after dark) and Saben had a hard time looking tough and mean walking around the dark alleys with a pink and yellow cake!

Cheers!

Best birthday ever, for sure!

Caught a taxi from our dorm in West End to the port at 5:45AM (interesting ride at 5 something in the morning…try putting 6 people into a 4-person car…cozy) and waited for an hour to board the ferry.

It’s good to arrive early so you can get the good seats up top in the open air (no sick bag needed plus a beautiful ride!).

The view from our seats

When we got to port we picked up our bags and found our friends’ truck. The 5 of us piled closely into the truck and headed on toward San Pedro Sula.

David, Lin, and Saben in the back of the truck

The drive normally takes 3-4 hours but we stopped several times along the way for snacks, fruit stands, traffic jams, and a really cool Garifuna village right by the ocean. The Garifuna are an interesting subset of Honduran culture. They maintain there cultural identity and speak there own language (also called Garifuna). We met a few young girls walking home from school and they were nice enough to teach us a little Garifuna and sing the national anthem in their language as well. Not something you would ever see on any tour!

Lake and Garifuna Village

Saben crawled out the tiny back window and rode in the truck bed for most of the way, waving at passing kids, people on bicycles, and other people enjoying the warm sun from a truck bed (very common in Honduras). Every bicycle had at least two people on it but many had 3-4 people stacked on. Whole families—father, mother, and two kids riding down the road on a single mountain bike!

Despite the natural beauty of the country, there is so much disregard for it. People litter as a normal practice, trash cans are common but rarely emptied so the trash just piles up and blows away. Still, it was such an amazingly beautiful—and fun!–drive. We drove straight up and through the mountains, passing African palm fields, the endless Dole pineapple fields, and lots of banana trees. We had fun trading and sharing snacks, chatting about the past week we shared in Roatan and learning lots of things about Honduras and its culture. David taught me how to eat a lychee fruit—you just crack it with you mouth and pull the halves apart and then pop the fruit out of it’s little case into your mouth. Very tasty!

Lychee fruit peeking from its shell.

We got to meet the family of our friends who had so kindly prepared an amazing lunch for us.

Beef Empanadas with salad on top. Very Very Tasty

They helped us make plans for getting to Guatemala giving us info and tips calling up friends they knew who could give us even more information and help. Frank and a friend who knows the city inside out even went further out of their ways to drive us around to find a suitable, inexpensive place to stay for the night! We were inexpressibly grateful and felt a little silly just saying thank you—it certainly wasn’t enough to properly thank our friends and their family for everything they did for us! We are extremely grateful for their incredible hospitality and generosity!

This morning we had breakfast with a couple of new Australian bunkmates who are visiting the island to get their Dive Masters. We traded travel stories and tips while eating pancakes at “the shack” (50 Lps, or $2.63) with fresh butter and strawberry marmalade. Yummy! Today we laid around on the beach all day till the sunshine faded from the sky. Great day just relaxing in the sun (ok, and maybe recovering a little bit from the last couple of nights…).

"Panqueques" at the shack

Saben, Frank, and Glenn packed in one more dive and had a great time. They were able to hit their max depth of 60 feet and see two turtles very close up. Since they are all certified divers now, they can bring cameras with them so Saben was able to take a few shots above and below the water, unfortunately the camera will not work past about 45 feet (due to the intense pressure) so no photos of the turtles.

Saben on the boat

Scuba Frank and Scuba Glenn (and some other guy)

The Reef (Blue because of the lack of light at depth)

Saben Post Dive

The Three Scubateers

We feel at home here on Roatan now. It’s as if we’re lived here for years. We know all the great places to eat and shop and we always run into friends no matter where we go. What a wonderful life! It’s our last day on the island and though we a reluctant to leave such a comfortable, lovely place we are also ready to move on to something new. We went out with our friends but the bars were all dead in the West End so we called it an early night around midnight and decided to catch the ferry back to La Ceiba in the morning. We had planned on leaving Roatan a couple of days ago but decided to stay an extra day or two because the guys offered to let us ride back to San Pedro Sula with them. They were going there to visit their families and we were going there on our way to Guatemala. We were so happy and grateful that we couldn’t possibly say no! So we all leave together in the morning around 6AM to get to port in time for the 7AM ferry back to the mainland. It’s not often that one can make such good friends but then again we’ve been living with each other for about a week so we’ve gotten to know each other pretty well. Looking forward to the journey!

Laundry day! Just outside out cabin/dorm is a little place where a local lady does laundry for tenants of the dorms. It’s only about 60 Lempiras/bundle (about one medium sized load of clothes for about $3 US). We spent most of the day chilling out on the beach doing a whole lot of nothing.

Lindsey on the beach

Today was David’s birthday so we went out that night to celebrate with him. Tons of people were out and about—every bar was absolutely packed. Last big blowout before the mini-high season (Christmas and New Years) ends. Good times!

Saben at Fosters

Us out on the town

Happy New Year! Last night was so much fun! We absolutely had a blast! We went out with our new friends and bunkmates David, Frank, and Glenn plus a few of our new diving buddies as well (it’s such a tiny island it’s really easy to bump into people you know).

The night started out with us and Glenn at this little snack stand drinking a couple rounds on the little porch just in front of it (pretty much every shop, snack stand, internet cafe, etc sells beer). It was nice just hanging out, watching people go by. We started there because we were waiting for the other two to meet up with us before taking off to the bars. As with this time of year on Roatan it started pouring rain.

First stop

Suddenly a taxi pulls up with (several) people shouting for us to get in. We see some guy we don’t know in the window and out from the other side pops David. There are 3 of them in the taxi plus the driver and then the 3 of us pile in too (not pleasant for me sitting on Saben’s lap in the front seat of a tiny Toyota!) As soon as we are all (mostly) in the car, we’re off. Just as someone is asking where we are going, the taxi stops and someone else shouts “Aqui! Aqui!” We literally drove 4 shops down, like a quarter of a city block, and got out! We were at the only reggae bar on the island, which like most reggae bars, only had one Rastafarian in it. Its a nice open air bar right on the water.

The place to be

David, Frank, Glenn, and a random Canadian

Saben, Glenn, and Frank

So we hung out there for a while and totally missed the turn over of the new year! There was no count down or anything, and none of us were keeping track of time. All of a sudden we just hear people start cheering and yelling. Shit…we missed it. Pretty anti-climatic but oh well right? So a 12:02 “New Year’s Kiss” this year. We hung out there for a bit longer till we got the bar-hopping bug and headed down the road to another bar called Nova. It’s this open sand/dirt area with a concrete step up with a DJ and dance floor. There were 2 really good fire dancers and a hot DJ.

Fire Dancer in action

We picked up another couple of people and somehow lost Frank and David and then headed up to Flowers Bay to a locals-only (well, mostly…) club called Hip Hop. Oddly enough there is no hip hop music, only some reggae and the occasional country music song. We skirted around the bouncer and didn’t pay the (expensive) cover and then ran into the crowd before they could do anything about it!

Hip-hop

After Hip Hop, we caught a taxi back to our respective sleeping places of the night and fell into rock-like sleep. Several hours later we woke up to beautiful, warm first daylight of the new year and had a big breakfast of banana pancakes. Saben and I took a 30-40 minute walk from the West End (where we are currently living) to the Black Rock at West Bay for some renowned snorkeling (You can take a water taxi for $2-3 US but we opted to walk). First day we spent together since the PADI course began! It was a beautiful, very fun walk across some sandy/rocky beaches, ankle-deep water and over a lookout bridge and through the backyard of a very posh resort. On the way there, Lin spotted a troubled seahorse writhing on the sand just beyond the water. Saben rescued it by scooping it up and putting it into some deeper water beyond the surf. Poor little thing! We rented our snorkeling gear at a little stand on the beach by Anthony’s Key Resort for $10 US/person (cheaper if you bring your snorkeling gear from West End—rental there is only $5 for 24 hours). The reef is literally about 5-6 feet below the surface so we swam through some really narrow channels between the coral. We got to see tons of fish—rainbow parrot fish, schools of both angel fish and sergeant majors, some small barracuda, lots of un-inflated puffer fish (there is a virus going around the island among the puffers and many of them are dying so they don’t flee when you come close to them), and plenty more fish we couldn’t name. The coral bites though! Saben got a nasty scrape on a couple of places up his leg. It’s really an amazing place for snorkeling and really does meet all the expectation and talk-up that people give it.

West Bay

Later that day we ended up running into Glenn and had dinner at “the shack” (red snapper all around…yum!). Fantastic start to the new year!

So this is it—the last day of a really horrible year. We couldn’t be happier! This year has been pretty rough on both of us and we are super excited to see what will happen in ‘09! Saben did 2 dives today, finishing his PADI course. Just before he left, he built Lin a sea turtle in the sand next to where she was sitting on the beach. Then, when he went out diving he actually ended up seeing two sea turtles! How weird! He saw a hawk bill turtle, a green turtle, a huge barracuda plus he found (all by himself) a sharp tailed eel which even his dive master buddy had never seen before. Anyway, scuba Saben had a great day diving and Lin is getting a really great tan. We’re planning to hit the strip with our new friends (our bunkmates) to celebrate the new year. More on that to come…