Holidays like never before

Rick and Sarah's Xmas

More than a month after our holiday experience I thought I'd tell you all a little about our abnormal Christmas.

In Nicaragua, the whole country practically shuts down for the second half of December. For Sarah and I this meant some exciting travels. We had visions of seeing many parts of El Salvador and Honduras, seeing beaches, fortresses, forests, and the like. However, given my desire to work too much, my reluctance to plan things, and a decision to be in a very remote town by the 30th of December. We ended up having little time to travel and an unplanned vacation at our feet. Therefore, with Sarah noting the very unromantic way in which I decided (unilaterally) the we'd just "see what happens", in a panicked rush the night before leaving we ended up choosing our destination (Utila), main activity (scuba diving), and means of transport (lo que sea).

We had heard that the cheapest place in the world to get your diving certification was in the Bay Islands off the coast of Honduras and thought that we might never have another opportunity where we were so close and with a few days on our hands. I'm always down for something new so I thought "why not go for it?"

Unfortunately, we realized that you can't book flights (astronomically expensive) or international buses (full) the night before leaving around the holidays so we decided to get there by any means possible. This meant that we took 3 days of travel, 6 buses, 4 cabs, 1 flight, 1 ferry, and 1 boat to get to our final destination: Hotel Kayla on Jewel Cay off the coast of Utila, Honduras.

Jewel Cay

And glorious it was when we finally arrived. The small island of ~400 people, themselves a mix of Honduran, Creole-English speaking people descendents from the Cayman Islands, Garifuna, and a spackling of other random folks. Sarah and I, along with anywhere from 4-7 other residents of the hotel were the only foreigners on the island. We enjoyed walking the only street (really a sidewalk because there are no cars), not worrying about email or cell phones (neither worked), and eating at 1 of the 3 restaurants on the whole island. We soon got to know a large number of the local population and quickly were saying hi in passing to new friends. This relaxed, intimate experience was leaps and bounds better than than the relatively noisy and expensive option of staying on Utila. What we lacked in our ability to hit up a raging bar scene or have international cuisine was made up in our "no worries, cold beer on the dock" lifestyle on the little cay.

Each day a boat would arrive to pick us up for our morning scuba diving. A sport which I loved for the relaxation of casually gliding underwater while watching bizarre and mesmerizing creatures but had difficulty getting relaxed with the awkwardness of breathing underwater, clunky gear, and my struggles to get my ears to go "POP!". I wish we had some underwater photos to show you but underwater cameras are not the easiest to come by. I'd love to do the expensive sport again so if there are any wealthy readers looking for a few dive partners, let us know.

Christmas Day

We had Christmas off from diving so we planned a full day of sunbathing, barbecuing, fire dancing, and kayaking with no presents to completely indulge in the anti-Christmas streak we were on. We even found a local who would allow us to make some international calls to the family from his house phone for an arm and a leg. After some hurried "I love you's and Merry Christmases" we returned to our untraditional Christmas routine. The next step involved kayaking out to an uninhabited island to lounge on the beach for the majority of the day. Then we returned to make a feast out of barbecued fresh fish and whatever else we could get our hands on. Fortunately those staying in the "hotel" (really just a few bedrooms around a common area) were some amazing people:
-An Irish artist and holistic medicine couple who live on a small island between England and France.
-A nude model Welsh man on a motorcycle journey through the Americas (his son tragically died during the first 100 miles but he's continued after some time back in Europe to try and honor his son's wishes and attempt to cope. See for yourself: lesandcai-americas.blogspot.com
-2 professional Israeli woman who have extensive travelling experience
-2 crazy Italians

Everyone contributed to a stunning meal which was followed by the sunset, then some group-purchased fireworks, more beer, some surprise firedancing by our new friends, wine and rum, and then some freaky moonlit snorkeling surrounded by phosphorescent creatures in the water. I had hurt my foot, so Sarah took my place in the water. I thought I'd share this quote from our friends blog describing the Xmas experience with you all:

"There wasn't a single present in sight, all day and matter of fact greetings were given all round. No fuss, no bother; the most unchristmas christmas I've ever experienced. And it was lovely for that

I missed the family a tremendous amount but felt very fortunate to be in the place we were surrounding by the characters that were around us.

Hope the pictures help my storytelling ability and I look forward to writing more about our adventures. Including our forced trip to Costa Rica. Stay Tuned.
-Rick

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