central america - mission complete

Firstly, thanks to everyone who has left kind messages on the blog. We don´t check the actual blog page unless we are making entries so there is a bit of a delay in us getting them but they are all greatly received. We MISS you guys!! *sob*

Anyhow, since our last entry we have been on a bit of a trans central american mission so that we can get to Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia for the last few weeks of our trip. Flights in the americas are ludicrously expensive and besides, flying isn´t nearly as much fun! So the mission started in Honduras nearly a month ago. Since then we have boarded crap bus after crap bus (with a few nice ones in between) and managed to haul our bearded (in my case), sombreroed, sunburned, food poisoned, back aching, travel sick bottoms all the way down to Ecuador, our current location. To stop things getting confusing this entry is about central america only - the Colombia and first few days of Ecuador will follow.

It has been an incredible trip. Watching the landscapes and faces change on the way down has been amazing; from the fiery, volcano strewn landscapes of guatemala through the rolling hills and grotty caribbean beaches of Honduras, into the flat plains and scattered volcanoes and lakes of Nicaragua, and onto the wildlife rich rainforests and incredible beaches of Costa Rica and Panama.

Like I say, the carribbean beaches of northern Honduras were a bit shabby. Maybe we were put off by the cold, wind, rain and pollution but nonetheless, we didn´t spend too much time there. What was interesting was the inbred, small town Garifunas who keep their african blood pure by ´keeping it in the family´. There were an alarming number of midgets considering the population of the towns. Another feature was large heads and unusually small faces. We´re talking less than 50% of the head´s total height. Really rather odd. Unfortunately there were no banjos or front porches in sight.

Onto Nicaragua and a whistlestop tour of the country, Starting in the colonial city of Granada, the highlight being Isla de Ometepe, a volcanic island in the middle of Lake Nicaragua where we saw a long thin snake eat a short fat lizard. A bit like me eating spaghetti but the other way round. The wildlife here was incredible - weird birds, millions of lizards of all shapes and sizes, howler monkeys (noisy buggers) outside our bedroom, snakes everywhere (well, we saw 3), and precious few tourists.

Costa Rica was beautiful, but expensive. There were lots of americans. We chilled out on some fantastic beaches for nearly a week where we relaxed with some surfing and turtle spotting. Well, I say turtle spotting, but devoid of any turtles. We sat there all night and the buggers didn´t turn up.

Panama was a bit of a rush-job as well. We only went to Panama City and the Panama Canal before taking a 1 hour flight to Colombia. We wanted to go to colombia by land but we would have certainly died. Bandits, drug smugglers, left wing guerrillas, snakes, spiders...... you get the idea. We were in Panama for the Carnival - not exactly rio but is was great fun and beer cost 30p a bottle.

---

---