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Published: October 17th 2005
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Guns. OK, they've been part of everyday life since and including America, but Honduras...they seem to take them a whole lot more seriously here.
We had to change some dollars into lempiras and chose one of the main banks on the central square of Santa Rosa de Copan, our first stop. We enter the bank past four guards, each with a shotgun and handgun - neither was holstered - and join the queue behind what appears to be half of the town's population. As has happened so many times, embarrassingly, we're ushered to the front of the queue and then behind the teller counters to talk to a senior member of staff, then we notice all of the male employees (which appears to number the other half of the town's population) have handguns stuffed into the belt of their trousers. I decided I'd accept whatever rate they chose to give me. On leaving, we're ushered out of a side exit past another six or seven armed guards and wondered if there was a Honduran, somewhere out there, plotting a bank robbery.
The border from El Salvador had no such evidence of heavily armed guards or police. But it was
Copan
Token cowboy shot the most expensive so far, even after we'd identified the scam between the customs officials and the tramitadors (unofficial helpers) and paid the official rates.
We spent a few days in Santa Rosa de Copan, just a regular regional town with not a huge amount to offer the tourist, but the kind of place that we seem to enjoy. After a few failed attempts at an unofficial tour of the local cigar factory we carried on to the Mayan ruins at Copán.
Copan is Honduras' most significant Mayan site, it's on a smaller scale than Tikal or Palenque, but is just as well maintained and has the recently excavated Rosalila and Jaguar tunnels as well as some of the most complex carvings...oh, and heavily armed soldiers. Either we've been spoilt by the majesty of the bigger sites in Guatemala and Mexico, or we're just templed out, but Copan didn't have the same appeal for us.
A restaurant owner we'd met in El Salvador recommended the resort of Omoa on Honduras' North East coast, so we braved the kamikaze bus drivers and the torrential rain, that turns on and off like a tap, and made our way to
the coast. We didn't find what we were after, the beach at Omoa not as clean as we'd been told and the cleaner ones up the coast apparently with restricted private access. So we headed for the Bay Islands, Honduras' biggest tourist draw, sooner than expected.
The ferry to the islands was just for passengers, which meant we'd have to be separated from our four wheeled friend for a few days, so it was with some relief that we found parking facilities, and the obligatory armed guard, at the port close to the town of La Ceiba. The excellent diving is what tempted us, more accurately Rachel, to the Bay Islands, so after docking in Roatan's port of Coxen Hole we shared a cab to the popular dive resort of West End. Not quite as laid back as Belize but getting there, this place is a mix of locals and ex-pats with a good selection of bars, restaurants and dive outfits, it’s the most developed town on the biggest and most developed of the Bay Islands. After a few drinks in a restaurant we got talking to the owner and his friend who expanded on Honduras' notoriety by explaining
that not so long ago it was classed as the second most dangerous place in the world, after Afghanistan and closely followed by Slough.
The next day was spent on the superb West Bay beach, snorkelling out to the pristine reef and getting eaten alive by sandflies - then it was time for Rachel to do a refresher dive, which she enjoyed so much that she followed it up with another reef dive the next day. This was good news because after eight dive free years she still has her confidence and enthusiasm.
Even better news was that, after four days, our car was still where we left it. So, back on the mainland, we pushed on for the capital, the unpronounceable Tegucigalpa. Tegus is another of Central America's infamous capitals, making headlines more for its muggings and shootings than any sights of interest. It's a rambling city as well, not with the straight forward grid system of streets that we've become used to, consequently it took a while to find our chosen hotel so we (I) were in desperate need of a beer. The nearest bar was rough, with a huge hole in the ceiling and a
weird assortment of punters that you don't really want to get caught looking at...but it was raining so it would have to do. We bought one beer, that's all, but were provided with a free lunch, an impromptu mandolin performance by the owner's friend, conversations with everyone in the bar and almost a standing ovation as we left with the whole bar waving us off, shaking our hands and shouting "Welcome to my country!". Friendly, friendly people...and they weren't even drunk.
Tegucigalpa also has a huge, sprawling, filthy market that made for a fascinating visit, and its extreme opposite, an ultra modern shopping complex - just as fascinating for us as we hadn't seen anything like it since California.
Leaving Tegus later than expected and again underestimating the distances and road conditions meant we had to make an overnight stop in a town called El Paraiso - otherwise we ran the risk of having the car impounded overnight while the border was closed. This journey also involved our first encounter with corruption. It was our own fault as we went through the same road-block three times while looking for a cigar factory. The senior policeman stopped us on
our third pass, even though we'd been stopped already by his younger colleague, and began a tobacco spitting rant at us. I guess we were so excited at being on the verge of our very first bribe that he must have taken us to be even dumber than the dumb tourists he first thought. He kept hold of my license and mentioned fines for not stopping but seemed stumped by our inane grins and constant "No entiendo" responses, eventually he gave up, spraying me with tobacco and spit as he handed the license back and told us, in a classic Mexican bandit voice, "You understand naaathing".
So we were then a couple of school kids revelling in the fact that we'd just got away with something or other when we finally found the cigar factory in Danli. We were allowed through the gates and strolled into the office thinking that tours would be a normal thing here, we thought different as we were shown to the MD's office. Oscar, sporting a two inch diameter cigar, was as friendly and obliging as he could have been, I got the impression that tours weren't part of his normal remit but he
West Bay Beach, Roatan
The reef is about twenty metres to the left took us around the whole factory and explained as much as he could, even giving us some free samples of their premium brand.
Then it was an overnight stay in the sleepy El Paraiso before an early morning crossing into Nicaragua a country I've always wanted to travel through but never quite known why...
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