Sunday, April 8, 2007

Adventures in Transit - Honduras

Happy Easter!

We are now in, after some crazy transit situations, in Marcala, Honduras. Let us tell you our tale.
It all began in Copan de las Ruinas on Saturday morning at 6am, with our destination being Perquin, El Salvador, or at least La Esperenza, Honduras. That first bus ride wasn´t too bad - through the mountains, a few pukey people, but not us, so it was all good! This bus took us to La Entrada, a kind of transportation hub.
Here we paired off with two people from Vancouver and hopped into a mini-bus which would take us to Santa Rita de Copan. That ride was unevetnful.
Upon arrival we immediatley got on a big, crowded bus headed to Gracias. Lee was making sure the bags were put underneath properly with the driver and ticket guy, but they were out there for a really long time. Turns out the bus door closed and they couldn´t get back in! So, after a rough start we were off. This bus was really crowded, and every now and then you´d hear a little animal peep. The woman beside us had two colourful, baby birds - parrots maybe- that she was feeding. Funny looking, noisey little things. Another guy had a little puppy... cute.
In Gracias we had to take a little three-wheeler taxi to a bridge near the edge of the city. There we got on a cozy mini bus (Lee was all snuggled up with some local guy - very cute!) towards San Juan.
San Juan is in the mountains. San Juan is isolated. San Juan is full of drunks. San Jaun is sketcho. San Juan had no buses scheduled for us to leave. So, we learnt how to Honduran-hitchhike in San Juan. We ended up waiting for half an hour before a big, cattle truck pulled up and people were jumping out the back crate. In our nervous, broken Spanish we asked where they were going. Magic word! La Esperenza! We hopped in the truck with about seven locals and hit the road. The road, as it turns out, is not so much a road as a cliff-gripping, dirt/rock, isolated path. We had heard it wasn´t a very good road.. but that wasn´t a very accurate description. With nothing much to hang on to, and the only thing offering any consolation being the only semi-nervous locals, a long ride to say the least. Roads seemed to dissapear because they were so steep, one of the drivers stalled on most uphills and so we would stop, roll backwards a bit and then lurch up the hill. The sun went away, it got cold, little over cast, and the ride continued: Pretty much forever. We eventually did arrive in La Esperenza, and the three of us couldn´t be more thrilled at being out, the prospect of food, shower and toilet!!

We spent the night there and caught an 11am bus out to Marcala, where we are now. It wasn´t a bad road compared to yesterday´s and it eventually met up with a PAVED HIGHWAY!! Yay! (It was an exciting time for us).

The plan, if it works, is arriving (finally) in Perquin tomorrow.

It´s been an interesting Easter Weekend for us, hope all of you had a great one!

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