Second Panama Trip II

We returned from the Kuna Islands to Panama City the next day with a four hour trip down the river and up the bouncy mountain road. We got back by noon and had showers as soon as we could. We then went to the Metropolitan National Park where we had a good view of the city and tried to find some of the native Geoffroy's tamarin monkeys. We saw one of these tiny squirrel sized monkeys living as a pet on the Kuna islands but were unable to find a wild group. That night we stayed in a different hostel, one that was closer to the heart of the 'new' city. It was full of international restaurants and nightspots. We ended up eating at a sushi restaurant with hundreds of different types of sushi. It was also the last night for one of my friends because she had to get back to Costa Rica, taking a bus leaving at 11:00 pm.

The next morning we decided to head to the town of Santa Fe, a small village in the mountains west of Panama City. On the way we stopped at in the town of Natá to see the church there. The church was built in 1522 after the Spanish decided to establish a city after defeating a large Indian settlement. The inside and outside of the church were well maintained and restored. We continued on to the city of Santiago where we ate the traditional Panamanian soup, sancocho. The next bus we took climbed a beautiful mountain road to Santa Fe. We arrived in town just as it was getting dark and managed to find a hostel. It wasn't in the guide book, but it had been recommended by someone we met in Panama City. It was a gorgeous hostel. It looked like a mountain cabin and had a great view. The rooms were cheap and, most importantly, it had hot showers which was perfect for the cool mountain air. The family that owned it were French and they were very friendly and gave us a bunch of suggestions about places to see. We decided to do a long hike so we went to bed early.

The next morning we headed out on a hike to a waterfall. The first 5-10 km followed a dirt road that rose and dropped steeply from valley to valley. Eventually we arrived at the trail head that led to the waterfall and the Santa Fe National Park. The trail was full of butterflies of many different kinds. It crossed a number of streams before leading to the river and a very impressive waterfall. Unfortunately there were a number of huge rocks and a steep cliff that prevented us from getting a close look but the spray of the falls kept everything damp, even at a distance. We stopped to have lunch and later I decided to try to make my way across the rocks to get a better picture of the falls. This was the wrong decision. I stepped on one particularly slippery rock and plunged 10 feet into the water to the amusement of my friend. I got out as quickly as I could but it was too late for my camera. At first it wouldn't turn on at all but later after it dried out it seemed to work fine but would only take black photos. Luckily I was able to salvage the pictures I had taken but my camera won't be taking any more. Since I was wet anyways, I swam up the river to the base of the waterfall and was suitably impressed by the power of the falls. The return trip involved many more butterfly sitings and even a bright green snake streaking through the grass. Once back on the road we returned a different way and ran into hundreds of yellow and white butterflies flitting around the banks of the river.

The next morning we went to the local coffee making factory where the manager gave us a free tour of the premises. The locally grown coffee was brought in, separated into higher and lower quality batches, dried out in the sun and in the heat and then roasted. The roasting room smelled incredibly good. The beans were then ground and packaged. They were sold around the world, mostly to Germany and they were also available in Panama and locally. I also visited an orchid garden where the owner hosted an orchid festival in August that attracted people from all over Panama. This time of the year there weren't many orchids blooming but it was an interesting experience. Later in the day I decided to go inner tubing. I had met a kid on the bus and he rented out inner tubes to go down the river. I found his house and got a tube. He gave me instructions on where to stop and I set off by myself. It was the end of the rainy season so the river was quite full and fast. After about 10 minutes another large river joined creating even larger rapids. I managed to make it almost all the way down this section but the last mini waterfall flipped over my tube and threw me out. I had forgotten to take my hat off at the beginning so it was knocked into the river. I tried to swim over to grab it but it got swept away in the fast current and I never saw it again. Meanwhile my tube had gotten stuck in a whirlpool and I couldn't swim back to get it. I had to get out on the shore and make my way back to the tube and then carefully swim rock to rock across the current until I could jump into the tube and free it from the whirlpool. The rest of the trip was a bit more leisurely as the river spread out and I could enjoy the beautiful scenery and the water birds in solitary peace. Once I got out of water I had a 5 km uphill walk back to town carrying my tube but it was well worth it for the tubing.

This was my last day in Panama as I had to get back to work. I left my friend behind because she had another week of holidays and I made the long journey back. It was 5 hours back to Panama City where I caught the 11:00 pm bus, 15 hours back to San Jose, and 4 hours back to Bagaces. After a full 24 hours of riding on a bus I went straight to sleep.

Second Panama Trip I

I took a week off from work to go to Panama. I left on Friday night with two of my friends. We arrived in San Jose at 10:30pm and just managed to catch the last bus to Panama City leaving at 11:00pm. Luckily it had three extra seats. The bus had reasonably comfortable seats and I managed to sleep until we arrived at the border at 5:00am. Unfortunately the border didn't open until 6:00am, so we were forced to wait in line for an hour. The Panamanian side was no better as acquiring tickets to cross the border and waiting for baggage checking took up another hour or more. The ride through Panama was another six hours but we were served meals and they played movies so it wasn't too bad.

We took a taxi to the part of the city known as Casco Viejo, famous for its colonial buildings, where we found a hostel. We spent the rest of the daylight wandering through the streets, admiring the cathedrals, buildings and monuments in the town before finding a pleasant restaurant to eat at. The next day we took the bus up to the Miraflores Locks on the Panama Canal and watched a big boat pass through. We then returned to the city to look at the ruins of Panama Viejo, which was the site of the original Spanish settlement. We climbed the ruins of the cathedral which gave an excellent view of the ruins and the city of Panama behind. Returning to our hostel, we arranged a meeting with a tour guide to the San Blas Islands who would take us out to the islands.

The next morning we got up at 5 am and we were picked up in a jeep. There were four other people already in the jeep: a couple from Vancouver and two girls from the US. We went east out of the city along the Pan-American highway for about an hour until we reached a dirt road. The road has been recently improved and now it is possible to make the trip in only 2 hours. Previously it would have taken 7 hours of hiking through the jungle. The road rose into the jungle covered mountains and it provided excellent views of the countryside when the clouds cleared. The ride was extremely bumpy, however, and I was glad when we finally arrived at the end of the road. The guide's brother and a boat were waiting on the river and all of our stuff was loaded onto it. The boat made its way up the river and we began to pass a number of dugout canoes manned by the local Indian tribe, the Kunas. At one point we passed a collection of huts and our guide, Germaine, mentioned that it was the local cemetery and we shouldn't take pictures of it. The Kuna people inter their dead in hammocks in a room with offerings left to the spirits to provide smoother passage to the afterlife. Eventually we came out of the river into the Caribbean and the San Blas Islands. We headed to the island of Cartí where our hosts lived. It was a densely populated small island that had 2000 people packed into huts that completely covered the island. We were taken to the far end of the island where our host family lived and we were provided two huts to stay in. One had a bed in it, so the couple from Vancouver took that one, and the other had five hammocks strung up in it. It was very primitive and reminded me of when I lived a couple months in the shack. The floor was dirt and the shower was outside. The outhouse was perched over the sea and you could stare into the toilet and watch the hundreds of tropical fish swimming around in the water below. It was around 11 am by this point, so after we got our stuff packed away into our rooms, Germaine brought us to his boat and took us out to a small island covered in palm trees to spend the rest of the day. The island was so small that it only took about 5 minutes to walk completely around it. Germaine brought us freshly caught and fried fish for our lunch. We spent the day swimming, lying in hammocks, and talking to Germaine about life living on the islands. All of the Kuna people speak the Kuna language and most of them understand Spanish. Germaine's spoken Spanish was excellent and he also spoke a little English but he was much more comfortable speaking in Spanish. He was studying tourism in Panama City and worked in a hostel in the city.

After returning from the beach we had a chance to look around the town. Most of the huts were traditionally constructed with reeds and palm leaves, but some, such as the school and the clinic, were concrete and were built by the Panamanian government. They had a generator on the island that provided electricity between 6 and 11 at night and some houses had a TV, which Germaine mentioned was a new development. The island was full of kids playing games in the street and many of them said Hola or Hello as we passed. At night I got to experience a night's sleep in a hammock. I was pretty uncomfortable in the morning, but I got a decent amount of sleep.

The next morning we set out on a more extended expedition to another group of islands. After an hour boat ride we arrived at Dog Island. This was another beautiful palm-filled tiny island and this one was surrounded by coral reef. There was a sunken ship just under the surface offshore of the island so I took advantage of the opportunity and I went snorkeling for the first time in my life. It was fantastic. The water was incredibly clear and floating above this huge ship teeming with sea life was awe-inspiring. There were so many different kinds of colorful tropical fish swimming about in big schools and small ones. Some were long and skinny, others were round and flat and all of them were brightly colored. I also saw a large barracuda hanging out in one compartment of the ship. It was as long as me and I kept a close eye on it until it decided to take off. Another cool siteing was seeing a group of squid. There was about 10 squids of varying sizes hovering over the white sand. At first I just thought they were funny looking fish swimming backwards but when I looked closer I could see their tentacles. I was so impressed by snorkeling that I spent all afternoon snorkeling around the island. The reef completely encircled the island and I followed it all the way around. The reef itself was a different experience than the boat. The depth varied greatly, some times it was difficult to avoid touching the coral because it was so shallow and other times the bottom dropped out and the coral disappeared into the depths. One of the American girls wasn't quite so lucky in avoiding the coral and got some nasty stings on her hands. It was amazing the amount of life in the sea. At times I would be surrounded by a huge school of fish and there was so many different kinds. Unfortunately I was so engrossed in snorkeling that I forgot my back was exposed to the sun. It was mostly cloudy, but that was all that is needed to give me a nice red sunburn. But the snorkeling was still worth it.

We left the island later in the afternoon and headed out even farther to the edge of the archipelago. The strong waves of the Caribbean could be seen crashing onto the reef at the outer limits. There was a lonely palm tree on an island that would have made a good desert island. Our guide took us to his friend's sailboat. It was a German boat and it was sailing around the world with a crew of 3 volunteers. It was currently spending it time sailing people back and forth from Panama to Colombia. The only way to get to Colombia from Panama is to fly or sail because no road connects them. The boat was anchored and was being cleaned but they gave us a tour and showed us they had space for 24. If you want to make the 5 day trip you would have to help out with the sailing and put up with crowded conditions, but it would be fun. After we left the boat we returned to town. Germaine let out a fishing line and every 5 minutes we would stop and pull in a tuna or some other type of fish. One time he pulled in only a bloody fish head. "Barracuda" he said with a smile, and I thought twice the next time I wanted to put my hand in the water. When we got back we had fish for dinner. After dinner we went to the local museum and were given an hour long lesson on the history and culture of the Kuna people by a very dedicated Kuna who spoke both Spanish and English. The religion of the Kuna has a lot of parallels with Christianity with an Adam and Eve story and a Jesus figure but there was also a lot of emphasis on the spiritual world. The world was affected by many good and bad spirits who were always present and many customs were necessary to appease them. The speaker also mentioned a number of times about the spiritual health a person and blamed illnesses on the fact that too many of the Kuna were gradually being westernized by TV and other influences and were forgetting to take care of the spirits. It was very interesting and it seems that this determination not to lose traditions, but at the same time taking advantage of the technology and tourism available, has made the Kuna people into one of the only indigenous Indian group that is actually growing in size. That night I slept very soundly despite the hammock and the sunburn because I was so exhausted from the entire day.

Last weekend I went back to Tamarindo to go surfing again. I left on Saturday morning and arrived at the beach in the afternoon. I checked into a surf hostel which had a very friendly Colombian owner who was eager to please. I didn't surf in the afternoon but I managed to watch an especially beautiful sunset on the beach with a full rainbow on the other side of the sky. That evening I went to the skate park in town with my friend from work who liked to skateboard. It was a bowl and we met a couple of locals and an American living in Tamarindo who were spending their evening skating. After we went to the bar in Tamarindo with a half pipe inside.

The next day I rented a surfboard from the hostel and headed out to the beach. The waves were perfect for a beginner surfer because it very calm and a big wave broke every minute or so. This meant that it wasn't necessary to fight the waves to get back out and it was easy to rest between waves. The wave height also was perfect. It was just high enough to make good surfing but it wasn't too high that I couldn't handle it. The only problem I had involved the large number of beginner surfers hanging around. I caught so many waves that I got a lot of practice surfing. Before I was just satisfied by standing up and riding straight ahead in the surf, but after an hour or so of practice I was able to control the direction of the board. Sometimes I was even able to surf parallel to the wave, staying on the crest, just like you are supposed to surf. I probably won't get a chance to surf on waves like that again in the near future, but I enjoyed it thoroughly.

Back at my house I have been having plenty of interesting visitors. One day I got off my bed to find a huge bug on my floor with long legs and even longer antennae. Looking closer, it seemed to have claws like a crab. I couldn't figure out what it was, so the next day I looked it up on the internet and found it was a tailless whip scorpion which is entirely harmless but extremely cool looking. Another night my friend discovered a snake coming in through a hole in the screen window. It looked like either a small boa or a rattlesnake without a rattle. It went onto my kitchen table and tried to hide between the spices. It rattled its tail like rattler and raised it head up to strike if I got near, so I proceeded cautiously. Eventually we managed to get it outside using a broom handle and it slithered away in the darkness. After looking it up the next day I learned that it probably was the mildly venomous lyre snake which is not dangerous, but would have bitten.

Last weekend I went back to the beaches at Mal Pais and Santa Teresa. A new intern from New York, Justin, arrived at Saco about three weeks ago and he is a big surfer and is trying to go to different beaches every weekend. I decided to join him last weekend.

We left just after work on Friday and caught the bus to Puntarenas. We caught the ferry across to the southern end of the Nicoya Peninsula and arrived at 10:00 pm. We managed to arrange a ride to Mal Pais from a bus on the ferry. The first hour was smooth paved road, but the last hour was a painful bumpy 10 km through potholes and soggy dirt roads. When we finally arrived in Mal Pais the rain was coming down very hard, it was midnight and we had no hotel. Rather than search for a place and get soaked we decided to sleep in the minivan that brought us. The night wasn't particularly comfortable but it was free and way better than being soaked outside.

We woke up at dawn and wandered down the beach toward Santa Teresa beach to the north. Eventually we arrived at a good surfing beach and Justin headed out to surf. I talked to some of the surfers hanging around and then fell asleep on the sand. Later we walked back towards the road and ran across a really neat surf camp/hostel. It was only $8 a night and we had a big room with a bathroom and there was a well equipped communal kitchen as well as a TV room. The hostel itself was a big building with a large courtyard. It had a few shops, such as a convenience store and a t-shirt store, attached to the street side of the building. It also had an old softtop surfboard that I could take out and surf with for free. I went back out to the beach in the afternoon and fought the waves to go surfing. The swells were very high so it was challenging to get the big surfboard out into the water but once I caught a wave it was fast and fun. At first I kept stumbling into rocks and getting pulled sideways down the beach but I eventually discovered a nice rock-free area where I had some success surfing. That night we watched game 6 of the playoffs between Boston and Cleveland and the two Bostonians staying there were very pleased that Boston won.

The next morning we went out surfing again and the waves were even more challenging. I had to return to the shore every 15 minutes to rest. Justin was out farther and was catching the big waves as they were breaking. They were as big waves as he had ever surfed and they were easy to catch so he had a blast. In order to get back to Bagaces we had to catch the four o'clock ferry and we were told that the bus would come at 2:20. We got there by 2:15 but no bus showed up. There was no way we were going to catch the ferry with the next bus so we decided to stay another night. Before returning to the hostel we decided to take advantage of the extra day and rent a quad bike. We were slightly concerned about the security of the quad at the hostel, but we were allowed to park it inside the courtyard. All the roads in the area were in terrible conditions from the rain, but the quad had no trouble getting through, even when we had to cross streams. The first trip we took was south to the Cabo Blanco National Park, the first park in Costa Rica. The trail there went along the shore and sometimes it was only as wide as the quad with a steep drop on the side. The shore was rocky and the waves crashing on them was very impressive. Eventually the trail ended at a volunteer camp where there were people studying the wildlife inside the park and we learned that the access point to the park was on the other side and we were technically not supposed to be there. So we had to back track out of the park and we took another trail that led to Montezuma, another beach town. It was dark by the time we arrived in the next town of Cabuya so we decided to return to our hostel. Unfortunately the lights didn't work on the quad so we had to return the whole way with only the help of a flashlight headlamp. We arrived back at the hostel just in time for the headlights to start working. In the hostel we watched game 7 and the Bostonians were again very pleased when their team won the game and the series. Most of the people in the hostel were surfers and there were people from Uruguay, the States and Switzerland. Some people were living in the town and everybody was enjoying the big waves.

The next morning Justin went out to surf so I took the quad out by myself. I went north along the beach and it got more and more quiet and peaceful. I decided to stop at one isolated beach to take pictures and shut the quad off. I took some shots and sat on the beach for a while before returning to the machine. Unfortunately I had forgotten to shift to neutral when I turned it off and, just like the headlights the night before, it refused to shift the gears without the engine on. And I couldn't turn the engine on until it was in neutral. I was planning to make the long walk back to find help but I decided to wait a half hour and see if it suddenly came back to life like the headlights. I waited and was just about to give up when suddenly it came back to life and I managed to turn it on. I made sure that I always switched it to neutral when I turned it off after that. I continued north along the beach until I reached a river crossing the trail. Even though I could have crossed it, I decided to turn back because it was getting late. This time we managed to catch the bus to the ferry (even though it was stuck behind a dump truck that was mired in the mud for a half hour) and we made it back to Bagaces by 9:00.

Last weekend was the Costa Rican independence day and I took advantage of the long weekend to go to Tortuguero. This is a small town on the Caribbean coast in the middle of a national park. It is famous for the turtles that lay eggs there and the canals that provide the only transportation to the town.

I left on Friday night with two other people from Bagaces and we spent the night in San Jose. The next day we took the bus out of San Jose and headed across the center of Costa Rica, passing through the beautiful Braulio Carrillo National Park. On the bus we met a friendly guy who works as a guide in Tortuguero and he was useful in assisting us finding our way. We got off the bus in the town of Cariari and we bought a bus/boat ticket to Tortuguero. It was Independence Day so the road was blocked off and a parade was passing through. This meant we had to make our way through the crowd and parade to the bus waiting on the other side. The parade was full of kids waving the Costa Rican flag and playing drums. The hour-long bus ride took us through endless banana plantations and, at one point, we had to get out of the bus and walk through disinfectant to get rid of any harmful diseases. The bus dropped us off at the end of the road where the only transportation left was by boat. The boat went down the brown meandering river and the banana plantations quickly gave way to jungle. A crocodile passed in front of us as the rain began to come down hard. After about an hour of river travel reminiscent of Apocalypse Now we came out into a wider lagoon and soon arrived at the town of Tortuguero. Our new guide friend helped us find a place to stay for the night and we arranged two guided tours with him. One that night with the turtles and a canoe trip the next morning. We had an excellent Caribbean style chicken dinner with coconut rice and wandered on the beach. The beach was endless and full of palm trees and was covered in turtle tracks which looked like little tractor tracks driving up on the beach. At 8:00 we met our guide to go see the turtles. Each guide had access to part of the beach and the park rangers would let them know when a turtle was spotted. We found a turtle right away but it had just finished laying eggs. Luckily, another turtle showed up right away. The rules were far more strict than the time I went in Nicaragua. There were absolutely no white lights allowed, only red lights, and we were forbidden to approach the turtles until they had finished making the nests and started to lay the eggs. All in all we saw four turtles show up in only an hour and, despite the strict rules, we got a good view of the egg laying and the crawl back to the sea. These were Green turtles which were about the same size as the Olive Ridley turtles I had seen before.

The next morning we had to wake up before 6 to go on our canoe tour. We had about seven people in a dugout canoe and we left from the national park docks. There were three paddles in the boat so I had a chance to paddle for the first time in about 2 years. The guide had lived there his whole life and had a lot of experience with guiding so he was able to pick out many birds and animals that I would have never seen, as well as expertly navigating the canoe. We saw many kinds of birds including toucans, a real close up of a night heron and a jacana with huge spider-like feet which allow it walk on floating vegetation. We also saw reptiles such as a Green Basilisk which can run on water, baby iguanas, and a caiman, which is like a small crocodile. Plus we saw a couple of different kinds of monkeys, including the long armed and long tailed yellow spider monkeys. After about three hours it started to get hot and we paddled back to Tortuguero for breakfast. Later in the day we took a 5 km walk along the beach to a rocky outcropping known as the Tortuguero Mountain. The beach was full of turtle tracks and the nests stretched the entire beach. On the way back we followed an inland path that went through some woods and the Tortuguero airport.

We returned the next day by catching the boat at eleven. The boat driver was very friendly and acted as a tour guide by looking for wildlife along the way. We saw more spider monkeys, Green Basilisk lizards and crocodiles. One of the neat things that he showed us was nesting bats. They would curl up on logs sticking out of the water and they looked exactly like moss or fungus growing on the log. When I translated to the English speaking passengers that he was showing us bats, nobody would believe me. It wasn't until somebody got too close to them and scared them away that I knew I had translated properly. They immediately flew over to another log and disappeared again. We finished the boat ride just in time to catch the bus back to Cariari and then to San Jose. We had a bit of time to spare in San Jose so we went a nice Mediterranean restaurant for dinner.

The past few weeks I have been going to different beaches. One weekend I went to an all-inclusive resort. This was only the second time I've been one of these resorts and this time it was near the town of Tamarindo. There were 8 of us that went and we arrived on Friday after work. The resort was right on the beach and had a huge swimming pool with basketball nets and a volleyball net. Unfortunately the entire weekend was rainy so we weren't able to enjoy lying on the beach but the food was excellent and there were plenty of things to do during the day. Some of us rented surfboards and we went out surfing. We were the only ones surfing there and the waves were as good as the waves in Tamarindo so it was a lot of fun. It was also within walking distance to Tamarindo so it was easy to get to at night.

The next weekend I went to Playa Carillo, which is a beach south of Tamarindo near Playa Samara which I had visited before. I had heard this was one of the most beautiful beaches in Costa Rica and I wasn't disappointed. It was a long sandy beach lined with palm trees and there were no buildings near the beach. The town itself was up a hill behind the beach and I stayed in a really nice cabina there. The place was owned by an Argentinian couple and they also had an Argentinian restaurant in front which served thick, mouth-watering steaks cooked in the traditional Argentinian way. The beach itself had lots of picnic tables and shade under the palm trees and the waves were impressive. There was one wave that consistently broke in the same spot. From the beach it didn't look all that big but by the time you got out there it was a massive pounding force. It was fun to try to body surf it but I had to keep retreating to the beach when it wore me out. It was so strong that it ripped off my dead toenail that I had injured playing soccer the week before.

The last couple of weeks I spent here in Bagaces. There have been fiestas here in Bagaces for the last three straight weekends. One weekend they had the first rodeo in a new ring that has just been finished being built next to the new pool. It was an American-style rodeo and it is apparently one of the best places in Costa Rica for this. They had a TV crew down to tape it for broadcasting on national television. There was bull riding, bronco riding, horse control competitions and steer-tying competitions.

Last weekend I managed to find a new house in Bagaces and I moved back down into town. I enjoyed living up in my shack but I am glad to be back in town with reliable water and not having to worry about dirt and scorpions everywhere.

I returned to Nicaragua yet again, this time going to the city of León. It was a long weekend so I had three days however it takes almost a full day of traveling to get to León. I went with a group of people from Bagaces and we took a direct bus. The border crossing consisted of a lot of time spent waiting around doing nothing and we didn't get to León until after dark. The Canadian guy that I mentioned before got off in Managua to get his tattoo. The plan was to stay in the hostel I had stayed in before but it was completely full. We found a really cheap hostel nearby for only $2 per person. My bed was fine but the others had beds in various states of disrepair causing temporary paralysis in various body parts. This meant that the next day we were determined to get into the good hostel. We ate a long breakfast at the hostel's cafe and checked into the hostel as soon as we could. We were planning on going volcano boarding (sliding down a volcano on a board) through the hostel but unfortunately they had canceled it for Sunday and we had to leave the next day. Instead we took a tour of the city, enjoying some of the many cathedrals in the town. After we took a taxi down to the beach and I enjoyed body surfing in some of the big waves until it started to lightning and I was chased back to the bar on the beach. We caught the bus back to León and it was almost as crowded as the last time I took it but this time I didn't have to hang on to the outside. In the evening we went to a Chinese restaurant and then we headed to a bar where they were playing live salsa music.

The next day we returned to Costa Rica via a number of buses. One to Managua, a city bus through Managua, and another bus to the border. At the border we figured we had a lot of time to get through the passport checking and catch the bus back to Bagaces. However the border was particularly packed because of the long weekend and we ended up watching the last bus leave as we were waiting in line. This meant that we had to take a taxi all the way back. There were five of us so the cost wasn't too steep but it still ended up being a lot more than the bus.

Last weekend I returned to Manuel Antonio which is one of my favorite beaches. My friends from Bagaces took their car but they only had so much space so I took the bus with Greg, the other Canadian. We got a ride in the morning with some friends to Puntarenas and then we waited for the bus at a restaurant by the highway. Unfortunately the bus went by without stopping and we were stuck. We started walking along a bike path on the highway and hitch-hiking but after an hour of walking without a ride another bus showed up. It was going to a different town, Orotina, but it was on the way so we took it. We spent another couple of hours in the town waiting for the next bus and we finally arrived in Manuel Antonio at 7pm, 11 hours after we set out. The first hostel we looked into was full but we managed to find a cabina and meet up with the rest of the group for supper. After we went to a popular bar which was packed. It had two levels and a great view of the ocean and was full of tourists from Costa Rica and around the world.

Our cabina was right next to the national park at Manuel Antonio so we woke up fairly early to go in. The park was full of animals and I saw monkeys, sloths, a coatimundi, and a raccoon on various trails and the beach in the park. The monkeys were extremely tame. I saw one digging through someone's bag on the beach. However the park seemed to be missing the black and red crabs that so entertained me last time. The first time I was in the park the jungle was full of these crabs scampering around everywhere, but I didn't see a single one this time. I don't know whether it was the wrong time of year or wrong time of day but it was strange. The rest of the group came with a Frisbee and we played on the beach. It was the first time I had played Frisbee since I was in Canada and I forgot how much fun it is. After we went to an excellent sushi restaurant for lunch.

Returning on the bus was as complicated as getting there. We didn't leave the beach until 5:30 pm when we caught a bus to Puntarenas. There we caught a taxi to the Pan-American highway where we waited for the bus in a restaurant. The very last bus passed by at 9:45 pm and we managed to wave it down. The bus was surprisingly empty, there was only two other people on it, so we were able to stretch out on the seats and get a bit of sleep. We finally arrived in Bagaces at 11:00.

I took a four day weekend to go to Nicaragua. I went with the two Canadians from Bagaces and we left early on Thursday morning. The border crossing didn't take too long and we made it to the beach at San Juan del Sur before one. We checked into a hostel that I had stayed before and headed out to explore the town.

We started walking north down the road looking for some nice beaches along the coast. After a lot of walking we decided to hitchhike and quickly picked up a couple of rides that took us closer to the beaches. We weren't exactly sure where the beach was, so we wandered into a group of newly constructed beach houses. The only path that we could see was behind a barbed wire and while we were looking for another way down, a guard carrying a shotgun showed up and asked what we were doing. He showed us a hole in the barbed wire and told us not to come back, emphasizing this by pointing at his shotgun. The beach itself had a few houses around but not a single person to be seen. On the way back we saw a lot of different kinds of new development and even came across a pet spider monkey whose tail was just as useful as any hand. We eventually caught a ride in a big truck that took us all the way back to the town. That evening we ate pizza and ended up crashing early.

The next morning we rented a couple of surfboards and took a taxi to a good surfing beach north of the town. The beach had some big waves and quite a lot of rocks, but there was plenty of space where beginners could practice. It was extremely tiring working my way through the surf to get out to where the waves were breaking, but it was a lot of fun catching the waves. Later in the afternoon the waves started to change and it was harder to catch the waves, but it was still fun. Later that evening, the one Canadian, Greg, ran into his tattoo artist from Canada who was there with his Nicaraguan tattoo artist friend. Greg made plans to get a new tattoo over the next couple of months from him in Managua. I also ran into a girl who had just graduated from Western in genetics and was volunteering in a hospital nearby in Nicaragua. She was born in Argentina and was a big soccer fan. She went to the U20 World Cup Argentina-Czech Republic first round game in Toronto. Those two teams played again in the final which was won by Argentina, so I imagine she was pretty happy about that.

The next day was rainy so we decided to head up to Granada. We decided to stay in the Bearded Monkey hostel which I had stayed before. However it was really full and they only had three spaces left: a mattress on the floor, a hammock and a sofa. We decided to stay regardless and I took the mattress. By a strange coincidence I was not the only Asaph in the hostel. There was another older man from Israel that had the same name as me. I talked with him and he said that my name is relatively common in Israel, but he was the first person that I have ever met with the same name. That evening we went to a very American sports bar and had wings, onion rings and hamburgers, which was a nice change from my normal fare, but seemed out of place in Granada. The whole town is undergoing a very thorough renovation geared to attract tourists and has changed quite a bit since the first time I arrived. There are cobblestoned streets being put in, lanterns and flower pots being put up, and the cathedrals have been repainted. There were even large changes since the last time I had been there in Easter.

The next day was Sunday and we had to head back to Costa Rica. The return trip was relatively uneventful except for the fact that Greg had not had a full night sleep on the sofa and fell into such a deep sleep on every bus that it was hard to wake him up.

This last picture is one of my new house in the woods. I woke up last night with a large scorpion crawling on my face. Apparently I have a new pet.

The last couple of weeks have been quite hectic. It seems that every night it's somebody's birthday or somebody is leaving or there is a soccer game or there is some other reason to stay out late and drink. In addition, I have been changing houses, so I had stuff all over the place and I was basically a nomad for a week. My landlady had her son come back to town unexpectedly and she needed my room back. She offered another room temporarily if I needed it. Luckily, I knew somebody who was moving to the San Jose area for six months and needed somebody to take care of his house for that time. However, this means that I am now living very primitively. The house is about 2 km outside of Bagaces and is hidden amid the trees and is quite isolated. The house consists of one small room with dirt floor and a tin roof and bars instead of glass for the windows. The bathroom is an outhouse about 100 meters away and the shower is outside and consists of a pipe pouring out water. There are three big friendly dogs that I am taking care of as well. I do have a comfortable bed, electricity, a fridge and running water so its not exactly like camping, but it feels like it. It does mean that I don't have to pay rent and I now have someplace to prepare food, but it also takes about twice as long to get to work. So far I'm enjoying living there, but I'm not sure how long I will be able to. I am still keeping an ear out for potential places in Bagaces.

Last weekend in between house moving I managed to find time to take a three day trip to the beaches of Puerto Viejo on the Caribbean coast. I have been to the Caribbean in Panama and Honduras, but never in Costa Rica so I was looking forward to seeing someplace new. The bus ride was not easy. I first had to take the bus to San Jose and I caught the bus from Bagaces. I had to stand but there wasn't too many people on the bus so I figured I would get a seat soon. I was wrong. I ended up standing on the bus for almost the full four hours and didn't get a seat until we were almost in San Jose. I was hoping the next bus would be a bit better because I guaranteed myself a seat by buying a ticket. Unfortunately I had the only seat in the bus with no window and a huge traffic jam lengthened the trip from 4 hours to 7 and a half hours. Luckily I had a newspaper and the American girl next to me was interesting to talk to.

I finally arrived at Puerto Viejo at 9:30 and managed to run into some friends I had made in Tamarindo. They went to a school in San Jose where they were studying Spanish and one of them had invited me to the Caribbean. I managed to find a place to stay at a nice hostel. There were dorm rooms or you could rent a tent or hammock to sleep for the night. I went back out with my friends and spent the night dancing to Caribbean reggae.

The next day I rented bikes with two of my friends and we biked 6 kilometers to a relatively calm beautiful beach outside of town. It had been raining the day before and in the morning but luckily the sun came up just as we got to the beach. The waves were quite a bit smaller than the waves at Puerto Viejo, but they were still surprisingly strong. They were also the perfect waves for body surfing, so I spent most of the day riding the waves right up to the shore. I also almost got hit by a big fish that flew out of the water right in front of me but I wasn't quick enough to catch it. That evening we went to a Asian Restaurant that had Japanese, Chinese and Thai food. They had all-you-can-eat sushi for quite cheap but I chose the freshly caught fish instead, which was delicious. The next day we went to a very nice cafe which had homemade chocolate and homemade peanut butter and served an excellent breakfast. The bus to go back didn't leave until noon so we still had time to relax on the beach. I really wanted to try surfing, but the only surf shops I could find were right next to the "Salsa Brava", one of Costa Rica's most famous waves, and it was way too advanced for me. We found another beach where the waves were slightly smaller and I tried to go body surfing again. Although I managed to catch some waves really well, the pounding I took getting back out was extremely tiring and I had to go back to the beach to rest.

I arranged to get a lift back with the private van that my friends had hired and the trip back to San Jose was a quick 3 and a half hours. I said goodbye and headed back to Bagaces. Puerto Viejo is completely different than the beaches over here on the Pacific coast. There are a lot of tourists, but it is not nearly as built up and still has the feel of a relaxed beach town. But it still managed to have many great restaurants and places to stay. Hopefully I will have a chance to get back there again.

The last couple of weeks I have been mostly going to the beaches. The first beach I went to was Mal Pais. This is on the far southern point of the Nicoya peninsula. I went with some friends in their car and it was about a 5 hour drive to the beach. An American who used to live in Bagaces had just moved down to Mal Pais so we went to visit his new apartment. The waves on the beach were huge, some of the biggest I had seen yet, and it was fascinating watching the surfers take the waves. There was a really cool thatched roof bar and restaurant right on the beach and we enjoyed the view of the beach. The next morning we were going to try surfing, but due to a very late night and copious amounts of rain, we decided to bypass on surfing.

The next week another intern showed up where I work. He is from Canada and was really looking forward to surfing. The other Canadian in town also was interested in surfing, so the three of us decided to go to Tamarindo to go surfing. We were all total beginners, and when we were renting boards the guy at counter recommended that we take a "teacher". We didn't want to pay anything extra so we declined. Later we found out he actually said "T-shirt", but by that time we all had raw, red chests. At first surfing seemed impossible. It was very painful lying on a board and paddling all the time and it was extremely difficult to get the board turned around in time to catch a wave. I was out about two hours, developed huge cramps in my legs, swallowed gallons of salt water but only managed to catch a handful of waves. I went back to shore exhausted and very pessimistic about surfing. I rested for about an hour and then decided to give it one more shot. Luckily, it was now low tide, and I was able to put my feet down. This improved matters immensely. Now I could relax between waves and swing the board around quickly to catch a good wave. I learned that surfing is a whole lot of fun. By the end of the day I learned to catch the good waves and how to stand up and surf the wave out. I still can't control my direction and I fall off a lot but falling into the water is almost as fun as surfing. The other Canadians had a blast too, and the new intern actually bought a cheap surfboard at the beach.


The next weekend I biked to the nearby waterfall with the two other Canadians. It has been raining pretty strongly for the last month or so and the road into the waterfall was nearly impassable. There was a tourist bus and another car stuck in the mud. The waterfall itself was about three times more powerful than I had ever seen and the pool underneath was brown and full. I went swimming and managed to catch another cold. Maybe next time I will learn. After we went to Liberia to watch the Stanley Cup final. We managed to watch one period at a bar before soccer came on and we got kicked out.

The next week I managed to injure my knee somehow which significantly reduced my ability to play soccer. Unfortunately, it also happened that this was the week that they started the mini soccer tournament in the company where I work. This meant that I will be unable to defend my title from last year and will have to watch the tournament instead. My knee injury also meant that I couldn't go surfing either. I went with the other Canadians to Tamarindo again, but I was only able to body surf, which is still a lot of fun. The one Canadian managed to snap his board in two and he was not too happy so he joined me in body surfing.

Hopefully my knee will be healed soon so I can get back to soccer, as well as go surfing again. Oh, and here is a picture of my new pet, Killer, snuggling up on my pillow.

My bike has been slowly wearing down as I have been using it but it wasn't until I moved into Bagaces that it finally decided to stop working. This meant I had a nice 2 km walk into work for a couple of days while it was fixed. I had to get the whole back rims replaced as well as fix the brakes and the gears. It was like a brand new bike and I was so happy about having my bike back that I promptly ran over a tack, popped my tire and had to send it back to the shop. When I got it back the second time I decided to make use of my newly fixed bike and pedal to the nearby Palo Verde national park.

It was 20 km of very rocky gravel roads to the entrance of the park. The road passed through cow pastures, sugar cane and other types of farms. Despite the road it was a relatively easy ride with the wind at my back and more downhill slopes than uphill slopes as the road made its way down to the river. At the park entrance I picked up a map and headed 8km into the park where there was some trails, a campground and a research center. The research center had rooms for quite a few guests and there were quite a few people there. The marsh was almost completely dry because it is the end of the dry season. The park is famous for the huge numbers of water birds that migrate here however it gets too dry for them in March and they all leave. So I missed out on the birds but I managed to see a group of spider monkeys hanging out in a mango tree. This was the first time I had seen spider monkeys and they amused me by swinging around on their long arms and tails and trying to threaten me by throwing branches and mangoes down on me. One even tried to pee on me but luckily they didn't have very good aim. I continued 2km to the river that is the base of the park. There was a big sign by the dock warning about crocodiles but I didn't see any lounging around on the shore. There were some things in the water far away but I couldn't tell if they were animate or not. On the way back I passed the mango tree again but it was now full of capuchin or white monkeys. Having seen howler monkeys earlier at the research center I had now seen all three types of monkeys in Palo Verde. I also saw hundreds of iguanas swarming around the campsites, a couple of coatimundi and some deer. The way back was much more difficult than I was prepared for. Not only was I very tired not being used to biking for such a long distance, but it was against a strong wind with many painful uphill stretches. The trip that took less than 2 hours getting to Palo Verde stretched to almost 4 hours returning and I was relieved to get back to the house. My bike managed to survive the trip intact, however on Monday morning I woke up to find my other tire was flat. I had to walk yet again to work. In this case I was glad to avoid the bike for the day.

The next weekend was a long weekend due to the Mayday holiday. Six of us from Bagaces decided to go to Nicaragua for the weekend and visit the island of Ometepe. The island consists of twin volcanoes rising from Lake Nicaragua. The taller volcano is named Concepcion and is one of the most active volcanoes in Central America. It's cone is bare of trees and you can often see smoke coming from the peak. The other volcano is slightly smaller but is dormant. It is covered in a cloud forest and has a crater lake at the top. To get to the island requires an hour long boat ride across Lake Nicaragua. The lake was quite choppy and the rickety ferry had water rushing in the sides, soaking shoes if you weren't careful. The ferry was packed and there seemed to be a significant lack of life jackets in the boat. However this was offset by the safety feature of signing our names on a list of passengers, preventing them from losing anyone. We managed to arrange a ride to our hostel from a guy on the boat with a pickup truck on the island. The island was very tranquil and rustic with cows, pigs, chickens, horses and goats freely wandering across the road. Our hostel was near the smaller, safer volcano and it was just as rustic. It was right on the lake and we went swimming as the sun set across the water.

The next day I arranged a guided trip to the top of the volcano through the hostel. I went with another Canadian from Oakville who just moved to Bagaces a week ago and is staying about 8 months while he does a co-op program from university. The first stretch was relatively flat across cow pastures. As we entered the forest the path started to steepen. The forest changed from dry tropical forest to rain forest jungle to cloud forest. When we got to the cloud forest the trail became extremely steep. Sometimes it was almost vertical as we climbed exposed roots and wet muddy clay. At the top it was too cloudy to see much but ever once and a while the cloud would clear just enough to see the blue lake in the middle of the forested crater. The climb down gave great views of the other volcano across the length of the island and it was very refreshing to swim in the lake at the end. On the return trip we didn't have a ride. It was much longer 2 hour bus ride with a transfer in the middle. We didn't get back to Bagaces until after dark.

Honduras IV

I awoke at 5am on Easter Sunday and I had to decide where I was going to go. I wanted to see the Caribbean coast and there were a number of different towns that I had to choose from, as well as the beautiful Bay Islands which are famous for their scuba diving. I didn't have time to visit the islands so I decided to visit the town of Tela.

I found a cheap bus to the city of San Pedro Sula. However, the reason it was cheap was because it stopped for anyone who wanted to get on or off. This made the trip much longer than it would have been but I didn't mind too much. One time the bus stopped and everyone started staring out the window. At first it looked like a traffic accident but the only truck I saw seemed to be parked on the grass undamaged. Then I realized there were two bodies lying on the grass. I imagine it must have been a gang execution and these two had tried to get out of their vehicle and run into the field. The bus stayed for a few minutes until a police officer arrived and started to check on the bodies. It was a grim reminder of the problems in Honduras.

I switched buses in San Pedro Sula and headed to Tela. Apparently I was the only one on the bus going to this town because we passed right by the town when I wasn't paying attention. I ended up having to walk a couple of kilometers back to the town in the hot sun. The town was right on the beach and it was full of Hondurans enjoying the holidays. After finding a cheap place on the beach with a very friendly owner, I went to find a place to rent a bike so I could pedal to some nearby Garifuna Indian villages. The Garifunas are an interesting mix of escaped slaves and Indians that intermarried more than 200 years ago and created their own culture and language. Unfortunately, none of the places listed in the guide book had bikes anymore so I ended up walking on the beach. The beach stretched on endlessly and walking barefoot on the flat sand was a relief compared to the steep mountain I had just been climbing. Its too bad that I didn't have much time left because I was interested in exploring the tens of kilometers of beaches that continue past Garifuna villages and large natural preserves. However I had to turn back to get to the town before dark. I found a small restaurant on the top of small hill overlooking the town just in time to watch the sunset over the ocean. The food in the restaurant was really good and I met a Canadian family eating in the restaurant. The daughter was living in San Pedro Sula teaching English and her parents came down to visit her for Semana Santa. They were enjoying their visit even though they had been robbed at gunpoint on the day they arrived. They were being extra careful and seemed to really like Honduras. Most of the travelers and Hondurans that I met in Honduras mentioned that Canadian travelers are very common but this family were the only Canadians I met. After eating I went exploring the town. I found a bar where they were showing the movie '300' on a projection screen, so I got time to try out the 4 different kinds of Honduran beer. After the movie was over I made my way over to a nearby dance club where I listened to a lot of the same type of music that they play in Costa Rica. Some of the songs I had never heard before but the main difference wasn't the music. Every half hour or so, a patrol of about 6 or 7 soldiers carrying large automatic weapons would come in, walk around the bar, watch the dancing for a while, and then file out. Given that Costa Rica doesn't even have an army and I rarely see police in a dance club, I definitely knew I was in a different country.

The next day I had to start making the long trip back to Costa Rica. I decided to head to Comayagua, a colonial city on the way back to the capital Tegucigalpa. I stopped in the town of El Porvenir (The Future) which seemed to be growing fast with many new developments, lots of American fast food outlets and a Pepsi plant. Unfortunately there was no buses to Comayagua until 5, so I headed back to San Pedro. I found the international bus station and I booked a bus from Tegucigalpa to Managua, Nicaragua for the next day. Then I took a bus to Comayagua. It was a pretty bus ride through the mountains, passing a scenic lake where the street peddlers were selling fresh fish to the bus passengers instead of the usual chips and pops. I finally arrived in Comayagua after dark and took a taxi to the central park. I was sitting in the park enjoying the beautifully ornate cathedral and trying to figure out where I was going to stay for the night when I was approached by three Honduran women. They had noticed me sitting in the park and wondered if I wanted a tour of the city. At first I assumed they were part of city tourism, but I realized they were just regular citizens. One was studying civil engineering in the local university and the other two worked in a bank. They found me a nice hotel to stay in and the student, who had a car, took me on a tour of the entire city. The city was formerly the capital of Honduras until the wife of the President was insulted by the city officials and convinced the President to move the capital to Tegucigalpa. This move actually helped preserve the colonial feel of the city and it has a number of very beautiful cathedrals and plazas. We were even allowed to enter the main cathedral which was full of intricate gilded statues. It is also famous for having the oldest working clock in the Americas. It was built by the Moors in the 12th century and given as a gift by Spain. The driver obviously was having trouble concentrating on both the tour and the driving because she managed to hit the curb, go the wrong way down a narrow one way street, and almost hit a bicyclist all in the first minutes of the tour. But I managed to survive the tour and I got to see a lot more of Comayagua than I had expected.

The next day I had to leave very early in the morning because I had to be on the bus leaving from Tegucigalpa at 9am. The Tica Bus that I was taking is very popular with foreign travelers because it is easier, faster and more comfortable than other buses. I sat beside a guy who was living and studying in Puntarenas, Costa Rica and had went to the Bay Islands in Honduras to scuba dive. I also met a girl from Guelph who was traveling across Central America and planning to spend a couple months working with the turtles in Costa Rica. The border crossing was very easy and the trip was long enough to watch 3 movies. I only had about $15 left to cross Nicaragua, so I had to be frugal, but I didn't want to spend the night in Managua so I caught the bus to Granada where I stayed at the familiar Bearded Monkey hostel. I caught the bus the next day to the border. I was hoping that by arriving on a Wednesday I would avoid the long lines at the border, although it was not to be. The border was less busy than before, but it still took 3 hours to cross. Even after crossing, there were huge lines waiting for a bus. Luckily they called more buses and the wait wasn't more than an hour or two. I finally arrived back in Bagaces where it was raining for the first time in three months. I had managed to avoid getting rained on the entire trip, even during my trek through the cloud forest and the rainy Caribbean beach, but here I was getting wet in bone-dry Bagaces. I didn't mind one bit.

Honduras III

The next day of my trip was Thursday, which is part of the Easter holiday, and I was worried about finding a bus. I noticed in my guide book that there was a national park nearby that had the highest mountain in Honduras, so I decided to see if I could find buses there. Luckily there was one bus leaving Copan that I managed to catch. I arrived a couple of hours later in the town of Gracias. The small town was founded in 1536 as one of the first cities in the New World and became the capital of Honduras and was used to administer the entire Spanish Central American empire. However now it is just another quiet Honduran town with most of the streets still dirt. The first day I spent exploring the town. Overlooking the town there was an old Spanish fort that was nicely restored. It gave a nice view of the town and contained the tomb of a famous former President of Honduras. There were a number of ancient churches, and the central one was full of people singing Easter songs. There was a large number of Honduran tourists, but I didn't have to much trouble finding a place to stay.

The next day I decided enter the nearby Celaque park and climb the mountain Cerro Las Minas. I wanted to spend the night in the park so I could get to the top early in the morning, but I hadn't brought my tent or sleeping bag. Luckily there was a shelter on the mountain, so all I needed to do was rent a sleeping bag in the town. After buying a gallon jug of water and some food I set out at about 10am. I wandered around town for a while until I finally found the long dirt road that led to the park. The 8 km road was hot and dusty and slowly climbed through Honduran farmland and hordes of exceptionally loud cicadas. Once inside the park, the many pine trees provided shade and reminded me of canoe trips up in northern Ontario. After the park office the trail followed a river. The park gets a lot of rain which provides water to 7 major rivers and to the surrounding towns and villages. There were many signs around asking visitors to avoid contaminating the water. The trail then headed up a series of switchbacks, climbing steeply. At one point I took a 1 or 2 km detour to a lookout of a open canyon with a large 100 meter waterfall cascading down on the far wall of the mountain. It's apparently even more impressive in the rainy season, if you can see it through the clouds. I continued to climb and reached the first campsite at about 3 pm. The shelter was falling apart with holes in the roof, parts of the walls missing, and the only bed was a piece of tin balanced on some poles sticking out of the wall. I debated whether to continue to the second campsite and risk getting caught in the rain, or stay here, where I would probably get wet anyway. After testing out the "bed", I decided that it was good enough to function as a shelter in the rain and I decided to stay.

After eating and watching the birds, a group of four very tired Honduran hikers arrived at the camp. They had camped at the second campsite the previous night and had tried to climb the summit that day but one of the women had injured her knees and they had to turn back. They were all from Tegucigalpa, two were programmers, one was a advertiser and the other a doctor. They were weighed down because they had brought too much stuff, but all that stuff was useful for camping. They made a fire, set up their two tents and had a nice supper. They mentioned that it was quite rare for Hondurans to do this sort of thing for a vacation and most of the people that climbed the mountain were foreigners, but they enjoyed it. That night I balanced on my noisy piece of tin and tried to get some sleep and not wake up the other campers. Fortunately it did not rain and I had a relatively comfortable night.

I woke up at 5am for an early start to the summit. At first it was dark enough to need a flashlight, but the sun was rising behind me so it was soon light. I left most of my stuff in the shelter and only took what I needed. The trail became extremely steep for about 500 meters, necessitating hands as well as feet in parts. Eventually it flattened out again into a large plateau covered in an ancient cloud forest, the largest in Honduras. Huge moss covered trees towered over the ground, blocking out the sun and making the floor almost clear of undergrowth. This made it difficult to follow the trail, but it was much flatter and easy to walk. I arrived at the second camp, where an older man from the States was camping. He had been a CFO of a software company that had been bought out and he had signed a 5 year non-competition clause. Since he couldn't work he decided to take the 5 years and travel the world. He was staying in the cloud forest taking pictures and looking for the elusive quetzal. The cloud forest continued for another hour of walking until there was one final steep stretch to the summit. Unlike most summits I have been to, this one was covered in trees. However there were some great views to the east and south through breaks in the trees because the clouds had not moved in yet. At 2850 meters (9350 ft) it wasn't the highest mountain I had been on, but it was high enough to be very cold. I had a sweater and a jacket on, but I started getting quite cold sitting on the summit. I ate some snacks and headed back through the cloud forest. After an hour, the clouds slowly started rolling in and the forest started looking very mysterious. I never saw a quetzal, or any other type of cloud forest animal, but I found that it was the most beautiful and peaceful forest that I have been to.

I returned down the mountain, passing the Honduran group I had met the night before, who were carefully descending with their limping group member. After exiting the forest I was faced with a scorching early afternoon walk through the open fields back to Gracias. I was thoroughly exhausted by the time I got back to my room in the town. I was planning to visit the nearby hot springs to soothe my aching muscles and meet up with my Honduran friends, but I soon fell asleep and didn't wake up until the morning.

Honduras II

After waking up the next morning in San Pedro Sula I spent a couple hours exploring the city and looking to buy a return ticket to Managua in case it was too busy to find a bus during Easter. It seemed like a friendly city and I explored a market and the central park. I also needed to find a bank because I had almost no lempiras which is the currency in Honduras. The lempira is worth almost exactly the same as the Nicaraguan cordoba, but they only have bills, no coins. This means that rather than having a pocketful of change, you have a thick wad of bills in your wallets. It felt strange peeling off two 1 lempira bills (about 5 cents each) to pay for a little plastic bag of water but I soon grew used to it. I then caught a bus to the town of Copan Ruinas which is just outside the famous Mayan Copan Ruins.

After a four hour bus ride that went through the cool mountains of central Honduras, we arrived at the valley where the ruins are located, near the border to Guatemala. I checked into a very nice hostel that only cost $4 and was recommended in my guidebook as one of the best in all of Central America. It seemed nice and everybody put their name and nationality on a main blackboard, but it was almost empty when I arrived. I had a few hours left of daylight and I wandered around the town. The town was very picturesque and the central park had a Mayan theme with an old church and a very interesting Mayan museum. I also wandered down some of the country roads and noticed that the town had many taxi tuk-tuks going up and down the hilly roads. I hadn't seen any of these in Central America so far and they are apparently a recent development here, being shipped in directly from India. I found the entrance to the Mayan ruins about 1km outside of town but it was getting dark so I left it until the next day. Back at the hostel I met two friends who were traveling through Central America. One was from Sweden and the other from Oregon and they had come from Mexico, through Belize and had just arrived that day from Tikal, another major Mayan ruins in Guatemala. We found a nice restaurant in town and enjoyed supper. It turned out that the part owner of the restaurant also was the owner of the hostel and he also offered a number of tours and different excursions around Copan and Honduras, one of which my new friends signed up for.

The next day I got up early to get to the ruins right when it opened at 8 am. The entrance gate was covered with very tame Scarlet Macaws, which are the national bird of Honduras even though there are no real wild ones left. The ruins were stunning, ancient temples and intricately carved figures hidden in the jungle. The site is especially well known for Stelae, which are statues, usually of a ruler, and on the back they are covered in Mayan hieroglyphics describing the date and story of the ruler. There are many temples, some only partially excavated with tunnels going inside them, an ancient ball court, and living spaces for the upper class. There is also a hieroglyphic stairway where each step was covered in hieroglyphics. This detailed story tells the history of the city and the rulers and greatly increased our knowledge of Mayan hieroglyphics. In 400 AD, at the end of a spiritually significant 400 year period, a stranger arrived and conquered Copan. Using religion symbolism, he was looked upon as a god and declared his 400 year reign. Him and his descendants built many of the temples and artifacts and turned Copan into one of the great Mayan cities. After 400 years, it appears that the king at that time declared the era to be ended, built a number of buildings signifying this event, and Copan was abandoned within a hundred years. I was practically alone for the first hour of wandering around and it was very awe-inspiring. By the time I worked my way through the entire ruins the big tour groups started to come in and I decided to move on. There was a nature trail through the jungle that led to some excavated houses as well as a lot of unexcavated mounds. I then visited the museum at the entrance. The museum centerpiece was a replica of one of the temples, reproduced exactly as it would have looked when it was built. It was covered in stucco and painted bright red with many designs painted over the walls. I always imagined the Mayans living among dull gray stones, just like the ruins look like now, so this new perspective was welcome. They also had some of the more intricate original sculptures inside protected from the weather as well as some examples of white stucco-covered houses of the nobles.

After enjoying the park I was planning to head to Antigua Guatemala to enjoy the Semana Santa celebrations there but I was told that the town would be crammed with people and it would be necessary to pay over $100 to find any hotel room. I decided to leave Guatemala for another time and just spend the rest of my vacation in Honduras. This meant that I had time to sign up for a 'Hidden Copan' hiking trip that I learned about the night before. Our tour guide was a long time backpacker from Belgium who decided to settle in Copan. It was me, the two girls I had met the night before and a group of about 8 Dutch tourists who had joined the tour at the last minute. We took a group of tuk-tuks a couple of miles outside of town and were warned to prepare for ticks. We headed through a couple of cow pastures, passing under barbed wire fences, and noticed that many of the hills were shaped like temples. Our tour guide mentioned that there were many unexcavated ruins all around, but nobody had the money to uncover them. We continued along a foot path through the mountains and passed through two isolated Indian villages. Strangely, these villages had lost all their traditional clothes and food in the last 40 years while just across the border in Guatemala lived groups with all their traditions. The tour guide was a wealth of information and opinions. He was a member of the Honduras tourist board representing backpackers and talked about the many problems facing Honduras. He explained about one particular project that was intended to improve the lives of these villages. The Japanese government have donated a lot of money for improving the area around Copan in return for exclusive access to the ruins. One of the projects was to provide running water to the villages. The project was started four years ago and was supposed to provide water in a couple of months. Thanks to a lot of mismanagement and corruption there is now just a pump and pipes that are still not connected to anything. The people in the village still have to make a long trek to collect water from the clean stream. He also talked about the major gang problems they have in Honduras. It is the main country that receives cocaine from Columbia and gangs are constantly at war over this lucrative business. The gang wars have made San Pedro Sula the city with the highest murder rate in the world, and Tegucigalpa the fifth highest. We walked right up to the border of Guatemala, and due to the relative remoteness of the area, it was the most popular area for smuggling drugs into Guatemala. A person could get $50 taking a kilo of cocaine across the border, an afternoon of work, taking the same kind of path through the mountains that we were. Needless to say, there is never a lack of volunteers. We returned to the road again where our tuk-tuks had arrived to pick us up and take us back to Copan. I again ate with my new friends in the same restaurant where this time we had some interesting Asian-style food.