Author: ajgaines

After all the sun I decided it was time to head back for the hills. Seanan and I split ways  and he headed to San Pedro Sula to take a plane to another country and I headed up a river inland from La Ceiba to try my hand at white water rafting and to hike some green paths.

I ended up at Jungle River lodge, a drive far enough from La Ceiba to bring you deep into the thick green of Honduras.

I fell asleep as soon as I arrived and the next day I tried my hand at white water rafting. It was slightly touristy but still super fun. My favorite part was when we were scrambling up the river, jumping of ledges and swimming against the currents.

The jungle was thick, green, and dense around the river and on my last day I went on a hike out to a waterfall on my own.

When I returned I found that the family I had met the night before were going on a road trip to a place near Lake Yojoa. Since that was kind of my destination eventually too they offered to pile me into the family van with them for the trip. I packed my things, jumped in the van and we were off to go deeper into the jungle! On the trip I got to hear the Spanish version of, “99 bottles of beer on the wall”(it had something to do with elephants) and I got to meet a real-life half Honduran, half Ethiopian prince, except he wasn’t really a prince. 5 hours later the family dropped me off at the lake and I was left to my own devices again to navigate my way to D&D brewery, where I would be staying for the next few days.

 

Ahhh finally back at a dry hot beach after months wandering and hiking around wet mountains. I finally get to swim again and soak in the hot salty Caribbean. I picked Utila because it’s one of the cheapest places on earth to scuba dive and I wanted to have my first go at freediving. I also heard there were awesome parties.

The ferry over from La Ceiba was rough. The whole thing shook violently from side to side and there were times when I thought we were going to flip. Two of my friends threw up and I would have lasted another 10 minutes before I would have too.

When we landed in Utila we were swarmed by dive shop employees trying to entice us to do a course with them. I banded together with Connie and Anne because we thought we could get a better price if we went together. Eventually we settled on “Parrot Dive Center” which offered to do our courses for $240 each. I was doing my advanced open water course while Connie and Anne did their initial. The facilities were minimal and the “free housing” was absolute trash. I spent each cold shower standing in rust and hair and each night floating in an inch of my own sweat. The heat and humidity and the fact that we had one tiny window for a top floor room made the room unbearable to be in during the day and miserable to be in at night.

I started my course the very first morning and realized that you can forget how to dive after a year of not doing it. I jumped in the water the first time and heard my gear leaking and squealing behind me. My divemasters said that it was fine, but when I went down 5 meters with the group I started to hyperventilate. It took me by surprise, I never even believed in hyperventilation, but my lungs started to spasm and I got this feeling that I just couldn’t breathe. I signaled to the instructor that I was having trouble and he came over, grabbed my arm and saw that my fingers were turning blue. I wasn’t very aware of what was going on around me but I eventually remembered what you’re supposed to do and I tried to hold my breath for a moment and then take long deep breaths. I finally got my breath under gave the instructor the “OK” signal. The whole first dive I just stared longingly above at the surface as I pushed down to 30 meters for the first time. I could feel the nitrogen narcosis and felt mostly confused about the beauty around me.

 

The coolest part of the advanced course was diving a wreck that was pretty close offshore. It was 30 meters deep and when we went down we also took a mountain dew and a straw and drank it at 30 meters.

We also got to do one night dive which was unreal. Swimming around with the flashlights made it feel like we were on the surface and just moving around very slowly.

I continued to dive by day and then went out to Tranquila for rum by night. We would see our instructor Joel there who could always be recognized by the glitter he put on each night to party and the glitter he would wear the next day as a consequence. One night we got to see a divemaster graduation where scuba snorkels were strapped to their mouths and jungle juice was poured down the snorkel and tequila in their face masks that they were supposed to suck down with their nose. Painful.

After my stint at Parrots Dive Center I headed to Freedive Utila to try my hand at freediving. I wasn’t ready to leave the island yet and wanted to spend my birthday with the people I had gotten close with in Utila. The freediving was rough at first but I made it down to 12 meters the first day and 22 meters the next day on a single breath. I can’t describe how odd it was to go that far down without any equipment. On the way down it’s scary, you think you’re running out of breath, but as you reach the bottom and flip around you look up and see schools of fish swimming around and it’s just bliss. You can see the surface and that delicious air wayyyy far above you but I was never in a rush to go back up. It took one and a half minutes to go down 22 meters but when you’re under the water it feels like a lot less.

On my birthday I decided to go freedive around one of the local reefs. It was my first time at Coral View. I went to the end of their dock where I found a little bar and ordered Salva Vida and proceeded to sip it. I practiced my Spanish with the bartender, Kimberly, and found another guy at the bar to practice my Spanish with. I ordered us both more beers and when he left I did a bloody mary. I was feeling pretty good when I dipped into the hot water and swam out. It was only about 20 meters until the depth went from a meter to about 20 meters below. I dove down a few times following the crevices and cracks of the reef. I saw all kinds of fish down there, a turtle just as he started to ascend and two enormous barracudas hanging out curious of me around the bottom. After washing off the salt water I headed to Tranquila for some rum and there I ran into the Irishman that I climbed Acetenango and Fuego with. This time I got to meet his girlfriend and one drink led to another and we danced the rest of my 26th birthday away.

I woke up one morning and realized I had been in Utila for far to long. I ran into Seanan the second Irishman again and found that his plan was to go to Roatan and then back to La Ceiba. I thought that sounded like a brilliant plan so after Utila we took another miserable ferry. I started the trip as the only person to go stand out on the bow and after the boat started flying through the air the captain called for me to come inside. I walked inside and while I was walking to find a seat the boat dropped so hard my head went through the ceiling. It was kind of awesome and hilarious but I eventually found a seat and held on tight for the rest of the ride.

We rolled into Roatan and stayed at a hostel called Buena Onda. I snorkeled more, ate more food, and quenched my thirst with more Salva Vidas. I ran into Jana from Belize again who just happened to be staying at Buena Onda as well and spent the last day exploring the island in a car rental. It really wasn’t that exciting but we found a really cool kitesurfing spot on the east side of the island where I found another old friend from Copan.

After the grueling trek up and down the volcanoes of Guatemala it was time again to retreat to the beach. I set my sights on Utila in Honduras, packed my 20 things, and shot out of Antigua. To split up the travel I stopped in Copan Ruinas on the way. Copan is directly on the other side of the border into Honduras so my shuttle crew and I had to suffer through another border crossing. Upon arriving at the border the *ssh*le immigration officers told me that I messed up by not ensuring that I had received a stamp when I entered the country through the airport. They made me sit in a corner and wait in the office for about an hour while I shook my head and whispered, “ladron” as he tried to solicit a bribe from me over a stamp. After an hour and a half he finally wrote some ticket that effectively took all the Guatemalan pesos I had and we were free to go again, taking our first steps into the lush green concrete of the Honduran side of the border.

I was in Copan trying to get to Utila ASAP so the night I got in, an American I met on the shuttle, Ryan, and I walked around and looked for shuttles leaving the next day. We found out quickly it was a much smaller place than we had thought and came to accept that the next shuttle left in about 2 days. We settled in the hotel we were staying at with an Irishman, Seanan, and German girl, Maria. Ryan and I set out to explore the town and find something to eat. The town reminded me of a slightly more broken down and less colorful Antigua. We found some of the most delicious burritos I have ever tasted at, “La Llama del Bosque” and returned to the hotel with a handful of cigars and a plastic bag full of clinking beer. We distributed the beers and helped Seanan write the play that he was creating for some theatre in Ireland.

Not having intended to do anything in Copan I set to research and found that there were some cool ruins a walk away to check out. Ryan and I hit the ruins and were pleasantly surprised to find that it was feeding time for the red macaws that live at the ruins.

They swooped in around us and knocked the sunglasses off of Ryan’s head at one point. They let us get close to them but kept their small beady eyes on us. At this point I was feeling pretty content with the experience but we trudged on anyways to see the ruins themselves.

We tired ourselves exploring the Mayan ruins and then settled in a tienda for some beers.

After getting just a small fix for large beautiful birds I headed to the other major attraction in Copan, Macaw Mountain where they rescue of birds that people have kept as pets and try to collect eggs to release back into the wild. They had about 10 different species my favorite certainly being the Toucan. They let you walk through an exhibit with them and at first I couldn’t see any but one flew out from a banana tree and landed on the path directly ahead of me, letting me take a few pictures before flying off again.