My Travels So Far - Part 2

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Ah, Part 2. And this one is much longer than the first. And a bit dirtier.




Chapter 3 – Meheecccccoo!



So why Mexico? Well, in my gap yar in 2008 my first trip away was to Mexico. I spent two months traversing the country with a guy I used to work with, from Cancun to Mexico City, and I fell in love with it. And I knew I wanted to see the rest of Central and South America, so Mexico was the logical place to start. So at some point in March, Matt and I booked our tickets to Oaxaca City, the capital of Oaxaca state, and spent the next two to three months learning Spanish in preparation. As I mentioned earlier, earning money in Banff was pretty easy so by the time we left we had managed to secure a sizeable chunk (approximately $5000) with which to travel for 6 months. So it passed that we said our goodbyes to the many friends we'd made and our Crack Home and hopped on the Brewster back to Calgary. The flight down was enormously uneventful and we arrived in one piece. There's really only one story I can remember from that first day which I only mention as it is one of the few moments in my life where mortal embarassment and immense pride are rolled into one. Warning: if you are squeamish, or easily disgusted I advise you skip this part. Reader excretion advised. Shit, discretion. Sorry. Discretion.



The plane touched down at about 2pm, and the heat washed over us as we left the plane. A cramped collectivo trip later, where a guy hangs off the side of a minibus and tries to cram as many people as possible inside (and there would be many more of those to come) we arrived at Hostel Luna, a lovely little sanctuary in the middle of the city. But the only thing on my mind wasn't that we were finally here, or how we couldn't wait to get exploring. No, unfortunately the thing that was preying on my mind was that I really, really needed to drop the kids off at the pool. We paid and got shown around, were read the rules and shown our dorm. Then I found the toilet in the corner. To put things into detail, the ceilings of our dorm were probably about fifteen feet high. However, the walls of the toilet cubicle in the corner only stretched to about thirteen feet, meaning there was about a two foot 'ventilation' gap. I think you can see where I'm going with this. Off I go and feel instantly better, absorbed in that feeling you can only describe by having gone through a similar experience (which of course everybody has, don't deny it). Job done (pun intended), I flush, but to my horror it doesn't go down. Not surprisingly, seeing the size of the thing. Another month of incubation and it probably would have had a pulse. I should probably mention at this point that Latin American plumping is terrible. Like, really, really bad, and I was doing no favours with my gift. All that was going through my head was 'shit, but thank God there are no other backpackers to see this'. Wrong. After I decided I needed some professional help in shifting the log down stream, I exited the cubicle, and, to my horror, Matt and a girl backpacker I hadn't even noticed (I later found out she had been asleep - past tense) were both sitting, eyes wide in horror as I edged my way out. The funny thing is, this wasnt even the worst part. My face flushed in shame and expecting to drop dead at any moment, I continued my walk of shame to the front desk where I had to explain 'yo necessesito ayudar con el bano, por favour' to a semi-amused, semi-disgusted owner. So off we go, fully expecting to be charged for the damage, but to my amazement upon seeing my masterpiece, proceeds to ask if he can take a photo (and who could blame him? Randy Marsh would be proud). Ask Matt if you don't believe me. A bucket of water, some air freshener and that almost imperceptible nod of respect between men later, Matt and I went exploring.



The next day we made the long trek into the mountains to see Hierve El Agua, an otherworldly-looking solidified waterfall with exceptional panoramic views over the mountains. Of all the places I saw in my first visit to Mexico, Hierve El Agua stood out the most. Matt seemed to like it, especially chilling out in the cliff-top pools watching golden eagles diving this way and that in the sky, looking for their next meal.



After that, we boarded our first of countless uncomfortable buses down to the Oaxacan coast, namely to another of my favourite spots: Zipolete. We rocked up to the same old hostel 'A Nice Place on the Beach' and, much to my amazement, the same English batender from years bfore, was not only still working there but actually remembered my name! I couldn't believe it! I mean his name and general persona is somewhat infamous in the Mexican backpacker circuit; this is a man who one day decided to change his name from whatever (he never told anybody so I can only imagine it was something dreadful like Gaylord or Clitoris) to Crazy Horse Invincible. At this point, most of you probably think I'm making this up, but I'm not. He actually exists. The most I could get was that he was from a small town near Scunthorpe, and the only reason I remember that is because he had 'cunt' tattooed and his left arm, and he joked about half-arsedly trying to cover it up by writing Scunthorpe across it. But he also said that would probably be worse, so he was left with the worst, permanent mistake of his life that inebriated eighteen-year olds are wont to do. So the next, I dunno, ten days, maybe less, maybe more, it's hard to remember, but for a while our days consisted of eating, drinking, surfing and hammocking.



Zipolete is a nudist beach too, so many hours were spent trying to sift between the horrible naked tprsos of middle-aged men who had let themselves get too aquainted with the siesta-culture, and the odd busty Scandinavian who raises an eyebrow at the concept of 'public decency'. I even went au natural myself, and it was great at first. Then I got hit by a big wave and lost my trunks for a terrifying few moments. Fortunately, fate was on my side and they resurfaced after about 30 seconds, but for those inbetween moments I was picturing myself wearing my shame and nothing else as i waddled back to the hostel. At some point during the mid-morning mojitos and early afternoon cooling off in the ocean (Fun Fact: Zipolete means beach of death in Mayan, and it lived up to its name - without warning, a shin-depth paddle could become a four-foot swell and sweep you out to the neasrest contintent of Australia, some 3500 miles away) we met an Aussie chick called Lisa who also had no problem with going topless, just as we had no problem with her having no problem with her going topless. It was pretty cool, actually - I'm winking at you Lisa, you saucy minx. One story that did crack us up is Lisa recounting her fully nude sunbathing ecperience at the secluded beach to the south, which, as she soon found out, was a gay beach. There she was, minding her own business, and all of a sudden, looking over her shoulder, sees two guys warming up the engines and a third trotting over to join in the fun. Suffice to say she hightailed it out of there to give their daisy chain-making a bit of privacy.



One night at the beach of death I got chatting to a Mexican gal called Frida. I say chatting: it was really more of a mime of various drunken gestures with broken sentences thrown in for good measure. Helen Keller would be shaking he head in dismay (if, of course, she could see...or hear...or speak...). Anyway, one thing led to another and we retire. But, and here's where it gets interesting, unbeknownst to me Frida had in fact been staying with another guy some time before who, so happened, was at the hostel bar. I was somewhat too engrossed in the task at hand to even notice, but fortunately Matt did and proved his worth as an epic friend. Apparently, this guy, upon seeing Frida and myself adjourn, made a move towards my room. Matt, seeing this, replies by getting a chair and moving it in front of my door, like a guard charged with guarding the Crown Jewels (and in a weird way he was). In effect, he told the guy where he could stick it while Stella got her groove back. Thanks mate.



It was also around this time that Banff was experiencing some of the worst weather on record. Flooding had meant that the neighbouring town of Canmore had to be evacuated, while landslides and rockfalls had cut off the Trans-Canda highway. A day or two after the the Frida incident, we were actuyally staying in her family's holiday home in the nearby town Mazunte (more on that in a bit) during the Super-moon, where the moon is at its closest orbital peak to Earth. I was feeling a little bit guilty about posting one of those 'where I am is better than where you are' statuses, and that feeling was made worst when we got news that not only were the Banff supermarkets completely devoid of food, but also the power was cut to the entire town. Now this happened on the Supermoon, and some of the photos that came out of Banff were nothing short of spectacular, but it didnt do anything to allieve my guilt, so a day or two later I posted an apology and hoped they took my words with a grain of salt.



Getting back to the point though, Frida's holoday home was awesome. Hidden in the lush jungle that stretches back from Mazunte beach, it was evident that it hadnt been used in some time. There was no power, little water, the bedrooms had curtains instead of doors (though they faced down the mountain with impeccable views so we'll let that slide) and so many creepy crawlies that Bear Gryll's stomach would be rumbling. In our initial clean-up I removed three hornet's nests, we doused a red ants nest with boiling water and Matt, in an unusual bout of scavenging of previous backpackers' discarded gear, came across a scorpion. But that's not even the worst. One morning at loosely 4am, Frida woke me up screaming 'Arana! Arana!' Now, I know what spider is Spanish and at first I thought she was being melodramatic. She jumped out of the mozzy nets and lit a candle, and as the light gently filled the room I saw a rustle on her side of the bed. Like something out of a horror movie, from the gap between the mattress and the mozzy net on her side of the bed, emerged a tarantula - a TARANTULA! - the size of my hand. And I have big hands. Putting it lightly, I freaked out. I jumped out of bed and immediately tried to find something to trap the little bastard. A cup? Too small. A plastic bag? No fucking way. Then I saw a bowl in the corner, passed it between me and the net, and BAM! Arachno Arresto! I can't remember exactly when Matt and Lisa turned up but I'm pretty confident they didnt see the goods, though I was so pumped up on adrnaline I may be wrong.



Not much really happened after that to be honest. The only thing that really comes to mind was my abysmal attempt at body surfing. You know how the human body is designed to bend forwards, so the yoga-enthusiast can touch their fingers to their toes and so on? WEll, imagine the opposite; feeling slightly over-confident (not unlike Hilly before she broke both her legs) I found myself in the predicament of being caught at the crest of a rather large wave. I skimmed, then toppled, then crunched. While somehow managing to kick myself in the back of the head, I was also dragged forward along the sand on my chest, all whilst underwater. The former stunt left my unable to walk for several days, while the latter left me with a Star Trek shaped scar under my right 'peck' (I jest, more of a flourishing moob) that would leave most Trekkies wondering if I was James T. Kirk reincantum. You have to take the good with the bad.



There is practically nothing to see along the very south-eastern coast of the Mexican Pacific: it's basically one beach about 500 miles long with a few towns dotted along the way for good measure, and locals always ready and willing to rip any traveller who dare travel their way. Out first stop was a shit-hole called Tonala (which we exited pretty fucking early the next day), then onto Puerta Arrista. Now we've all seen those westerns from the 1970s, with the dusty towns and the non-existent population that only come out when there's some kind of a show-down. This was that kind of a town. It was about as much fun as dropping into a convent on a stag night, so I won't waste any more of your time. We were heading to the south western point of Guatemala, so the western hignways were the most logical. Matt was meeting Camille in Cancun in about 3 weeks so that gave us enough time. This is one thing that I particularly miss about the Pacific coast; thunderstorms. You just don't get them like that anywhere else in the world. They come out of nowhere and engulf you like the mouth of hell for half an hour, then pass harmelessly into the distamce. My favourite memory of these phenomenal events was from one namelss town to another. The trip was about 6 hours, and about halfway in along the vast desert plains we saw a cumulo-nimbus of epic proportions swelling in the distance. It was only around 2 in the afternoon, yet the sky on the horizon was as black as ink. We came closer and closer until it surrounded us, and then we were treated to one of the best, natural electromagnetic storms on Planet Earth. Left and right, bolts were going as nucking futs as a kid on Halloween. In that crazy forty-mintue period, I saw lightning that split into thre bolts before hitting the ground, lightning that bounced across the underside of the the clouds like a mirrored Grand National, lightning that seemed to strike ten places at once without eveer touching a thing. It was beyound epic. Like Thor and Zeus were having a child's argument over who could throw the biggest bolts, and Matt and I were slap bang in the middle.



Between the shit coast and Guatemala, there's only really one thing I'd like to say. I believe the town was called Tapachula, some asshole shanty in zero-point society. There was a stall that sold surprisngly good bugers for $1. Other than that, this was the first of the many learning curves that Matt and I would come across, namely, when in a poor town in a poor country, double check the signs on the hotel. After our bus arrived, I volunteered (or maybe I lost and rock, paper, scissors) to scout the town for best value accomodation. I must have visited about five or six before I decided on one in particular. All was well until later in the night when from behind our walls (again, stopping several feet short of the ceiling) came the enamoured grunts of pleasure and squeals of enthusiastic joy that working gals pull off so well (pun definitely intended). At first it was amusing and I wondered if Mexican hookers had an itemised billing list for levels of orgasmic pleasure (400 pesos for heavy breathing, 600 pesos for I'm-getting-close-dont-stop-now, 1000 pesos for "ERES UN DIO!" and so forth). After an hour of it though, Matt and I were thoroughly annoyed. Good for him, being able to fornicate like the Energiser Bunny, but seriously...shut the fuck up. The next day, upon closer inspection, we noticed that the hotel had two rates: one for the night, and one for the hour. That wasn't even the bad thing though. After he finished (possibly the most unpleasant climactic sound I've ever heard) things got noisy. Sighs of (fake) joy turned to screams and sobs of terror and various miscellaneous onbjects were being thrown and smashed. We had no idea what was being said but it obviously wasn't pretty. Puta (bitch) was being said a lot, I know that. Not knowing whether or not to get involved, as the slightest provaction on our part could land us in some trouble with his amigos locales, we tried to wait it out. After another 15 gruelling minutes we decided to say something (not to the violent bastard, of course; to the kid at reception). Matt went down and mentioned to the kid (who has no older than fourteen) about a domestic disturbance. He goes up, says something along the lines of Spanish, and the guy shut up. We never knew if the girl got out but at least we could sleep. Bienvenido (y adios) a Tapachula.



Guatemala



Our first port of call in Guatemala was the lovely big town/little city of Antigua. Photos simply dont do it justice: set in the shadow of Volcan de Agua, which looks exactly like the kinds of volcanoes that children draw in geography classes, Antigua is remarkable flat. An old colonial town that profits well from tourism, Antigua's beauty lies in its faded single-storey terraced houses that line effortlessly along grids of cobbled streets, occasionally connected by giant arches. All of the paint had faded, yet it added to its character instead of taking away from it, and the people were absolutely lovely. We stayed in a nice little hostel which made a welcome change from the night before, which offered excellent rooftop views over the city and mountains. We went out one night to Cafe de Luz, which takes the cake of most unusual bars - the only electricity in the place was for the fridges, for the whole place was lit by candlelight. It was very cool and we had a great time with some other English backpackers (who got exceptionally wasted in true English style). The next day we took a short (but exhausting) hike to La Cruz, a giant white cross that stands atop a smaller mountain overlooking the whole city. I may not be religious but there was definitely something spiritual in that view. Well, until we were told by a local to be careful of the bandits in the wood that often prey on tourists. Other than that, our days had a very melancholy ambience to them. But we did have a schedule (of sorts) and Antigua doesn't have that much to offer to those with tight purse strings. So back on the bus to our next destination - Lake Atitlan.



The journey was horrible. Several buses with several times more people than seats, and the final road down from the mountains to the lake was a little less than the worst kept dirt road on the face of the planet, and it lasted for around forty of the longest minutes of my life. Sitting on a bed of nails would have been preferrable to that. Finally we arrived at Panahachel, the port hub of the lake, and, graciously reaquainted with solid ground, set off to find lodging. I was surprised to see a lot of older gringos in the town, mulling between the local restaurants and artisan shops. It was nice but not the reason we were there. Word of mouth had put us in touch with a small town on the other side of the lake called San Pedro, but the lake ferries had stopped by the time we arrived. We found a lovely hacienda where I almost felt guilty about how much we knocked her price down (almost), got some dinner and went to bed. Early next morning we hopped on the ferry and enjoyed serene views over the lake until getting harassed by local hoteliers at the docks of San Pedro. Mr Mullet's was the name of the hostel recommended to us, and for good reason. Everything about it instilled an instant calm on the weary traveller: hammocks lined the landings outside the cosy dorms, a (surprisingly good) pool table, a cheap bar, kitchen and lawn area to sunbathe. And thus the next two, three, four, ten, eleven etc. days passed with utter peace and tranquility.

In the days we went kayaking, exploring, shopping...thats about it actually. Matt's cousin * and her friend joined us for a few days by way of their own journey north. I should mention here that Matt has an enormous and enormously close family. Many of his stories start with "So me and Johnny, my cousin, and his cousin Joe went drinking one day with my other cousin on my mum's side's sister Lauren where we met Uncle Sam and Mother Russia to discuss great-ucle Charlie's growing obsession with belittling Mary - you remember me telling you about my second cousin Mary yeah (mmhmm)? - well..." and so on and so forth. So it was finally nice to meet an extended member of his family, and Monika and Nuisha were gorgeous and charming and gorgeous to the core. On our kayak trip across the lake to the infamour San Marcos we pulled into a imposing cliff-jumping spot which satisfied our (and by our I mean Matt's) fix of adrenaline, while pointedly ignoring a local kid who was trying to charge us for the priveledge of jumping from an 8m platform. Then we moved on to San Marcos. To put it into some context, San Marcos is to San Pedro what Nimben is to Byron Bay, Amserdam to North Korea, Brighton to Blackpool. It is seriously the ultimate hippy hang out. Unfortunately, during our brief visit the roads had been torn up to relay some sewers or something, so it looked, somewhat ironically, like a war zone. At one point up the street we passed a bunch of cheerful trippy hippies who complimented us on our auras and asked if we;d like to buy some jewellery. We politely declined. At that was basically it. There is absolutely nothing to do in San Marcos except go searching for magic mushrooms and then eat said mushrooms. On the way back the heavens opened, and I'll tell you this: being in the middle of a large lake in a kayak holding a metal pole in a thunderstorm is not my normal idea of fun. Thankfully we made it back to Senor Mullet's in one piece.



I'll pop it in here (you'll get the joke in a sec) that the main drinking sector of San Pedro is down a long, winding, narrow lane locally known as Rape Alley. No joke. And one stroll there after dusk and you can see why. Only about 10%!o(MISSING)f the lane is lit and there are lots of little alleyways and doorways that feed into it. Furthermore, it has little to no drainage (like nearly everywhere in Central and South America) so during the wet season when we were there, when the sotrm clouds gather the whole lane becomes a small but fast flowing stream. You might be asking if it was worth potential unwanted sodomy, muggings, beatings and soakings all for a chit-chat and the local bars, and the answer would be yes. Definitely. I can't remember the names of the bars but one in particular had a fantastic atmosphere. One night I joined in a live jam, sitting behind a drumkit playing funky reggae; another night I brought back a beautiful American chick. The food down there was also very good, serving everything local and everything not.



At a different bar, however, I had a simultaneous stroke of luck and misfortunately. There we were, getting drunk off $1.50 beers when I feel a flutter in my pocket. I reached in to check if my iPod was there and here's the thing: somehow, this kid, casually milling around, had managed to not only take my iPod, but he left the silicon case in my pocket. If I was any more inebriated I probably wouldn't have noticed him making a beeline for the exit but I caught him just in time. After a few words (about 10 minutes of arguing and shouting really) with help from the owner I got it back. Matt wasn't so lucky however; the same kid managed to swipe about $20 from him while he was getting drinks. Needless to say, from that point on we were much more aware of the little bastards. Live and learn.

I could go on and on about San Pedro, but it'll take up too much time so I'll move swiftly forward. Yet another excruciatingly long, hot, complicated bus journey took us to a small town in the Guatemalan highlands called Lanquin. The town itself is unremarkable in every way but one; it's just on the edge of the increasingly famous Semuc Champey National Park. Arriving late we check-in to the vastly over-rated and expensive Zephyr Lodge, which is like an edificial version of a leech, sucking money out of you every chance it gets. But we were only there for one thing, so with the tour booked we set off the next day. Our first stop was the caves. Some of you may have been cave diving before (or 'spelunking' as the cool kids call it) but this was a bit different. First, they neglected to tell us how cold the water was. Second, no aids were given to the weaker swimmers. And thirdly there was no electricity so we were wach given a candle to hold with one hand while pathetically paddling away with the other. Don't get me wrong, all of this definitely added to give it an otherwordly experience (can you imagine if they tried introducing something like that in England?!), but after an hour and a half we were all pretty thrilled to get back to sunshine and solid ground. Before lunch we were given half and hour of so to piss about on the most ridilously oversized river swing I've ever seen, dropping you from a height of about 15ft or so, and then onto the main event.



We've all heard of natural limestone formations; deep gorges with spectacular waterfalls, exapnsive caves with stalagmites and stalactites and everything in between, coastal stacks, stumps and arches. But this was the first time I had ever even heard of a limestone bridge. At some point along its course, the Semuc Champey picks up astonishing power, sweeping around bends and carrying off anything unlucky enough to fall in. Then, quite unexpectedly, it drops down into a black abyss. To stress how dangerous this part of the river is, several divers, most of them professionals and well-equipped, have tried going down this bit. Not one person has survived. Thus begins the bridge. Where the river falls, a limestone platform streches away some 300m, from bank to bank, and is entirely made up of a series of calm, turquoise, gentrly cascading pools where visitors can mull about at their leisure, seen best from an incredible platform at the top of the adjoining hill. There are deep parts where you can jump off trees and shallow parts if testing gravity isn't your idea of fun. You can even go underneath some of the small waterfalls through a series of naturally carved tunnels. It's fun, but seeing as how the space is only just the size of your head I wouldn't recommend it to claustrophobics. Then, as abrubtly as the bridge begins, it ends with an impressive display of waterfalls and the river gets back to its usual aggressive manner.



The next day (or perhaps the day after) Matt, in another example of his get-up-and-go compared to my more 'meh', organised a tubing trip on the local river, but with a few twists. Using his bargaining skills he magaged to improve a "$15 for 30 minutes and 2 beers each" to "$10 for an hour and 4 beers", providing he got together 15 people (which he found no problem). I'll say it is a thoroughly enjoyable way to spend an afternoon, drifting lazily on cobalt waters, sipping beer and occassionally trying to best each other in yet more tree jumping. We had also changed our rooms at the (piece of shit) Zephyr lodge, moving from a cramped, sweaty dorm right next to the bar, to a cheaper cabin at the farthest point. The reason it was cheaper was because it only had two walls, a roof and some beds, but that actually worked out better: less noise, more room to breathe and truly spectacular views over the rolling jungle below. It was here that Matt and I temporarily parted ways: he was heading north to Cancun (which I opted to avoid like the plague having been there before) to meet Camille, while I would continue east and meet them en route.



I'll skim the next chunk, as there really isn't much to report: Rio Dulce - possibly the biggest river I've ever seen, perhaps 2-3 miles in width at its widest; Livingstone - a very odd Creole town on the Caribbean coast, founded by slaves with a certain hallucinagenic vibe; and the worst city ever made, La Ceiba - think of a crackhouse, then imagine an entire metropolis made from these crackhouses, and you have La Ceiba. I arrived there at 5.15pm (despite setting off from Livingstone at 6.30am) and missed the last ferry to the island of Utila, so I had to make do with a hostel. Never in my life have I been bitten by bed bugs so badly - from my ears to my elbows, the bites gave the appearance of uncooked chicken skin, and took three days to completely clear up. Upon seeing my leprochotic state, the hostel manager merely shrugged and went back to, what I'm assuming, his Saturday morning cartoons and making sure he had everything he needed to continue being the world's biggest cunt.



Bright and early the next day I boarded the ferry and got chatting to an Israeli backpacker named Cal. We got on famously, so when the ferry docked we decided to stick together and, by way of numerous good reviews and recommendations, went to the (in)famous Utila Dive Centre. As a perk of diving with them you also got put up in a hotel (note - NOT a hostel: shared dorms, yes, but with hot water, air conditioning, hammocks, and a swimming pool), which was a big incentive.



Utila, in short, is pretty much the only interesting thing to do in Honduras, unless of course you're into running drugs on an international scale in which case it's a dream. The two main languages are English (half with a Louisiana accent, half without) and Creole. Spanish is there, but more like the Special Cousin that everybody makes allowances for but in the end treats as if they aren't there. It's pretty weird. There aren't many proper roads so the main transport types are scooters (minimum 5 people) or golf carts. Everything - food, water, power and everything in between - is imported AKA over-priced. There's a retardedly big drinking culture where happy-go-lucky punters can win T-shirts for doing particularly nasty challenges. For the most part it's unbearably hot and humid, and iguanas, should you decide to jokingly chase them, sprint on the hind legs while waving their front legs in a fashion reminiscient of the terrorist chase in Team America (seriously, it's possibly one of the funniest things I have ever seen!).



So we start the diving course with a couple of other English guys. The first day is boring, reading books and memerising tables and so on. Then we go for the first dive: even though we were just in the shallow bit by the dock I could already tell I loved it. To those who have dived before, read on. To those who haven't, imagine being dunked in another world, devoid of sound, darker, and everything in slow-motion. Throw in a couple of fish and boom, you're not even close. It's awesome. So when we finally went out to the reef I was like a little kid at Christmas, yet more like oneof those kids who thinks Santa might eat me if I hadnt been good (that reference is from a fucked up Finnish christmas film called Rare Exports. Just saying). We hit the reef, do our safety stuff and drift silently into the world of Finding Nemo.



Now that I was here, I figured I might stay put until Matt and Camille wound their way down Belize. It was about 3-4 more weeks, and I wasn't doing any more diving (with hindsight a big no-no 'cause that instantly put me out of the game, but we'll get to that later). So, first thing first, I needed a cheap place to live. A few trial and errors and I land an apartment with an English chick called Faye. She was a cunt, and I hope she burns in Hell. Rude, hard, spoilt, and slutty (ok, the last one isnt so bad - our first day, she fell asleep naked on her bed with the door wide open. I walk in the front door, put down by bags, go to get some wwwhhhaaaaattttttt????? My brain kicked in after a moment and I retreated, and a few moments later her door shuts. We never spoke of it, but we both knew what just happened. Moving on.



There were several awesome things about the apartment: first, it was really, really nice. On stilts (common in utila), it had both front and back balconies. The rooms were spacious with built in wardrobes and ceiling fans, and it was surrounded by mango trees (mango sorbet, mango salad, fried mango, baked mango, sun-dried mango...basically imagine Bubba said mango instead of shrimp and you get the idea). Second, the Louisiana owners had a puppy named Skittles. He was without a doubt the coolest puppy ever to be born.



The next big thing was a job. Faye had a job in a bar where she got to wear the sluttiest clothes and get paid a lot, so like most female bartending jobs, really. Unfortunately, nobody offered to pay me as well if I did that so I had to find an alternative and in the end I found a job in a place called Babalu which I think is every bartender's wet dream. I started at 5pm, would count the money, set the candles, put on (my) music and drink. The bar itself occupied a jetty into the crystal clear and perfectly calm waters, but with a twist: a giant square in the middle of the jetty had been cut out, and a few unobtrusive rock features (and a moored toy boat) placed inside. Customers could come, have food and drink, and sit with their feet dangling over the edge of the natural aquarium. In my time there multitudes of aquatic creatures came and went: a juvenile leatherback turtle, a stringray, a spotted eagle ray, lobsters and mooray eels, their partners-in-crime, crabs, angelfish, clownfish, blowfish, pufferfish, etc. It was the main attraction, and it was awesome. I worked from 5-10pm, could drink as much alcohol as I liked (providing I didnt get drunk, which as you can probably imagine was pretty hard), got a free meal from the cocain-dealing kitchen, and my boss was an 85 year old Italian stoner called Papa Babalu. My wage was only $1ph but I didnt care because the customers were awesome and usually tipped me a lot.



On one fun dive I did, we were extraordinarily lucky: on the way to the first dive site we got to swim with dolphins and pilot whales, then whale sharks on the way to the second, which had apperently never happened before. And this is excluding all the crazy critters that luck amongst the coral and sponges.



In time, Matt and Camille made it down too. They arrived shortly after I started my shift and we all got pretty drunk (Papa Babalu wasn't too happy but I was the only bartender so there wasn't much he could do). I took them to a couple of bars afterwards, including one particular favourite: Treetanic. Voted in the top 10 of Lonely Planet's best bars in the world, Treetanic is unusual at its best. The main bar is a treehouse with walkways that stretch back through it's 30-40m long garden, and the ENTIRE garden is done up in intricate mosaics. There are unusual seats and swings dotted about (unfortunately I dislodged a scorpion when I sat on the swing-seat which decided to sting me in the webbing on my right hand during its freefall) and cool lighting everywhere. And, of course, cheap drinks. After that we went to the 'night club' which was on another jetty further down from Babalu, and spent most of the time jumping from the tower at the end into the water. The rest of the night is a mystery. We woke up in my room at about 4 in sweltering heat. The power had gone out over the entire island, leaving the room to become a very large oven in the absence of air-conditioning or a ceiling fan. We later learned that Honduras, since the USA's crackdown on Colombian cocaine, had became the main route for drug trafficking and Utila, with its isolation and minimal policing, was key for cartel planes and boats. So when the island's electricity is shut off it means that somewhere on the island a plane is passing through to pick up copious amounts of party powder. Hungover, cooking in our own skins and with only warm water to cool us down, the next day I showed them round. It didn't take long - there isn't much to do. Eventually we organised a diving trip which went very well - Matt got a little too close to a reef shark and almost had his finger bitten off.



After a week we were ready to move on (me especially) and because my landlady was trying to charge Mamille (as I came to think of them) $50 each for the time spent in the room I had already paid for, we ended up sneaking away at 4 in the morning. Not our finest hour, skulking away like thieves in the dark, but better than paying an extra $100 for ten days. So we boarded the ferry and gave Utila the finger. It was fun for the first week, but unless you're continuosly diving and powdering your nose, there really isn't much there.



Like I said before, Honduras isn't particularly interesting. Even Lonely Planet admits it, though it half-heartedly tries to be diplomatic, meaning that we bee-lined it straight for the Honduran-Nicaraguan border. I seem to remember coming to rest at a hotel in a small town just south of the border, where, to our surprise, there was a festival. Latinos find cause to celebrate almost anything, and though we had no idea why this night was such a big deal it didn't stop us from enjoying it. Drum-lines by school kids, carny stalls and more food than Texas (with the exception of being occassionally harassed by a drug-addict) made for a lovely welcoming to Nicaragua.



Destinacion numero uno was the mountain town of Esteli, a quietly busy colonian settlement in the mountains famous for cowboys and coffee, amongst many other things. So we checked in to our hostel and went exploring. A day or two later, we took a trip into the outlying rainforests to see Cerro Tisey and the mirador (lookout point), staying in an over-priced (surprise, surprise) eco-lodge half an hour away. The view was spectacular: to the north you could see the brief outline of southern Honduras' highlands, and to the north-west was El Salvador. We plodded around, soaking up the view and rising moisture, lit up the cigar I bought earlier (one of the 'many things' I mentioned earlier) and were treated to a rare show of pileuiridescent clouds - Rainbow Clouds. You know that scene in Independence day when the UFOs burst from their clouds? Well imagine the UFO is actually a rainbow, and dial it back a few notches, and you have what we saw.



Another of the things we had been told about by Nick in San Pedro was of a man - a hermit, really - who had spent the last few decades devoting his life to something that only he could truly understand. It was a while up the road from the eco-lodge, and just so happened to be near an eco-town, but I'll get to that in a bit. With vague diretions from the staff, we walked and walked and walked until we found the farm. We cut through, found the 'path' (a dried river bed) and walked some more. At last we came to what can only really be described as an organised garden covered in chaos. Clusters of palms and banana trees with odd wood and rock carvings littered throughout told us we were in the right place. A moment later the hermit, a strange man by the name of Estoban* appeared from a hut and introduced himself and the place in a way that told us he'd done it a thousand times before. Obviously he was better known than expected, but that didn't detract from the experience. At once we set off (Camille translating what she could) and he took us through his garden, pointing out the orchids and rhodedendrons, pineapples and oranges, bananas and cherries and so on. Then it really started to get interesting: out of nowhere the first carvings appeared on the cliff, ranging from a few inches to possibly six feet. The majority were animals and religious figures (including an impressive nativity scene set into a natural cove), but there were writings (biblical passages I assumed) and Mayan-influenced drawings too. All of them were carved using a chisel and a harmer and nothing else. He actually reminded me of an elderly Andy Dufrane, relentlessly picking away at solid rock, though for a much less rewarding reason than freedom. He told us he has been up there for 40 years, and that he started carving about 35 years ago. He was up there during the Nicaaguan civil war and all the poiltical turmoil since, but that it never really affected him. All in all he seemed perfectly content, if not a bit loony, to be away from it all, and who could blame him. Filled up on fruity goodness and the life experiences of a very unusual man, he left a small donation (about $2) and made the steep climb back to the road.



More walking and a failed hitch-hike later we came into the "eco-town" which I forget the name of. Disappointing to say the least. Every part of it seemed like it had gotten ready for some huge influx of visiotrs, with organic restaurants, locally made artisan shops and small farms along the main road, but the visitors never came. It was kinda sad actually. We had lunch, took a look around then left. As we were waiting for the bus back to the city and interesting thing happened. There we were, bottom of the lane on a steep hillside and surrounded by tall fucking trees, Matt and I enjoying a game of chess, Camille reading Game of Thrones, when Matt points out a distant sound, like a faint white noise, coming from down the hill. It got louder and louder, and in the distant trees we could make out rain. Then, like a sheet being slowly pulled across the forest, the rain reached us and in a heartbeat rain was pouring on all sides of the shelter. Strange as it is to say, this is actually one of my most memroable moments in Latin America.



And then onto Leon, El Capital, and what a great city! It's one of the prettiest colonial cities in Central America, and has heaps of culture to boot, which I would talk about but you could just as easily find it in a guide book. This is my story. We stayed at a great little place called La Tortuga (The Turtle) and it was from there we set about exploring. In the first few days we did the usual cultural things, like galleries and museums (it was in one of these that Camille and I first realised that Matt wasn't in his, ahem, 'natural habitat' so to speak).



A day or two later we hopped on the bus to go volcano boarding. Yep. Cerro Negro has been attracting visitors for some years now, a textbook conical volcano made of black sand and ash. We were given Slipknot-esque jumpsuits and wooden sleds stuck to a sheet of aluminium, and started the climb. At the top we were rewarded with exceptional panoramic views of the surrounding countryside and treated to a brief history of the volcano and the unusual obsession with throwing yourself down a rocky escarpment at high speeds. As it goes, the guy he first threw himself down did it on a refridgerator door, and it just went from strength to strength. One by one we went down, which took a while as there were about 50 of us. Matt went second or third, and I was a couple behind him. The person with the fastest speed got 3 days free accomodation in the hostel's sister hostel on the coast.



I shifted my shitty looking sled to the edge and suddenly had to desire to move. It was a long, long way down, and looked a lot more fun in photos than in reality. But I manned the fuck up and was even given an unwanted push. Within seconds, dust and sand and gravel were flying everywhere, and my sled felt like it would abandon me to a faceful of rock any second, but somehow I held on (many others were'nt so lucky). I slumped to a stop, wind-beaten and heart racing, was told my speed (47kmh - not bad, I thought, but it felt a lot faster) and dragged my sorry ass to the truck. Matt was waiting with one of those smug looks on his face, just waiting for me to ask him his speed. I asked: 73 kmh. Bastard. Smug, heavy bastard. But with hindsight it worked out well. Camille unfortunately did fall over. From the bottom it looked pretty funny, but it was worse for her. Tumbling down a volcano isn't much fun, and she hated it. It turns out getting a faceful of coarse black sand isn't fun. But at the end of the day Matt got the fastest speed, and with a little sweet-talking we managed to organise for the three of us to go to their sister hostel in Las Penitas at a beach some 25 minutes from the city. But first, we had the post-volcano boarding celebrations at The Bigfoot Hostel: it wasn't much of a party, more about a couple of complimentary shots of nasty alcohol that I choose to forget the name of, and chilli-infused tequila that had two people vomiting.



At the beach house, a day or two later, we settled in nicely. The optimal word when describing this place is 'chilled' - there is next to nothing to do apart from chill on the beach, chill by the pool, chill IN the pool, chill in the garden, play pool or watch movies. Oh, and drink. The town is...barely a town. More of a handful of houses and restaurants. But it was in this tranquility that I did my second mural, in keeping with the art style of the other murals around the place. That is to say, funny creatures doing usual fun things at the sea. It was the biggest painting I've ever done and I'm kinda proud of it, and it's always great when you get paid (in free accomodation and beer) to do things you love. It took me about 3-4 days to do and by the end Mamille were going stir-crazy with boredom ("You nearly finished mate?" "How much longer mate?" "Anything I can do to hurry it up mate?"), so when I was finished we took off for the world-famous San Juan Del Sur.



It's hard to put into words what San Juan Del Sur was like. If you love, surfing, partying, surfing, partying, Australian surfers and Australians in general, then it's the place for you. Otherwise, I really wouldnt bother. I think we spent just the one night in the town itself, doing the infamous hostel crawl (a tacky-as-fuck pub crawl across the various participating hostels - you may as well have been in a nightclub in...anywhere). But you got a singlet! Yay. We took a trip to the surf beach Playa Maderas (another annoying thing - for a town so famous for surfing, there is actually no surfing in the town itself. You have to get local buses, each about helf an hour away). On the one hand, Maderas was quiet, isolated, lazy and we had a room to ourselves. On the other, it was pretty expensive, isolated (again) and we walked to the other end of the fucking beach and back again to decide we'd stay in the first 'hostel'. I wont go into too much detail, except the kitchen was a nightmare that we were only allowed to use after 5 and the staff were wankers, but there was fun had. And a LOT of chess. Still, it was a fucksight better than San Juan.



Isla de Ometepe was our next destination, and an impressive one at that. The name Ometepe coms from Mayan, meaning two (Ome-) mountains (-tepe), and is situated in the south of Lake Nicaragua, the largest lake in Central America. Coming by bus, when you first see Isla de Ometepe I imagine the first thoughts on everybody's mind is 'Fuck, that is one cool-looking island!' as it was certainly mine. Recently it has become a favourite for backpackers, which unforunately means it's being rapidly developed in places. It's National Park status isn't doing much in the way of protecting nature against encroaching urbanisation, but for the time being it's sheer size and steep slopes still allow for many hidden retreats, such as *hostel* on the east side of the southern island. Our first night there we had a few beers with some hostel-goers, watched back-to-back Black Books and The Mighty Boosh, of which the only people laughing were myself and the only other English guy, watched the sunset from the coolest treehouse ever made and had lovely local steaks at a restaurant down the road. The place also had a surprising number of pets, including a dog, two cats, a macaw and - of all things - a pig. I can't remember the pigs name, but I called it bacon and it seemed to like that well enough.



There's practically nothing to do on Ometepe except setting every muscle on fire if climbing dormant volcanoes is your thing. It's definately not mine. Though I do remember Matt saying I was gross for taking a shower after dropping the kids off in the pool as there was no toilet paper, when, ironically, it was Matt a few weeks later who thought it was completely normal to drop his shorts while body-boarding and fertilise the reefs Kevin and Perry-style. We left after a few days, moving for one night to a hostel closer to the docks on the other side of the island. By this point we had been spending a lot of time with Mikey (the English guy from before) and his girlfriend Phoebe, an eceptionally smoking-hot Australian bar manager, and I was decidingly feeling very third-wheelish (and when that happened my thoughts often drifted back to Monika which made me feel even worse) so I decided I needed a few days to do my own thing. Mamille left with Mike and Phoebe to Costa Rica and I decide to stay another couple of days and then hitch-hike down to Monte Verde. Bad move.



By the time I made it back to the mainland I was aready feeling better and in good spirits. I had spent a month hitch-hiking around Eastern Europe and had no troubles at all, with the exceptions of some creepy advantageous businessmen who I tolf to fuck off. And the first sign was very good indeed: you may choose not to believe this (I couldnt believe it myself when it happened) but my first ride, about 10 minutes after leaving the dock, was in the back of a pick-up with six nuns, in full gear and everything. I had never met a nun before, and always regarded them as a bit...excessive, in giving their lives to the cloth, but these ladies surprised me. Though my Spanish was bad and broken next to theirs, they were still very inquisitive and all rpound lovely ladies. They took me farther than they needed to, and I was waiting about 20 minutes before my next ride, a wealthy Nicaraguan plantation owner and his stunner of a wife, who gave me a run down of their loves, their business, the local politics, asked about me and couldnt believe I was hitch-hiking when the buses were so cheap. They were on their way to a wedding, but still took the time to drop me off at the border, which was another 20 minutes out of their way. I thought, 'Wow, this is easy. Way easier than Eastern Europe, where the longest I had to wait was 10 hours at a gas station. This is gonna be easy!' Then BAM! Costa Rica.



Post-border, in short, I walked for 4 hours along the "highway" (a dirt track) in which time I was nearly attacked by a stray dog, splashed by a lorry, stared down by some local youths, bitten relentlessy by mosquitoes and then it started raining. A lot. Finally, I managed to get a loft of a guy who drove me forty minutes to the nearest town (he spent the whole time talking on the phone, and the less rational part of my mind believed I had stepped into a Costa Rican Wolf Creek). Now dark with torrential rainfall ( a storm that I was told would last for about 3 days or something absurd) I temporarily abandoned my hitch-hiking experience and paid the extortionate $2 bus ticket to the nearest city, about 3 hours away where I hastily found a cheap hotel (not Mexican-hooker-hotel cheap, but not far off) and dried off.



Bedded and rested, I set off early the next day, keen and confident that today would be better. Six hours on the side of a highway without so much as a creepy "I can take you anywhere you want to go" pissed me off, so again I buckled and got the bus to a smaller town a couple of hours away, hoping that if someone saw a lonely packpacker miles from anywhere they might take pity (or try and take advantage, which is why Gladys, my recently obtained mini machete, was always close at hand). Unfortunately, noone did, and if they did it was in the form of a middle finger. Slowly, I realised that Costa Ricans really don't like hitch-hikers.



I had arranged to meet Matt and Camille in Monte Verde, a backpacker resort town high in the rainforest famous for over-priced adventure sports. I mean, who would pay $20 to walk along a suspended bridge? It seemed a little arbitrary to me, but enough people do it so maybe I'm just a cheap boring bastard.Getting there was no picnic either: after the fiasco with hitching I resigned myself to buses. A gruelling 6 hour ride up and over steep twisting roads sharing a seat with an old lady who I had just seen shoving a net bag filled with live chickens into the cargo hold on the roof. That kinda shit is everywhere in Latin America, but seeing it over and over doesn't mean you get used to hit. It almost makes caged hens look as if they live in palaces. Poor, delicious bastards.



I arrived into the town with the information that Matt and Camille where at *name* hostel, which was a bit out of town, so i trudged uphill in the pouring rain for about 10 minutes only to discover they weren't there. Furthermore, the hostel's power kept flicking on and off meaning that their 'free wifi' - also being used by about a gazillion other people ran at a trickle. It took an hour to send one message and get a reply with where they actually were (in their defense the hostels' names were very similar), which was actually right nect to the bus stop. Needless to say I was a bit pissed, but the first properly hot shower since Canada soon washed away the anger.



Now, I've heard lots of people say that Costa Rica is in fact a really lovely place with lovely people, and it is, and around the town were dozens of fun things to do, like the suspended rainforest bridge, ziplining, jungle tours, holding sloths and so on. Unfortunately we couldn't do anything because everything there was outrageously expensive. Unlike most Latin American countries, Costa Rica, because it is a favourite holidaying destination for Americans and has seldom been involved in coup-etats and harbouring drug barons. So used I was to paying $4 per night that when I learned the cheapest bed in the biggest dorm was $12 I had a mini heart attack and quickly resolved to get out of there as soon as possible. Maybe I'll go there again when I'm a millionaire.



I was still wanting to spend a bit more me-time so me and Mamille agreed to meet up in Panama City in a few days time, and I was going to try my hand one last time at hitch-hiking (after I had caught the bus to a more accesible place). I failed. Again. Miserably so, in fact. I effectively waited by the side of the road for a day and half and not one lousy fucktard gave me a ride, so I admitted defeat (again) and hopped on a bus to the border. By the time I got there night was falling fast and I still hadnt gone through Immigration. I couldn't bear the thought of spending another night in over-priced accomodation so I decided to head through. However - and this is the fun part - in the time in took for me to make up my mind two coaches had pulled up and now about 80 tourists (mostly American pensioners sporting cameras and lots of grey hair) stood between me and customs.



An hour later I was through and both pleasantly surprised and equally horrified to find some local carnival happening on the Panamanian side of the town (though this border town was technically one town, it was split down the middle. To this day I don't know how it worked but the locals didn't seem to care) and that all the hotels were full. I was in a bit of a pickle, you might say, and to top it off the Panamanian soldiers were eyeing me suspiciously. After some asking around I learned that there was a hotel about two miles down the highway (and I say highway in the loosest possible sense of the word - more of a glorified dirt track), so off I went. About half an hour later, soaked through with sweat which attracted mositoes in the hundreds and my feet burning, I came to the hotel. It was closed, and by the looks of it had been closed for several years. At that point I wanted to sit by the side of the road, cry and fall asleep, but then I remembered I was in a strange new country, by myself, in the dark. So I had a cigarette, sucked up the pain and exhaustion, and dragged myself back to the border, much to the bemused yet suspicious glances of the soldiers. I decided it would be best to break the ice with them anbd ask for their help, mainly because I had no other option, and to my surprise they were awesome. Upon explaining my predicament, they called me a taxi and learnt of a motel about 5 miles further down than the hotel (they asked me why I didn't stay at the hotel, and when I told them it was closed they didn't believe me at first. It seems the owners of said establishment apparently just packed up and fucked off one day without telling a soul), and they even paid the driver. So off I went for a second time (though much faster and in comfort this time) and within minutes we were at the most disgusting motel I've ever laid my eyes on. Two doors had been broken down and shabbily hung back up, the bed was little more than a piece of styroam on legs, and there seemed to be the daily meeting of cockroaches in the corner, no doubt deciding where the best places to scuttle are (that was also, incidentally, the time I learnt that cockroaches can fly). And the owner, who I can only describe as a Latina Mrs Trunchbull of Matilda fame, was actually trying to charge me $11 for it (NB that might not seem like much by western standards, but it was over double what I was willing to pay)! I just thanked my stars that I asked the cabbie to hang around while I checked it out, and we went back to the border.

This story does go on a bit, so I'll cut it short and just say that I managed to convince the soldiers to let me back into Costa Rica for the night so I could find a motel (which I did; $7 for an ensuite, air conditioned room with a double bed, TV and wifi - Cockroach Trunchbull could suck it!) and get some much needed rest. I saw the sergeant again the next morning and gave him my sincerest thanks, which he happily accepted. They must have thought I was truly the worst packpacker they'd ever seen, but if they thought so they kept it to themselves.



I wasn't really sure what to expect in Panama (a comically stereotypical part of me thought the whole country was one big canal surrounded by people wearing Panama hats and smoking cigars) so I was pleased to discover that, for the most part, it is a very clean, well-organised and friendly place. I stopped in a place called David (odd name for a town), which is lovely. I only saw a bit of it when walking around trying to find a place to stay and again when getting food, but I'd recommend it. Unfortuately there are no funny stories to metion here so I'll move on.



The next day I caught a bus to the famous Panama City. On the way we stopped at a service station where I got chatting to two English girls heading the other way, trying, somewhat hilariously, to hitch-hike. So naturally I told them about my experiences thus far and saw the look of horror mingled with pity in their eyes. They told me that they had been hitch-hiking from Peru and as of yet hadn't encountered any problems, which did not make me feel any better about it. Then again, it would truly be a strange world where two attractive white girls have a harder time getting a lift from strangers than a scruffy looking guy. At least that's what I keep telling myself. Then we exchanged brief goodbyes and good lucks and I hopped back on the bus.



I'll always remember my first sight of Panama City, as the sun set behind the multiple skyscrapers and sprawling metropolis and the lights came on. From a distance the city is more beautiful than London or Melbourne or Sydney, mainly because the business district is built on a long, thin strectch of land like an arrowhead, with the rest shrinking down in and around the various docks. The dusky hue gently gave way to the neon sprawl as I grew closer, and I knew that I would like this city quite a lot.



That said, my first impression of how different prices were hit me hard as the cheapest cabby I could find from El Terminal to El Hostel cost me $15 – basically two-thirds of a daily budget – and the hostel wasn’t much better. (hostel) was THE go-to hostel in Panama City, right on the edge of Old Town without being too far from the city, and it was fun: the rooms were (relatively) comfortable, the kitchen was good and offered a free all-you-can-eat pancake breakfast complete with fruit; there was a nice social area with communal guitars, free wifi and table tennis, a downstairs bar where beers cost $2 in happy hour, and (by far best of all) a cinema room. Now, if you’ve ever stayed at (hostel) then you don’t need me to tell you how awesome their cinema is, but for those of you in the dark, let me paint a picture. Imagine you’re bored, hungover, tired or still drunk/stoned, but there are too many people everywhere you go. You’ve seen the sights but your boat trip/flight isn’t for another few days. All you want is somewhere dark, comfortable and entertaining (and liberal, of course). Enter the cinema room. At first sight it looks like a shabby classroom which teachers use to entertain kids when they cant be fucked to do any work (which is essentially which it is). Then you take a look around, and (this is all in a hostel, bear in mind) you see a three-tier leather-benched setup complete with cushions, blankets and pouffs, upon which one could recline and laze a easily as Dionysus during (?). A film has been requested and reception send their orders through the wonders that is fibre optics, and with the lights out, snacks at the ready and your body ready to not move for the next two hours, the film shines out onto a twelve foot screen.



At this point, some might say ‘Well, Jack, that does sound super awesome, but it’s not the real thing,’ and I would say ‘Fuck you, you’ve obviously never been backpacking!’ For the lonely traveller, the cinema is a distant memory; no backpacker in their right mind would blow a days budget ($20, give or take) to go and see a Hollywood Blockbuster, so having the experience of a free, in-house cinema was nothing short of epic. In ten days I watched a depressingly high number of movies (300, Forest Gump, Mad Max, Avatar, Star Wars and The Motorcycle Diaries, to name but a few), and I was happy. But as awesome as the cinema was, there are a few other better stories kicking around in the cobwebs of my memory.



One of the milder ones explains why we can no longer take Matt out to centres of historical interest. Camille and myself, being the two more cultured ones of the group, wanted one day to go to the (museum title – something about a Canal) to get a bit more informed before we visited the world-famous canal. It was within walking distance in the Historical town (which was blown to kingdom come in the Panamanian War of Independence), and feels a lot like walking around Roman ruins, but with a bit more life. In amongst the derelict buildings and scarred paint and metalwork you see stalls of every kind, casually thrown up against the crumbling bricks and mortar. It has a certain rustic charm to it, not exactly aided by the throngs of cars bouncing menacingly along its cobbled streets guided by bored-looking traffic police who look like they’d rather be anywhere but there.



But on we marched, having given up on the Lying Planet’s map of the area and instead resorting to directions from locals, which didn’t go as well as planned. One girl in a café told us to go one way, while (after heading that way and finding nothing) another man gave us directions to somewhere else entirely. So it went for the best part of an hour, criss-crossing, retracing and swearing, until finally we arrived at the museum, a surprisingly beautiful (and in one piece) building with a towering front. It was very well-done inside – with the marvel that is air-conditioning – and we soon found ourselves walking room to room casually studying the various historical maps and artefacts (annoyingly, but not surprisingly, the whole thing was in Spanish which meant that two-thirds of the information was lost on me). For those of you out there who have never heard of the Panama Canal, let me tell you now that it is by far one of the most abitious and monumental engineering projects ever undertaken by humanity. Before I saw all the work and planning that went into such a design, the ignorant side of me had kind of assumer that they just blasted a long trench from the Atlantic to the Pacific in a straight line through the country, which could not be farther from the truth. In reality, the channels they blasted went from lake to lake in an almost zig-zag fashion, supported by megaliths of steel reinforcements on either side. In the space of x years, x men carved out x kilometers of tunnels and trenches connecting x lakes and resevoirs from coast to coast. X people died, mainly from malaria, poor sanitation, and as results of insufficient health and safety (drownings when pumps broke, cave collapses, falling from steel girders etc), but they fought on and in x, as the spillways were lowered and the canal filled up, Atlantic and Pacific waters met for the first time in history, and trade routes were cut drastically. Now, a boat travelling from Europe to, say, Singapore, a distance that would normall have taken months, now took weeks. It was a major milestone in marine trade, one that provided an invaluable trade link between east and west, and it was all on display for keen minds to learn about.



And what was Matt doing at this point, you ask? Touching the exhibitis, pissing off security, and being a general nuisance. It was like someone taking their kid to an R-rated movie. And what’s worse is that security started following myself and Camille around, thinking that we might at any moment pick up a century old shovel and start whisting Hi-Ho, Hi-Ho, It’s Off to Work We Go. We tried and failed to get him to calm down and behave but he was bored, and when Matt gets bored he’s liable to do anything. Soon enough, he was playing David Guetta on his iPhone and putting the speaker end into a hundred year old grammaphone – a GRAMMAPHONE! – with the increasingly irate security chums looking like unimpressed and overdressed punters at a rave. A final selfie with an antique camera and we were out of there. The funny thing is, if you pulled that kind of stunt in England or Australia (not quite Canada, they’re all too polite) than you would most certainly be fined and/or psychologically evaluated, but there they just wanted us to get the fuck out and let them get back to not doing any work.



Another little oddity that Ill mention came in the name of Joe. Joe was a fifty somehing English man a little lost in time and life. He, like everybody, had a story but regardless of whether it was true, false or merely exggerated was still a sad one. Joe was a traveller and had been for many years. He was divorced and unskilled, but at some point in London in the previous few years he had met a Panamanian mother-of-two and fallen in love. They moved to Panama and all was good until he lost his job (I forget what) and his wife ran off with another guy taking all of his money. Desolate and alone, with no money for a return flight, he moved into the favela outside Panama City and found a job in a factory, hoping to save enough for a flight home. Then things took a downward turn, and a new gang took over, forcibly evicting ‘gringoes’ and unsupportive locals with guns (I checked this and there had indeed been a recent hostile takeover in the underworld), forcing Joe to move to a hostel and seek emergency help from the British Embassy. He had no passport (he left it in the ghetto in the confusion), no money and was working for accomodation, waiting to see what – if any – help he would be given. Now, at first I was skeptical, but then who wouldnt be? But not once did he ask for anything. Ever. He sourced his own food and refused my offer to buy him beer; his life may have been in tatters but he still had his dignity and pride and was determoned to get back to England whatever the cost. Some of you may think it slightly odd that I have devoted a rather long paragraph to an old, broke (but not broken) English guy near the end of his rope, but it was his attitude, his ‘who could’ve guessed the view from rock-bottom could be so beautiful’ take on life, that captivated me. I listened and sympathised and counted my eternal blessings, and realised that no matter how bad things can get, if you don’t cultivate the right mental attitude then you’ll be defeated. That is what I took away, and is part of the reason I try my best to hold onto an upbeat view of life. Which brings us neatly to the most…unusual…night we had in Panama City.



One evening, after a day of doing nothing in particular, we happened downstairs at the bar during the happiest of Happy Hours. It started out as your average night, enjoying cheap drinks with fellow travellers in the smoking area (though in Central America a hospital could probably be considered a smoking area) and swapping stories like how’s your father. For a while the best entertainment was a severaly intoxicated English backpacker who refused to take the hint to go piss up a rope, instead coming on to Camille (in front of Matt). The upside of this was that because he was so inebriated he was exceptionally open to suggestion, so when politely (and impolitely telling) him to go away, I suggested that there was a girl inside who had been asking me who my friend (said wino) was and that he should go find her (5’6”, blonde hair, blue eyes, massive breasts, you know the kind) and like that he was gone. So the conversation idled on until the bar closed and I was thinking about bed, until Matt pulled me to one side and said that one of the guys we’d been talkiong to and his friend wanted to go out, but not to worry as the guy, an American by the name of x, had been living in the area for two years and knew everybody. So we trotted off down the road to a bar, and thi is where things started picking up; the ‘bar’ around the corner was in fact a strip club, which, and I would be lying if I said otherwise, perked my interest. ‘Why not?’ I thought. The last time I had been in a strip club was in Mexico five years prior with Rich and our Mexican friend when we went to visit him in his hometown, and had ended up staying there till six in the morning, positively well-oiled as we strolled out into the morning sun. Unfortunately there must have been something, well, illegal, about this place we were being taken to because as our merry bunch were strutting up there was an armada of cop cars stationed outside with some unlucky patrons being carried away. Thus ended our hopes of naked women.



Our ‘guide’ though was nowhere near ready for the night to end. Despite it being the past midnight, he led us to the front doors of a rather swanky looking jazz-bar-style place where the bar staff were just finishing the cleaning. They opened for him and let us in, and our man did all the talking. Almost straight away the bartender disappeared out the back and returned a few moment later with a crate of beers, which were duly paid for and we left. At this time I was thinking ‘Great, we have the beers but nowhere to drink them’ which is when our man was most impressive. It turns out that our man was the heir of a very big, very powerful company in the USA, and was possibly richer than God. Remember me saying about a bunch of the buildings in the Historic Centre being blown to smithereens? Well, this guy had recently purchased one of these edifices – three-stories tall with an area the size of a football pitch, but with no floors whatsoever, as if somebody had built the walls and windows and simply forgotten about the floors. On top of that, he had turned it into a nightclub that opened once a week (I had actually been there several nights beforehand) with plans to renovated the entire place. Wealthy, ambitious and addicted to cocaine. He really liked his cocaine, so much so that he casually bought about 10 grams and passed them out like candy to the eight of us (aside from me, Matt, Camille, our host and his friend I can’t honestly remember who else was there, only that there were definitely eight of us). So the hours passed by and we enjoyed ourselves, again swapping stories but this time with slightly different connotations. At some point, announced by an immense bolt of lightening and a deafening crack of thunder right above our heads, the heavens opened and we were driven out of the roofless monstrocity, where we were cordially invited to carry on at our host’s apartment around the corner, a place that would not look out of place in uptown New York. An hour there, with the effects of gratuitous cocaine and booze wearing off, we said our thanks and carried ourselves off to bed. We crawled into our beds exhausted in at seven in the morning, all very contented by what a fun and random night we’d all just had.





Fun fact: despite being a country famous for building a canal that connected two oceans, there is no road access at all into Colombia, the gateway country to South America. This strikes me as very strange, as they seemed to welcome lateral trade routes yet turn their noses up at their neighbours to the south, meaning that there are only two ways to get to South America: by air, which is of course ludicrously expensive, and by boat. Like you would expect, there was fierce competition between tour operators offering various packages, and after sifting through the dozens of leaflets, websites and reviews we agreed on (name here), and that was largely due to the price. The more lavish boats avoided the infamous San Blas Islands that dotted the coastline and instead went farther out for longer before docking in Cartegena, a busy port city in Colombia’s north-east popular with backpackers. Unfortunately our budget didn’t accommodate that far, so we went with the speed-boat option, a four day and three night trip with food and accomodation included. All we needed to bring was water, snacks and booze. Lots and lots of booze, which the local supermarket provided for perfectly; never before and never since have a put away two bottles of $2 dark rum, $3 bottles of wine and a six-pack of beer in four days.



The company picked us up in two cars from the hostel dark and early at about 4.30am, to drive us the two hours to the ‘docks’ (more of a severely dilapidated jetty) where we would board the boat and meet our tour guide/drivers. There were fourteen of us in total, from all corners of the world, but trying to socialise with people you would be spending the next few days with on a hangover at 7a.m. isn’t exactly easy. Fortunately there were three guys on the trip from the US, Ken, Tyler and Jordan (which are possible the most American names out there), who had been out the night before and keen to get the party started (or at least keep in going). Almost straight off the bat, they started passing around bottles of rum, whiskey and wine to whomever was feeling adventurous, and when they met a wall of shocked, queasy static from the rest of us they tried (and succeeded) to break the ice by way of vastly inappropriate jokes, the kind I will refrain from repeating here.



That first morning, as we sped our way south and entered the San Blas Islands with increasing intoxication, the beauty of this somewhat secluded part of the world was spread out before us: the sky was crystal clear, the ocean so flat it became a flawless mirror, so much so that at times it became difficult to tell where the sky ended and the sea began, and here and there in an assortment of shapes and sizes were the islands themselves. Most of them were little more that spits of sand barely above sea level with a tree or three jutting out, but every now and then were larger ones with white sand beaches with bending palms, stretching back into dense jungle that rose up around a hill. I will say this now: these are the kinds of islands that appear on postcards in airports with the word ‘Paradise’ written underneath in a fancy font. They are that beautiful and that surreal.



The boat journey, however, was not. Fourteen tourists crammed onto four wooden benches for between three and six hours, depending on the distance between the islands. By the time we rocked up on the shore of our first stop (and where we would be spending the first night) I felt like my ass had ran a marathon while the rest of my body stood idly by, occasionally voicing support for said buttocks but not meaning it at all. And I was not alone: one by one we clumsily shifted our asses over the side and waddled up the shore (though I admit at this point we had already been drinking for four hours and it wasn’t even lunch). This was the first inhabited island we had come across, and it came with a warning: you see, the San Blas Islands are inhabited by an indigenous people known as the Kuna, who, among being excellent fisherman and the world’s shortest people (the Dutch are the tallest, in case you were wondering), seem to be pretty shit at town planning and all round diplomacy. Case in point, in our first port of call we were strictly warned not to touch any coconuts. Okay, sure, it’s their land. I’m not gonna argue. Then we noticed the giant wire fence that ran from shore to shore down the middle of the (may I say again; tropical) island.

“There’s an ongoing dispute between the two tribal chiefs on the island over the ownership of the coconuts,” said our guide* when we brought up the elephant on the island. Uh-huh. We had been on the island no more than a minute and there were so many things wrong with this sentence:




•
This island was perhaps, at best, three hundred meters in circumference. One could walk around it in about a minute. One could, if one wished the ‘full force of the law’ borne down upon them, lob a coconut from one shore to the other (it’s funny because they’re so small and the idea of a Kuna police force is hilarious: “Drop the coconut and put your hands on your head! You’re under arrest for attempted racketeering of Kuna resources ” and so on).

•
Aside from the huts erected for tourists, I saw perhaps three huts on our side that the locals lived in, and I never saw more than four locals. Double this for the other side and you have around eight locals, or two small ‘Tribes’ (though I would not call that a tribe; it’s barely a family) who are feuding over…

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Coconuts.

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The fence. A fifty foot long, six-foot high, ugly-as-sin steel fence snaking its way between palm trees on this otherwise beautiful island defines insanity. The rule went that if a coconut fell on one side it belonged to that tribe, and if it fell on the other then it was the other tribe’s. Simple enough, just idiotic. Let’s set aside the fact that they’ve just carved up a tropical island for coconuts in the same way Europe took a map of Africa and carved it like a birthday cake. That’s their prerogative. What I don’t get is why they didn’t just use available resources. I mean, you’re the indegenous owners of paradise and have ample supplies of wood. You’re skilled enough at woodwork and weaving to build surprisingly lovely huts, churches and halls from wattle, daub and mud. So why the fuck would you spend what little money you have to go to shore, buy fifty feet of crude steel fencing, haul it back and chuck it up across an island that tourists pay good money to stay on. It. Makes. No. Fucking. Sense. But that’s just me.





Boy, that was a rant. My apologies. Let’s get back to the story shall we?



The first day was a lot of fun, largely as everyone in our group was pretty legendary. We drank (obviously), smoked, played football and volleyball in which I’m proud to say that I was no less shit than everyone else, ate, gathered wood for a fire then promptly abandoned said fire a minute after we got it going, then…blackout. The next thing I remember was waking up in the dorm all alone save for Ken in the bed opposite who quickly informed me of my antics. Without getting too far into it, I may have drunkenly mistaken the next bed along for a urinal. That’s all I’m going to say. Regardless, I was met with the humiliating yet respectful cheer at breakfast, the kind of Good Morning that says, ‘Last night was indubitably hilarious, and we shall take our laughter, but we shall be laughing with you and not at you because there isn’t a soul among us who has never done something utterly cringe-worthy that they wish they could take back.’ Oscar (the poor Austrian fellow whose bed it was) never warmed up to me again, though. Weird.



The next few days, even with my notes, all seem to blend into one though there was a strange routine to them: we would wake up, tired and hungover with our livers screaming for peace, eat breakfast and clumsily climb into the boat. Thereafter, we would spend an uncomfortable few hours on hard, backless benches in silence. After a while, when the sun was high and the wind had pulled us from our dozy states, conversation would start flowing again. Then we would stop for lunch on an island and have some time to explore the Kuna villages. It’s difficult to describe these islands and their people. On the one hand it is nothing short of incredible that these people still live in such a traditional fashion in this day and age, especially given the tourism generated from boat passage across the Darian Gap. The Kuna live in huts made from bamboo, wattle and daub, have little to no electricity (they don’t even know what Wi-Fi is) and are completely unfamiliar with basic hygiene. Case in point, as our boat was pulling up to one island on the second or third day, we got a good look at their ‘toilets’ – a rickety jetty hanging over the water with a hole in the bottom. And, as you would expect, the waters lapping around underneath were…disgusting. So it was somewhat of a contradiction to be on these picture-perfect tropical islands with indigenous communities that time has barely touched, surrounded by waters filled with their litter and waste. They were the ‘caretakers’ of the islands who cared more about coconuts than keeping them clean.



Our hostel on the second night seemed a touch sturdier than the long hut from the day before, which was just as well as late in the afternoon we were treated to a fantastic storm, with thunder shaking the ground beneath us. There was even a little makeshift ‘aquarium’ where several of our party took to wading in to pick up the turtles (the turtles, unsurprisingly, were not particularly fond of that game). Funnily enough, that night, after numerous card games involving alcohol, one of the Americans actually repeated my unsavory actions from the night before in the room we were sharing with three others. The next morning, much to my relief, the jokes were directed at him, and were so for the rest of the day. I believe some bets were taken as to who would be the next to disgrace themselves, but as to whom was the favourite I cannot say.





A lot of the trip may be a drunken blur, but there is one part of it that I will never forget. On the fourth and final day our boat took us around a giant cliff jutting out from the mainland with a tall pole erected on the crest, and this, our driver told us, was where North America ended and South America began, effectively marking the northernmost terrority of Colombia. We were now in South America, my second continent on my trip, and it was a beautiful day. We pulled in at a small port complete with a duty-free shop where we stocked up on supplies and had our passports stamped by Panamanian emmigration, then, a bit further down the coast, checked into Colombia. A short trip later and we pulled into our final port of call, a sleepy little town called Capurgana, where we checked into our complimentary hostel and thanked the stars for a comfortable, stable seat.



And so concludes Part 2 - I'll put up the next part when I get the chance (and I've written it). And if you read this far (which I doubt anybody has) then thank you.

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