city girl goes jungle...

am i glad i did....extremely
when am i going back...NEVER

the past 5 days have been quite an experience. i´m not even sure where to begin. whenever i thought things couldn´t get any crazier...they did. so i suppose i will start with the journey home from la mosquitia.

we (cami, katie, tour-guide-reynaldo and i) woke at 3am to begin our 13-hour journey. the first 3 hours by boat (a 4 person canoe-with 7 people on it - powered by a tiny motor). the first hour on the boat was fine...we were cruising along, in the dark, wide open lagoon...no problems. then we almost hit a grassy patch and capsized. this startled us a little. but then 3 minutes later, we hit a fallen tree and really almost capsized. now i am angry and petrified....and bleeding from my hand because the tree caught my hand and tore open a nice piece of skin. a few minutes after our 2nd accident we started to notice glowing eyes peeking out of the water. i´ve always wanted to see a crocodile...but not while driving in an overcrowded four person canoe at 4am that almost capsized two times, with blood dripping out of my hand. i was freaking out a bit at this point....just praying that i made it through the ride. thankfully the rest of the boat ride was perfect. i even saw a shooting star (this is only the second one in my life) and a few satelittes (this was a first). the sky was so clear, making everything visible. there was also a cool algae in the water that was glowing as the boat tore threw it....very cool!

so we make it to shore where 6 run down pick-up trucks are waiting to fill up with passengers. two men, anxious for passengers, grab our bags from the boat and throw them in the back of their truck....leaving us no option but to ride with them (this is the way they operate here). so we get in the truck and within the first five minutes the truck stalls. trucks were not meant to be driven through 4 feet of water on the beach. they finally get the truck started and we continue driving on the beach. (la mosquitia is so remote that there are no roads going into it....the last road ends 30 miles before the first village so you have to drive for 30 miles on the beach to get to it). then we get to a point where the waves have flooded the beach and we are forced to put the truck on a ¨ferry¨ (see picture) but we must first wait for the truck ahead of us to cross. well the truck ahead of us lunges forward as it´s crossing the puddle and is now hanging halfway off the ferry. it took 20 minutes but they amazingly got the truck off the ferry. it was actually quite comical. we were worn out by this time so all we could do was laugh.

the rest of the return trip was pretty smooth and we were happy to be back in civilization. i decided that i needed to splurge and stay in a nice hotel room. cami and katie agreed so we are back in la ceiba staying at a very nice hotel and enjoying the luxuries that we did not have while in la mosquitia.

la mosquitia was amazing. it was a world i have never experienced before and i am having a difficult time putting words to it. the people live so simply....houses made of materials they gather from the jungle....simple meals. we stayed in hut like houses. we bathed using buckets of water from the river. (see the photos). we got over our bug phobia the first night...we had two huge spiders, two billion mosquitos, hundreds of beatles, a few cockroaches and god knows what else in our room. fortunately our beds came equipped with mosquito nets. i´m pretty sure i have deet poisoning but i did not suffer any insect trauma. but it is really nice to know that i will be sleeping in a big, warm, insect free bed tonight without a mosquito net hanging around me.

i did have a really cool experience. cami and katie asked me to teach them some yoga. so we were on our porch doing yoga and our tour guide (reynaldo) came over and was interested in learning some yoga as well. some of the kids saw what we were doing and gathered in curiousity...and within a few minutes they were moving, trying to mimick us.

i wish i could better describe the amazing five days spent in la mosquitia...the pictures will hopefully do a better job than my words.

tomorrow i am parting ways with the girls...i am headed to livingston, guatemala and they are headed to el salvador. i am starting my trek north to belize and then i´ll head south again from there.

hope you are all doing well. happy belated birthday pop...hope you enjoyed your day...big hug to you!

love,
me

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