Transportation randomness in Honduras
It never ceases to amaze me how different Caribbean coasts are from the rest of whichever country they may be in – Tela is no exception. Right on the coast of the Caribbean sea, Tela is about halfway between the Gautemala border and the the ´famous´ Bay Islands…where cheap, cheap, cheap scuba diving is in abundance. Now, it took quite an effort to get here – I dare say it may have been emotional at times. Starting from Tegucigalpa, I landed at the bus terminal after doing some necessary running around (including shopping! yayyyy…new shirts can be quite a thing eh?). Despite having checked earlier, the bus I wanted leaving Tegucigalpa @ 11 was now cancelled and the next one @ 12:30…which became 1pm…which didn´t leave till close to 1:30. To pass the time I read, wrote/swore in my journal, etc. and thats when it dawned on me that no one in Central America seems to need to occupy the “waiting period”… at least not like I was. People just sit there. Sometimes talking, mostly just staring straight ahead, no worries. Tried it, can´t do it…need to be busy! Haha.
Right, because of the delayed bus I, of course, missed the connecting bus to Tela – so, instead of heading to Caribbean coastal goodness I was stuck in San Pedro Sula, alledgedly the sketchiest city in Honduras with little Hondurian lempiras to my name – only US funds. And I was there at night. Knowing absolutely nothing about the place let alone where I could possibly stay. Thank the lord I was at a proper bus terminal (quite possibly the only one in Central America because I never came across one before or after) with internet…again, I am thankful for my good fortunes and can’t believe my luck. So, after some google-ing I set off to Hostal Tamarindo and despite there being no water (they rotate turning off the water in different areas of the city) had a good night sleep for about $10.
Dedicated to get to Tela ASAP I hit the bus terminal for 7 AM (after figuring out how to break out of my hostel as we were on lock down until the staff woke up). Chipper and alert due to some yummy coffee I boarded the bus to Tela after asking half a dozen people for confirmation and having a worker take my bag and place it on the overhead rack. Let me give you a brief play by play of what happened next (its helpful to imagine the following as an inner conversation that started calmly and rose in the anxiety department):
Hmmm, that’s funny – why is the driver’s assistant collecting money from people? I paid for my ticket at the station. Hmph, no worries. Usually people can pay either at a ticket booth or on the bus. Wow, this quy has quite the look of confusion whilst I hand him my bought ticket. Let me break out my very bad and broken spanish. Something about Tela…yes, yes – that’s where I’m headed…sign me up buddy! Hmmm, oh – shit – uh-huh. This is not the bus to Tela. Where the eff am I going – well, actually, that’s the least of my worries…. you get the point.
It took awhile to get him sufficiently distracted from continuing to collect $ from the passengers (who actually knew where they were going) in order to find out, ah, “con permisso?”, how do I go about actually getting to Tela then. This would require backtracking to San Pedro Sula….riiiiight….and I would go about doing that….??? Could you dumb down your spanish just a tad for me? Thanks. Again, you get the drift. Finally established that the plan would be as follows:
1) get off the bus in a few minutes (this meant 20); 2) cross the highway, flag down a bus to San Pedro Sula, and get on the proper bus. The waiting period at this stage involved having a truck driving try to convince me to be his driving companion back to the city (yes, I declined); 3) encounter 2 car accidents on the way back to San Pedro Sula, which slowed traffic to a crawl; 4) arriving, TWO HRS. later – I am attempting to explain to a guy (from the bus company that I want to be travelling with) how I was placed on the wrong bus by about 5 different people. His solution? He found me an English-speaking Argentinian to babysit me. Haha. Oh well, her and I had some good chats and I did finally manage to make it to Tela. Sigh. At least the most interesting part of travelling via bus is that there are so many people offering everything from water, to pizza, to friggin medication either on the bus or by hoisting these things up to the windows via wooden-rake like things.
Hopped into a cab and headed straight towards the water and stayed, well to be honest, in the Ghetto accomodations of Tela – MarAzul. But for about $5 a night I would take it – plus, the lady who ran the place gave me a fantastic padlock for the door. Except I didn’t have anything valuable so wasn’t that concerned about people getting into the room when I wasn’t there. On the other hand, locking myself in consisted of a rather rusty, poorly nailed in, sliding lock (you know, a la bathroom stall variety). I would have rathered the padlock for the inside to be quite honest! And, again, no running water after 3pm – that’s ok, I had a rather large bucket full with water sitting in the shower. So, tapping back into my Raleigh mentality and life in Nicaragua, I got by just fine. Knew I would need my plastic mess bowl at some point…!
Tela is an interesting tourist town for Hondurians – a few gringos but not in abundance. Very nice and hot so grabbing a beer beachside was glorious. Tela is lined up to become the next Cancun so I wanted to take advantage of the lack of development. Beach was filled with school kids and with local teens gallopping bareback on the beach. However, after some wandering around the town I became furious to find that, once again, my backpack had been unzipped. Grrrr! Oh well, nothing of value so was fine but still frustrating to no end and was beginning to despise my daypack and wishing for something less “I’m a backpacker”. All good though as I calmed my nerves at Casa Azul over nice cold limonada con soda & beer. An English speaking bartender and bar-‘neighbor’ made for a good night of chatting and an establishment of a plan for the following day – I was gonna go to Miami Beach.
So Saturday I woke up bright and early to try and get to Miami; tried to get a cab with the help of lovely ‘MarAzul’ lady – yet being a gringa meant that that cheapest I could get one would be 500 Lemps versus 100. Hmmm. Local bus it was. First to Tournabe – with the bus breaking down, of course. Arrived in Tournabe where I was supposed to get to the beach. Hitching was recommended to me. Except there were no cars going by. I asked some local ladies if walking was possible and even though I didn’t know what they were saying exactly I was pretty sure they were telling me that I was a crazy white girl who would be walking at her own risk. Right. Decided to check into the bus that would be going in a few hours. While waiting for this bus I sat with a man who spoke some English and his family. Practiced my spanish with some 10 year olds, blew bubbles, and watched a traditional Garifuna dance that involved the men being dressed up as women (alledgedly because when the Spaniards were kidnapping the women from their homes the men decided to dress as women and then attack their captors).
The ‘bus’ – a pickup truck with old wooden board as seats – showed up and I arrived at Miami beach via a sand road and met a very nice old man who was eager to show me where I could get a beer. Now the driver of the ‘bus’ explained to me that he could pick me up in 2.5 hrs – however, I would need to go with him to visit his family for 2-3 hours on the way back to Tela. Tempting, what with all the cultural learning opportunities, etc. Yet, after fitting in some great swimming and walking around to the lagoon (the only people who live in this area are people who fish in the lagoon…they live in theses small huts) I opted for hitching a ride with 3 surveyors from Tegucigalpa (who also commented on how the even for them being in this area was like a different country). My ‘family’ from Tournabe was quick happy to see that I was able to make my way back towards Tela – so sweet. On the other hand, my ‘mom’ (lady from MarAzul) was not impressed to see me jump out of a truck full of men. Again, very sweet and protective people along my travels. I ended my trip to Tela with another good night @ Casa Azul – speaking to some locals and some gringos…even skipping with some local children (when was the last time I skipped…? on a Sat. night…? in a small Hondurian town…?)…I even tried Gafiti which is a drink made by the Garifuna people (the descendants of escaped slaves…also called creole). Gafiti is both medicinal and good for getting hammered as it is a mixture of alcohol soaked in various roots and herbs. It is said to have healing and potency powers. Its ingredients are as follows:
– Most any type of alcohol (though rum is most popular)
– Garlic (a nature immune system booster)
– Allspice (a blood tonic)
– Jicaco Negro (roots of this black nut-bearing tree is used for calming the nervous system)
– Big man ( a mahogany-colored root found in the bush)
– Dead man ( a root used to enhance sexual drive)
– Cloves (for flavouring)
I decided that my only ‘regret’ of Tela was not taking the tour to Punta Sal, which is supposed to be stunning and well worth it. Oh well – closing down the bar at Casa Azul and having drinks bought for me (long after I had decided I should probably go to bed – damn rubber arm!) resulted in my being armed with lots of advice r.e. Utila (Bay Islands – my next destination). So on the Sunday a.m. I got back on the bus (relatively smooth operation – thank God!) and hopped on the ferry to the lovely island of Utila…
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