Country-hopping

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Howdy y'all (we do hope you're appreciating our varied greetings) from Guatemala.

We escaped Punta Gorda by boat to Puerto Barrios, Guatemala, where we had a rather stressful re-entry to the country. The boat journey was pretty bumpy and for some reason they decided to separate us from our beloved rucksacks by putting them in the other boat, but you can be sure our eyes never parted from that boat for the duration of the crossing. We are aware that going through Customs is a legal requirement for entering a country, yet Customs was nowehere to be found. We decided sticking with the other travellers was our best bet, so we stalked them the 5 minute walk to this hidden building where Customs was hiding.

Customs done, we needed a bus outta there. Re-whacking out our Spanish after 3 weeks of Creole we located the bus but with no means to pay. Everybody had different ´helpful advice´but we eventually converted some dollars into Quetzales, we were ready to roll. But no, our tummies disagreed. After putting our bags on the ´coach´ (if you can call it that), we saw some street food and it looked good. With a nifty eyes-still-on-coach exit, we ordered some food and the coach decided that it was now ready to depart and so it did. We´d already handed over our money and there´s no way we were leaving those potato wedges behind, so Rose sprinted and hopped on the bus, one foot on, one foot off as if trying to anchor it to the pavement while Lucy waited desperately for the money and chips. The vendor, possibly trying to make us lose our luggage, asked if we wanted ketchup, mustard, salt, pepper, mayonnaise and every other condiment on the planet but finally handed them over and literally as the bus was pulling away we hopped on (panic not, we were equipped with wedges). All eyes followed us as we sheepishly made our way to the back of the bus...

The bus journey was a horror in itself. We´re used to chicken buses now, but this ´bus´wasn´t even fit for a chicken. Seats were hanging off their hinges and the toilet door swung open every time the ´bus´slowed down. Just as we finished our delicious meal, the bus came to a stop and five armed (and we mean armed) police men got on and demanded to see our documents - only us, rude. When the police man holding our passports decided it would be fun to walk off with them, we panicked. Man with gun vs. losing our passports. Fun either way. Luckily he remembered half-way and we were reunited, close shave. To make matters worse, a very drunk, creepy Guatemalan man got on and made a beeline straight for us. Staring at us for 20 minutes wasn´t good enough for him, so he decided to join us on our two seats. This meant Lucy was spooning Rose and he was spooning Lucy. Again, fun. The smell of alcohol off him could have made us drunk, but instead just made us feel pretty sick. After fruitless attempts of trying to ignore his endless come-ons, we decided standing was a better option. What a gentleman letting two girls stand while he thieved our seats. Luckily the lovely bus conductor sensed our discomfort and moved some locals in between us and him.

We arrived in Chiquimula (which we have since been told is a major part of the drug cartel) in one piece and stayed in Hotel Hernandez for the night.

Big love x

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