HONDURAS: THE MURDER CAPITAL OF THE WORLD

Apr 16

Let us start off by saying that we are mere visitors to these wonderful Latin American countries. We can't comment on political issues, poverty, and the way of life of the millions of people we didn't meet. We are merely describing our great three week experience in a country that we knew almost nothing about before we crossed the border... - Richard and Ashley

With a reputation of being the murder capital of the world who wouldn't want to go to Honduras? During our volunteer prep back home in Vancouver we had the choice between Guatemala and Honduras, and chose Honduras. We knew that due to its reputation it may have less volunteers and our impact could be more far reaching. Plus we wanted to give this misunderstood country of Central America a chance and scope it out for ourselves.

We heard the bad press before we left on our trip. But then again we heard bad press about almost every Latin American country we had made through safely. The one difference were all of the stories about the corrupt police in Honduras. We made sure that we had our necessary warning triangles, fire extinguisher, and all paperwork handy in case we got pulled over. Prepared and vigilant.

Well, after two weeks in the country we were pulled over handful of times while going through police checkpoints. Every single one of these started with a smile and a handshake. Sometimes they asked for paperwork, but every time they just waived us on and told us to have a good day. Riiiighht. That's what all the fuss is about? Maybe they're just doing their job, or maybe it was Richard's sweet technique of bombarding them with bad Spanish. Try it, it works!

"Hola! Como tiamo? Soy Ricardo. Mucho gusto! Soy de Canada! Nosotros manejamos aqui de Canada! Vente mille kilometers! Mi gusta acampar!"

Oh yeah, we didn't get attacked by any drug cartel either. Bonus!

Okay, so if we didn't get bribed by cops or attacked by drug dealers, then what did we do in Honduras? First things first was a stop to the ruins of Copan. After 8 hours on the road we stopped at Jim's Pizza for a margherita pizza and some beer. So far so good, Honduras. The next day we fueled ourselves up with local coffee and bagels and lox. Not necessarily having a hard time finding great food in this country.

Really, Copan was just a good place to stop after crossing the border from El Salvador, but we thought it was worth a walk through the ruins while we were in town. In all honesty, after seeing Tikal, Teotihuacan, and Palenque these were pretty underwhelming compared to the sheer size of the other ruins. The saving grace was that there were only a handful of other tourists and the park was muy tranquillo. Our recommendation is to bring a picnic lunch and hang out for a couple of hours.

Our next week was spent in El Porvenir, but you read about that in the last blog post... didn't you?

After volunteering we needed to make one more stop before the run to the Nicaraguan border. We set up camp at D&D Brewery on Lago Yojoa. Once again, the food was great... we started our mornings with blueberry pancakes and local coffee ($4). Then we rented a rowboat for the day ($2.50) and worked out our shoulders and backs while working on some sweet hand calluses. Hardcore. Also we enjoyed the serenity on the lake.

And then the cops came to our campsite. Here we go, they want a bribe for sure and we weren't even driving anywhere. Our conversation was in Spanish, but here's the English version:

Police: "Do you want to take a photo with us?"

Richard: "Umm... Pardon?"

Police: "Do you want to take a photo?"

Richard: "Okay, can I sit on your bike?"

Police: "No problem, we can turn the lights on too!"

Alright Honduras, you win this one. Nicaragua is next!