Honduras

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following on from the last entry...
Next morning we headed to the docks at 8am to get our passport stamped and got on the 9.30am boat to Puerto Barrios in Guatemala. it cost us $37.50Bz to exit Belize which was annoying but good as we had to get rid of our belize dollars anyway, we just hadnt wanted to spend it! My last $1.15 of coins i spent on chips onthe exit ramp lol. The boat took about 1hr 45min but it was a beautiful day with no wind. it was only a small motor boat but they packed us in, about 20ppl with all our luggage. When we arrived we went and got our entry stamp to guatemala and to change the rest of our belize notes at the bank and noone would change them. So we found a minibus to the honduran border and the driver said we can change them with his friend at the border so we did. It took about an hour or just over to get to the border and changing money was easy. We got our exit stamp just under 2 hours after we´d entered guatemala and headed on into Honduras. The immigration office in Honduras was huge! with a very larg parking lot and its own giant police station but the whole place was virtually empty. We walked 5 mins up the rd to catch the chicken but to puerto cortes, but ended up getting off early at the lovely little town of Omoa.
We stayed at Roli´s place, a backpacker guesthouse with a resident iguana and boa that shared a bit enclosure that was split in two and a rabbit that roamed the garden and 2 dogs who always wanted attention. We had free use of the bicycles which we took advantage of immediately as there was no ATM in the town and we had small amount of cash we went and changed US dollar into Lempiras at the small bank. We met a german guy who was staying in the dorm (we had a private room... was cheaper) and joined him for a beer down along the beach... the sunset was amazing! We were facing directly west so saw the sun set across the ocean with fisherman pulling their nets into their boats in silhouette to the sunset.... it was so picturesque, but of course our camera had runout of battery! The beer here is good, I had a Salva Vida and dario had Imperial. The town itself is very small and we explored it all pretty quickly there is an old spanish fort here, but we didnt even have enough cash to go in lol, but it was pretty from the outside. Once again we were starving after travelling all day after only eating cereal for bfast, we finally ate again around 6pm, we cooked rice at the hostel.
Next morning we managed to catch a bus to puerto cortes as it sped past us I yelled out and with a screech of brakes and black smoke from the tyres they pulled over and let us on. Once in purto cortes we got to an atm and got some money out and then proceeded on to San Pedro Sula the 2nd biggest city in Honduras, its got a bad reputation for everything except the bus terminal, its the hub of travel in northen honduras so our gateway to the rest of the country. We got there and waited an hour until our bus to the town of Tela left at 2pm (we ate disgusting ham and cheese sandwiches for lunch, yck!). Luckily I woke up when we had stopped somewhere on the highway and saw the Tela sign, we asked the driver if this was it and had to get off in a hurry, we´d both fallen asleep and nearly missed it! We walked into town for about half an hour before finding the hostel Mango that we had been looking for, but we were diaspointed, the prices advertised in the lonely planet were 3 years old and had gone from around 200L ($10) a night to more than double, so we settled on Posada del sol down the road. Its a nice little family run place with private rooms for 250L each. We walked down to the beach and had an early dinner in a nice pizza place right on the beach. delicious! then wandered around town looking for icecream, we found a Sarita shop and got some really good icecream for about 28L each for 2 huge scoops in a fresh waffle cone... approximately thats like $1.50.
Next morning we had brekky at a little restaurant, Dario had arroz con leche and was very full at the end! we wanted to do a tour of the local nature reserve but we´d missed all the leaving times, they all leaveat 8.30am! so we had a very lazy day allll day, we´d organised with some guys who needed extra numbers to do a tour the next day that we would join if they needed us but eventually it was all way to complicated and the tour place was shut anyway when we went so they´re going with another company and we dont have to bother. For dinner we wanted a cheapy and ate locally, frijoles, tortillas, huevos con chorrizo, pork, avocado and cheese, a typical dinner here, cost us 110L for 2 full dinners and drinks, so about $6... then we had more Sarita icecream 😊
Next morning after brekky and a walk on the beach (sadly theres a lot of rubbish) we headed for the buses to La Ceiba and off we went. 2 hours later and after one crazy preacher riding the bus while quoting the bible loudly at everyone else we arrived. La Ceiba is the 3rd largest city in Honduras and said to be the partying city and there are a lot of adventure sport opportunities nearby in the jungle. We had heard from some guys we met in Tela that a hostel called the Banana Republic is a great place so we taxi´d it there. Nice place,we got a room for cheaper than 2 bunks and it has a kitchen and wifi! we´ve been yearning for wifi for a few days, its crazy how you like your creature comforts even when travelling like this. We decided to go and check out a butterfly museum and the supermarket so we could cook dinner. It took us over half an hour to get to the museum and got there just as the owner returned. Basically it is a huge shed done up like a museum behind this expat american´s house... in saying that... it was awesome! we met some giant hercules beetles and a coule of tarantulas and a scorpian... then we saw all his collection, covering every wall and there are stands in between are thousands upon thousands of butterflies, moths, bugs and beetles perfectly reserved and inned to boards. what started as a hobby in the 70´s became his life. he was very enthusiastic showing us all kind of cool stuff and pointing out things we may have missed, explaining the processes etc.
After a while in the museum we headed straight to the giant supermarket that was on the walk home. We were pretty hungry, we´d eaten cornflakes for b´fast at around 8am and hadnt eaten since, it was now 5pm. We went a bit nuts, bought salami, cheese, loads of vegies coz we´ve been craving them which is a bad sign we´re malnourished lol and fruit and juice and milk etc. We cooked up a stirfry in a giant pot as its the only thing to cook on the tiny gas stove at the hostel with. The guys working in the hostel gave us some Ron (rum) which was potent!

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Photos

Honduran Lempiras
this constitutes approximately $150, at the time $1au is around 20 Lempiras. we carry around $20 a day and it takes up a lot of space!

yay we´re rich!
unfortunately they are lempiras

La ceiba
giant hercules beetle, live! its massive! but so nice! at the butterfly museum

biggest butterfly in the world
it was apparently found down the road from the museum

the alphabet
as seen on different species of butterfly wings!