Todos los Santos y Quetzaltenango del 31 de Octubre al 8 de Noviembre

Cruzamos la frontera entre Honduras y Guatemala sin ninguna dificultad. Tras un paso relampago por la capital, Ciudad de Guatemala, llegamos al pueblo indigena de Todos los Santos en los Cuchumatanes. Estamos a 3000 metros de altitud y nuestra primera sensacion es frio. Hace frio y no estamos muy preparados para ello. Un jersey y una sudadera es lo mas grueso que empacamos cuando planeamos el viaje a la soleada Costa Rica. Aqui, en el oeste de Guatemala, donde todos los pueblos estan por encima de los 1500 metros, hace frio. El 1 de Noviembre se celebro la fiesta patronal de Todos los Santos. Toda la poblacion es indigena y todos los hombres visten los mismos pantalones (rayas rojas y blancas) y camisa azul mientras las mujeres llevan un vestido multicolor en el que predomina el azul. Al parecer en Guatemala, cada pueblo tiene una vestimenta ligeramente didstinta que los distingue de otros pueblos. El idioma autoctono es el Mam aunque todos pueden hablar español. El show central de la fiesta es una carrera de caballos en linea recta de un punto a otro y vuelta al mismo punto (con sus trajes tipicos y sombreros con plumas) Antiguamente, cada vez que corrian de un punto a otro se tenian que beber un chupito de licor y seguir corriendo hasta que se caian borrachos del caballo y quedaban eliminados. Esta tradicion fue copiada de los conquistadores españoles por los propios indigenas que la han continuado hasta nuestros dias. Ganaba el que mas tiempo aguantara encima del caballo. Actualmente es igual aunque ya no beben durante la carrera, lo que no quiere decir que alguno no vaya bastante bebido trsa toda la noche de fiesta y las caidas tambien estan aseguradas. A parte de esto, no habia mucho mas en el pueblo, una pequeña noria para las fiestas y una humilde iglesia. El dia dos fuimos via Huehuetenango hacia la ciudad de Quetzaltenango. Una de las ciudades mas grandes del pais y con edificios grandes, lujosos y bonitos. Al parecer Quetzaltenango debe su riqueza a las grandes fincas de cafe que se esparcen a su alrededor. La moneda nacional es el Quetzal (que es el pajaro sagrado de los mayas) y la cerveza nacional mas popular se llama Gallo. Por cierto, un pequeño repaso a las cervezas mas populares de cada pais que hemos visitado: En Costa Rica beben Imperial, en Nicaragua Toña y Victoria, en El Salvador Pilsener, en Mexico Sol, Corona y Dos equis, en Belice Belikin, en Honduras Salva Vidas y en Guatemala Gallo y Cabro.
Guatemala es probablemente el pais mas colorido de centroamerica tanto por los paisajes como por la ropa de los diversos pueblos mayas que aun mantienen pero leyendo los periodicos nos da la impresion que Guatemala es tambien el pais con mayor corrupcion institucional. Las noticias de robos se suceden dia tras dia y no de ladrones comunes sino de alcaldes, gobernadores, funcionarios de la seguridad social, banqueros, ex ministros, ex presindentes, jueces, fiscales anticorrupcion acusados de corrupcion y hasta la policia esta implicada en robo de vehiculos y robo de droga a los narcotraficantes para su posterior venta por ellos mismos! No digo que en España nunca pasan algunas de estas cosas pero aqui el saqueo parece mas descarado.......
Tras visitar y descansar en Quetzaltenango nos dirigimos a Panajachel donde actualmente nos encontramos a orillas del lago Atitlan.

Santa Rosa de Copan, Gracias and The Ruins of Copan

26/10/09-29/10/09

We took the early boat out of Utila to begin our long journey back to San Pedro Sula, where we took another bus to the small village of Santa Rosa de Copan. There is nothing much to see here, apart from the usual main square and church, and on our first night, we were surprised to be paying quite an expensive rate for a fairly basic room, so the next day we were determined to find somewhere cheaper to stay. It didn't take long and we were soon moved into an even more basic room, with a bathroom which I couldn't bring myself to use once, the one consolation being that it was the cheapest room of the whole trip at just $3 each!

The one interesting thing that we did here was to visit the local cigar factory, Flor de Copan. It started as a small family business more than 60 years ago and now has 1,000 employees who together make 50,000 cigars a day. 99% of the cigars are exported, leaving just 1% for local consumption. 90% of the exported goods go to the US, while the remaining 10% are distributed throughout Europe. For a small fee, we were given a guided tour of the whole process. Much of the lands surrounding Santa Rosa de Copan are dedicated to the cultivation of tobacco, and this is where the factory gets the majority of its tobacco from. Once they receive the tobacco, it first has to dried and sorted by quality and size (not only are there different types of tobacco plant but each plant has leaves of different sizes too). Once dried and ready to be used, the leaves are taken to a room, where a group of around 70 women spend all day removing the central vein of the leaves. Apparently this part of the leaf is converted into fertilizer to be reused by the local farmers, although we did not see this part of the process. The smell of tobacco is very strong here, so the face masks we had been given at the start came in handy here :) Once the vein has been removed, the leaves are smoothed out flat and put into piles according to size and quality. The next room is where the cigars are actually made. One group has the task of rolling the cigars themselves, cutting them to size and storing them in trays of 10, which are then taken to another group of people who apply the outer layer of tobacco to complete the process. The finished cigars then go through a quality check, and the slightest fault results in a cigar being sent back to be re-made. The cigars that pass the quality check are then individually wrapped in plastic, with the appropiate labels etc. and packed into beautiful boxes, which are also made in the factory, but according to designs sent by the client. If I were forced to work in this factory for any reason, I would want to work in this part, not only because I would enjoy being involved in creating the final product, but also because it doesn't smell as bad in this part of the factory :)

Our next stop was in the small village of Gracias a Lempira. Lempira was an indigenous warrior who tried in vain to protect his people and land from the Spanish conquerors. He was cruelly murdered by the Spanish when they drew him out of safety under the pretence of a truce, and is considered a national hero. In honour of his memory, the national currency of Honduras is the Lempira. Again there was not much to see here, although there is a fort on top of a hill, which we visited in the afternoon. It does not appear to attract many tourists (to be honest I do not think Gracias itself is a popular tourist destination), but rather appears to be a hang out for local teenagers! Something that grabbed our attention were two cannons just outside the entrance of the fort that were made in Seville in 1799 and 1803 respectively using copper from the Rio Tinto mine, located in Vuelva in Andalucia. Both canons bore the inscription of Charles IV, King of Spain at the time of their construction.

Our final visit in Honduras was to Copan Ruinas, another Maya ruin site. The ruins are located a short walk out of town, and the town itself, although small is very beautiful, with an interesting museum and several hotels, restaurants and bars. Despite this, it isn't overly touristic and I really enjoyed our stay there, even though it was very brief. And although we have already seen so many Maya ruins, I found Copan really interesting. Something that made it a bit different to other sites we have seen were the various stone columns, known as stelae, which are representations of the different Mayan governors. While the Mayas inhabited the area there were a total of 16 governors, all of which are represented on a stone table, situated in front of one of the pyramids. Another remarkable sight is the Heiroglyphic Stairway, with a total of 75 steps, each of which bears a heiroglyphic inscription. Several measures have been put in place to conserve this magnificent structure and restoration is an ongoing process. A final thing that caught our attention here was the number of maccaws. We must have seen about 16 of them, always in pairs and constantly making lots of noise! They certainly give the ruins an extra something.

Santa Rosa de Copan, Gracias y Copan ruinas del 27 al 30 de Octubre

Desde Utila tomamos un barco de regreso a La Ceiba. Alli tomamos un bus hacia San Pedro Sula donde tomariamos un bus hasta nuestro destino: Santa Rosa de Copan. Y que hay aqui? pues aunque el pueblo no es tan bonito como habiamos imaginado si que tenia alojamiento barato. Una habitacion doble y baño compartido por 6 dolares (4 euros) batia el record como la habitacion mas barata del viaje. Os podeis imaginar la falta de lujo de dicha suite presidencial a la que trajimos nuestro propio papel higienico de un hostal anterior. Aqui visitamos una interesante fabrica de puros habanos (llamados asi por el tipo de hoja que los envuelve...) Nos hicieron una visita guiada a la fabrica por 36 lempiras (la moneda nacional de Honduras toma el nombre de un guerrero indigena que combatio a los españoles) o 2 dolares. Vimos todo el proceso, en una primera sala almacenan muchisimas hojas de tabaco donde se inicia el proceso de secado del tabaco. En una segunda sala, unas setenta mujeres (quizas mas) trabajan de pie quitandole una hebra a la hoja de tabaco para empaquetarlas (solo hombres, cargan con ellas y se vuelven a almacenar) y llevarlas a la sala de corte. Aqui el olor a tabaco es muy fuerte y teniamos que llevar mascarillas. En la tercera, mas de cien operarios se dedican enrollar el tabaco, cortarlo segun las especificaciones de la marca y envolverlo en otra hoja de tabaco. Despues pasa por un control de calidad donde devuelven los puros minimamente defectuosos para que sean enrollados de nuevo. En una cuarta sala se dedican a fabricar las bonitas cajas de madera donde empaquetaran los puros. En una quinta sala se empaquetan y etiquetan para distintos fabricantes. El 99% se exporta y el 1% se vende en Honduras. De las exportaciones el 90% se exporta a Estados Unidos y el 10% a Europa. La empresa, Flor de Copan, empezo hace mas de 60 años como pequeña empresa familiar y en la actualidad cuenta con mil empleados y fabrica cincuenta mil puros diarios. Recientemente ha sido adquirida por la hispanofrancesa Altadis.
Posteriormente fuimos al pueblo de Gracias donde hay una antigua fortaleza española. La fortaleza esta medio abandonada y apenas recibe turistas. Lo que mas me llamo la atencion fueron dos cañones españoles muy biwn conservados fabricados en Sevilla en 1799 y 1803 con la inscripcion Carolus IV y otra que decia cobre de Rio Tinto. Hasta aqui ha llegado el famoso cobre de Rio Tinto, transformado en dos grandes cañones de guerra.
Nuestra ultima parada en Honduras fue en el pueblo de Copan, desde donde visitariamos las grandes ruinas mayas de Copan. Esta ciudad maya fue el centro intelectual de la civilizacion y se pueden observar grandes construcciones de piedra. Aqui nos llego la noticia de un acuerdo entre Mel Zelaya y Michelletti para resolver la crisis antes de las elecciones. A dia de hoy, siguen sin ponerse de acuerdo. Esta vez no se ponen de acuerdo sobre el acuerdo al que llegaron. Dejamos Copan con destino a Todos los Santos Cuchumatan en Guatemala para ver el festival el dia de todos los santos.

A few more Utila highlights

Although the majority of our time in Utila was spent doing the dive course, there is still plenty more to tell of our stay on this beautiful island. Famous for its party atmosphere, several of our evenings in Utila were spent visiting the various bars, the most popular ones being Tranquila, Coco Loco and Treetanic, a bar which has been built inside a tree! Don't ask me how they did it, but it is an amazing sight and the atmosphere is great. On our first night, while Miguel was still with us, we were planning for a long night out, but contrary to Dave's claim that Saturday was usually 'a big night' for everyone on the island, the evening never really got going, and having started knocking back the Salvas (beers) quite early on in the evening, we were ready to go home by about 1am!

Another nice evening out was spent with most of the staff of the dive shop in celebration of the owners finding out that they were going to have a baby! It was a very exciting time for everyone and we had a great meal together, followed by a few drinks. This wasn't a late night for us though as we had to get back and prepare for our theory class the next day! Dave also kindly invited us round to his place for dinner one evening, where he prepared a curry with Carrie's assistance. They even remembered to do a non-spicy version for me, as I can't tolerate anything even slightly hot, and it was delicious. We spent a fun evening eating, drinking beer and telling jokes, and Vic and Miguel, at Carrie's request, taught us a very long list of Spanish swear words, which Carrie diligently wrote down, along with English equivalents :)

Before we left, we were lucky to be able to watch the Dive Olympics, something which had been set up by a few of the Parrots' staff just for a bit of fun. There were four teams of five people and the events included things such as holding your breath under water, a swimming relay, an egg and spoon relay wearing flippers, a running relay carrying scuba tanks through a slalam of chairs, jumping off the top floor of a nearby bar (with more points being awarded for the quality of the jump) and,of course, the traditional drinking game, which involved each team drinking two beers each one after the other, with the fastest team gaining maximum points. It was great fun to watch and a great success!

On our final day, we thought we were going to see the famous beach parties, which tend to take place every second Sunday. People carry a sound system and bbq down to the beach, everyone brings their own food and drinks and together they party the night away. Unfortunately, everyone was too hungover after the Dive Olympics to bother organising it. In fact several people who had taken part in the Olympics the day before hadn't even been to bed yet, and most were still partying in Coco Loco. And so it transpired that most of us ended up spending the day in Coco Loco, where we enjoyed a great crab soup, made by one of the locals, and spent the afternoon drinking and dancing. It was a brilliant way to end our stay on Utila and although we were a little sad to be saying goodbye to everyone, we have some fantastic memories of those few days and we will never forget the wonderful people we got to meet there.

Utila, Islas de la Bahia. Parte II

Pido un minuto de silencio para mi camara de fotos recientemente fallecida. Tras varios transplantes de pilas Duracell se confirmo la triste noticia. Esto se une a la temporal perdida de las fotos actuales de la tarjeta de Lauren con lo que de momento no podemos subir ninguna foto para todos los que seguis este blog. Vamos a seguir contando nuestras andanzas aunque no podemos prometer mas fotos, probablemente hasta nuestra vuelta.
Terminamos nuestro curso de buceo. Mas cosas que hemos aprendido y queremos compartir: debajo del agua es imposible saber de donde vienen los sonidos (si por la izquierda o la derecha) Esto se debe a que la velocidad del sonido es cuatro veces mayor debajo del agua! y por eso no apreciamos si el sonido nos entra antes por un oido o por el otro..... La profesora esta aprendiendo buceo tecnico. Esto es bucear a profunfidades de 50, 60 y 70 metros con gases distintos al oxigeno como el Helio o el aire enriquecido y con varios tanques para ir dejando en el camino. Nos contaron que otros bucean en cuevas submarinas (de lo mas peligroso) y los buceadores comerciales bajan a mas de 100 metros para buscar petroleo. Nosotros ya hemos terminado, Lauren queria hacer el curso avanzado consistente en hacer cinco especialidades a elegir (nosotros habriamos hecho buceo nocturno, busqueda de un galeon hundido, buceo profundo o mas de 30mtrs, fotografia submarina y navegacion con brujula) Sin embargo decidimos no hacer mas y seguir con nuestro viaje. Una vez conseguida la licencia hicimos una inmersion mas con Dave (el chico que conocimos en Belice) como nuestro Master de buceo (los master de buceo no pueden enseñar a gente sin licencia pero pueden liderar inmersiones con gente con licencia) que acababa de ser contratado por Parrots, nuestra escuela! Nuestro ultimo dia lo pasamos en una fiesta en el Coco Loco, Tranquila bar y Treetanic que es un bar encima de un arbol gigante. Toda la gente en los bares tiene que ver con el buceo y la mayoria de los camareros son tambien profesores o masters de buceo que trabajan media jornada en la escuela y media en uno de los multiples bares locales...... aqui estan todo los dias de fiesta y nos comentaban que siempre hay una excusa para hacer una... que viene un huracan, se encierran en un edificio seguro y hacen una Hurricane party. Que hay toque de queda del gobierno, se anuncian fiestas del "toque de queda" en las que la gente entra y no puede salir hasta el fin del toque en la mañana siguiente....haha. Curiosos no? Por ultimo se celebro en nuestra escuela una olimpiada de buceo en la que participaban los empleados y masters de buceo. Pasaron pruebas en equipo como aguantar la respiracion debajo del agua (un chico la aguanto un minuto y cuarenta y cinco segundos!) relevos de natacion, correr con las aletas y un huevo en una cuchara (relevos tb) tirarse desde el segundo piso de un bar al agua en diversas modalidades como recto, bomba, voltereta, de cabeza, en plancha siendo esta ultima la que obviamente daba mayor puntuacion, haha. Fue una competicion divertida que ponia punto y final a nuestra estancia en la isla. Al dia siguiente saliamos hacia Santa Rosa de Copan tras despedirnos de Annie, Dave, Jared, Ingrid y los demas.....

A Diver´s Paradise: Utila, Bay Islands

17/10/09-25/10/09

After the long hours spent travelling the day before, it was such a relief to finally arrive in Utila, part of an island group known as the Bay Islands, situated off the north coast of Honduras. Utila is famed for being one of the best (and cheapest) places in the world to learn to dive and this was our main reason for going there. Since the start of our trip, I had been hoping that I would have the chance to get my diver's license, and although Vic had always maintained that he would not be joining me, by the time we arrived in Utila, he too had come around to the idea, and so we wasted no time in finding out what options were open to us as complete beginners!! As soon as you get off the ferry, you are bombarded by people from the various dive schools, all desperate for customers, especially because it is currently low season :) We politely accepted leaflets and listened to what they had to say, but we already knew where we were heading too...Parrots Dive School. When we arrived, Vic and I were introduced to Annie, a lovely girl from England, who would be our instructor should we decide to go ahead with the course. Although there are several diving organisations throughout the world, the courses on offer at Parrots were PADI courses, with PADI (Professional Association of Diving Instructors) being the biggest and one of the best-known organisations in the world. As novices, we would start with the PADI Open Water Diver course, which in theory would take four days to complete (it ended up taking us six days due to adverse weather conditions at the start of the course). Completing this course allows you to dive anywhere in the world to a maximum depth of 18m. We decided to take the plunge and agreed to start the following Monday, giving us a couple of days to relax, explore the island, and of course, get started on the theory. In advance of starting the course we were each given a text book with more than 200 pages of theory, mini-quizzes and chapter reviews. I thought I would never get through it all in just a few days and was already worrying about the tests we would have to complete in order to pass the course :)

Our accommodation was very basic and the bathrooms could certainly have done with a proper clean, but it was so cheap (just $4 each a day) and so close to everything that it was no real hardship, and it's surprising what you can get used to after a couple of nights! I had an unfortunate encounter with a tarantula-sized spider in the bathroom one night, but it had disappeared by the morning and thankfully did not reappear. We tried to get a head-start on the diving theory, but it was difficult to get into study mode, and the bits that we did read started to put us off doing the course altogether. The first chapter talks about pressure changes, discomfort in your air spaces (primarily your ears) and the need to equalise (expand the air space) at every metre while descending. As you descend below sea level, the ambient air pressure increases and the volume of the air inside your air spaces (ears, sinuses and mask) decreases, causing discomfort. The most common way of equalising your ears and sinuses is to pinch your nose and breathe out gently, until you feel a slight pop (similar to the sensation experienced when flying). To equalise the air space within your mask you simply have to breathe out via your nose, which is why masks are designed to cover your nose as well as your eyes. Ascending is a different matter, as the volume inside your air spaces is now increasing rather than decreasing. This does not usually create too much of a problem as the extra air tends to escape of its own accord. The only serious problem you could experience would only arise if you held your breath. The air inside your lungs would increase in volume, forcing your lungs to expand, much like a balloon, which could lead to over-inflation or even lung rupture. This is the most serious injury a diver can suffer from, but one that can be easily avoided by never holding your breath....hence the golden rule of scuba diving is: Keep breathing :) Also important during your ascent is to maintain a steady pace...you should never ascend at a speed faster than 18m per minute. Ascending quicker than this, especially from a great depth, can lead to nitrogen narcosis. While you are underwater, nitrogen forms in your blood, with more nitrogen being produced the deeper you go and the longer you remain under water. With our theory books we were given a table, which allows you to calculate how much nitrogen you will have in your blood after diving for a certain amount of time at a certain depth. It is very important, especially when doing multiple dives, to work out how much time you can spend at one depth and how much time you need to wait in between dives, to ensure that you remain within the decompression limits. If at any time, you exceed the limits, you are required to make saftey stops of between 5 to 8 minutes at a depth of 5m before surfacing....In the worst case scenario, if you do suffer from nitrogen narcosis once you are out of the water you have to go to a decompression chamber, which subjects you to the same conditions as a dive, but over a period of several hours!!! As you can probably imagine, we were starting to panic a bit, as the book makes it all sound so dramatic, but once you get into the water, all those worries disappear and everything comes quite naturally.

There were just three of us doing the course: Vic, myself and another guy from Israel called Omri, who was nice, although a bit of a problem for Annie at times, in that he wasn't always prepared for class, he would often take his time when Annie called us in to the classroom and he often arrived late for dives (one morning he arrived more than 50 minutes after the scheduled meeting time). Due to very bad weather around the time our course was starting, we ended up spending the first couple of days doing nothing but theory. The text book was split into five chapters and it was up to us to work through the book in our own time and prepare the chapter reviews for each class. In class we would watch the video corresponding to each chapter, Annie would summarise the main points and together we would go through the chapter reviews. Finally we would complete a multiple-choice test before moving on to the next chapter. By the end of the second day we had already completed three chapters, leaving us with two more to go and, of course, the final exam. Over the next couple of days, in between doing our enclosed-water dives, we completed the two remaining chapters and sat our final exam. As Annie had promised, we all passed the first time and the theoretical part was over :)

The practical side of the course involved two enclosed-water dives and four open-water dives. During the enclosed-water dives we were kneeling on the sea bed at a maximum depth of between 5m-8m, with Annie and two assistants, meaning that we had one experienced diver for each beginner, which helped to put us all at ease. The purpose of these first 'dives' are to learn and practise the skills necessary to be able to progress to open water. There were 21 skills in total and included things such as (1) taking your regulator out of your mouth and replacing it (if the regulator is submerged in water, water gets inside so when you put it back into your mouth you have to expel the water before you can breathe normally again), (2) filling your mask up with water and displacing the water by breathing out through your nose, (3) removing your mask completely and replacing it while underwater, (4) swimming without your mask, (5) telling your buddy that you're low on air or out of air, using the appropriate hand signals, and using their alternate air source to go to the surface. Every diver carries two air sources: the primary and the alternate, which a diver's buddy might require should they run out of air during a dive. Like the name suggests, a 'buddy' is the partner you dive with. You ALWAYS dive with a buddy and it is each diver's responsibility to keep his or her buddy in sight at all times. There are certain hand signals you have to learn in order to be able to communicate with your buddy underwater. There are signs for: 'I'm out of air', 'I'm low on air', 'I need to share your air', 'I'm cold', 'Shall we go up?', 'Something's wrong!', and 'How much air do you have?' This one is particularly important, as it is essential to regularly check how much air you have left, to avoid running out before reaching the surface. As well as it being bad for you if you run out of air, it is also detrimental to the tank if you drain it completely. The air in the tank is measured in either bar or PSI (pounds per sqaure inch), which we were using. A full tank is between 2700 and 3500 PSI and I think it is normal to start your ascent when you reach 1000 PSI so that you have at least 700 PSI remaining once you hit the surface. There are different hand signals to show how many thousands and how many hundreds of PSI you have remaining.There are many other signals too, and before every dive, it is important to go over these signals with your buddy.

Next it was on to the open-water dives, during which we would reach depths between 12m and 18m. Buoyancy is essential when scuba diving and being too light or too heavy will affect your ability to stay at the same depth in the water. More often than not you need to wear a weight belt and there is a test you can do at the surface to make sure you are weighted correctly. Once underwater, your buoyancy is controlled by your breathing more than anything. As you breathe in you rise slightly and you descend again as you breathe out. You can also use your BCD (buoyancy control device), a jacket similiar to a life vest, to help control your buoyancy. This is connected to your air tank, and you can add small bursts of air to it during your dive. You do not want to add too much though, as this will cause you to ascend too quickly, which is dangerous. When you are ascending, it is essential to let the expanding air out of your BCD constantly! During these open-water dives, we continued to practise the skills we had learnt in the enclosed-water dives, to ensure that we could do them at depth while suspended in mid-water. The rest of the time was spent swimming behind Annie, trying to stay next to our buddies and of course, admiring our surroundings. At first, I think I was too preoccupied with the actual swimming to take much notice of anything around me, and it also felt awkward to move my head from side to side, but once I had relaxed a bit, I soon got the hang of it and really started to enjoy it! We saw lots of beautiful fish, at times we were in the middle of huge schools and there seemed to be fish everywhere....it was truly amazing. After each dive we made a record in our log books, and Annie would point out the fish we had seen in a big and tell us the names. Some of my favourites include: Queen Angelfish, Fairy Basslets and Rainbow Parrot fish. There are several others that I love but I can't remember all of the names :)

Also included in the package, were two free fun-dives for when we had completed the course itself, and we had the honour of having Dave as our dive master. A dive master is someone who can take other qualified divers out on dives, but is not yet qualified to instruct. At Parrots, there were several dive master trainees, with Jared, Alan and Ingrid being the ones who often accompanied us on our course dives. On our fun dives, I buddied up with Ingrid, who was brilliant at spotting things and we saw so many fish. When we filled in our log books after the dive, I didn't even have enough space to write down everything we had seen! The first fun dive was best of all and proved to me that I do love scuba diving, and I really hope I will have the chance to do a lot more dives in the future. I would have loved to have gone on to do the Advanced Open Water Diver course, as the dives sound really cool (you can choose from wreck diving, underwater photography, night diving, navigational diving and several others). Unfortunately, we didn't have more time or money to spare, but hopefully one day. For anyone that has ever considered learning to dive, I assure you, you will absolutely love it! I did and I can't wait for the next time!! Just one more diving fact before I finish...does anyone know what scuba stands for???.......self-contained underwater breathing apparatus. Who would have guessed? :)

Utila, islas de la Bahia del 17 al 26 de Octubre. Parte I

El viaje en barco lleva una hora. Llegamos a Utila, isla donde naufrago Robinson Crusoe y escondite de piratas. Al parecer, en esta isla, el famoso Morgan escondio su tesoro. La isla esta altamente especializada en escuelas de buceo. No solo para principiantes sino para los buceadores avanzados que se sacan los Masters de buceo o los que se preparan para ser instructores de buceo. Hay montones de ellas. El idioma mas hablado en esta isla no es el español sino el ingles. Los habitantes autoctonos son verdaderos descendientes de piratas y hablan un ingles extraño, con palabras distintas y un acento brusco que ni Lauren llegaba a entender a veces. Decidimos sacarnos la licencia para bucear en Parrots, una de las escuelas. Se llama el PADI Open Waters, lo que nos permitira bucear en cualquier parte del mundo hasta una profundidad maxima de 18 metros. El curso lleva una semana y no es como yo me lo habia imaginado. Pensaba que te ponian el equipo y ala.... a bucear. Pero lo primero que te dan es el libro gordo de Petete que tienes que estudiar para pasar unos test y un examen final. El libro te enseña las normas basicas de buceo y de seguridad aunque dice cosas como ¨los tiburones rara vez atacan al ser humano pero si lo hicieran, que no te entre el panico¨como? que no nos entre el panico? que hacemos........ le acariciamos el lomo? El libro dice que debes salir del agua lo antes posible si se mantiene a tu alrededor ya que normalmente los tiburones estan de paso y solo si no lo hacen podria ser una amenaza. Hablando con otros expertos buceadores comentaron que lo que hay que hacer es darles un puñetazo o patada en el morro ya que son muy sensible en esa zona y los dejas KO. No se..... no estaba yo muy convencido, mejor no pensar en ello. La regla numero uno es: nunca dejes de respirar debajo del agua o aguantes la respiracion. Parece obvio no.... pero algunos principiantes en panico tienden a aguantar la respiracion lo que puede ser muy malo debido al cambio de presion cada vez que desciendes un metro. Esto hace que el aire en tus pulmones se comprima al descender o se expanda cuando asciendes lo que no es malo mientras sigas respirando pero si lo aguantas... los pulmones se hinchan como un globo segun el aire a distinta presion se expande y puede llegar a romper los pulmones lo que es una de las lesiones mas graves de un buceador. El libro seguia animandonos! Bueno, la segunda regla mas importante es: Asciende muy lentamente, nunca mas de 18 metros por minuto. Esto es por el nitrogeno que tu cuerpo absorve ademas de por el cambio de presion. Si asciendes muy rapido tu cuerpo no tiene tiempo de eliminar el nitrogeno y puede llevarte a sufrir una Narconitrosis. Tambien si estas mas de lo permitido a una determinada profundidad por lo que nos dieron unas tablas para calcular nuestro nitrogeno en el cuerpo despues de cada inmersion e intervalos de seguridad entre inmersiones. Nuestra profesora, Annie, nos dijo que si estos limites de ¨decompresion¨ se superaran nos tendrian que llevar a una camara de descompresion para reducir aceleradamente el nitrogeno en sangre. Que bien no? Con toda esta teoria, estabamos deseando meternos en el agua! Finalmente llego el dia. La primera sensacion respirando debajo del agua es muy extraña. Al principio como que no te fias de que regulador (por donde tomas el aire) te vaya a dar aire. Cuando ves que no pasa nada empiezas a calmarte y disfrutar de los peces, el coral, los sonidos y la sensacion de flotar como un astronauta. Es muy relajante..... aunque de vez en cuando te dices a ti mismo... sigue respirando... que no se te olvide...haha. Nuestra profesora era de Inglaterra y sabia muchisimo. Nos hizo aprender 21 habilidades debajo del agua para ir cogiendo confianza en caso de alguna situacion de riesgo. Nos enseño las señas para decir algo va mal, peligro, me duele el oido, todo bien, tengo frio, tengo poco aire, no tengo aire, necesito compartir mi aire, sigueme, baja a mi nivel, sube a mi nivel, numeros para decir la cantidad de aire en el tanque en cientos y miles de PSI- (libras por pulgada cuadrada en ingles-pounds per square inch) Lo que no nos dijo es a decir ¨me meo¨Lo cual me pasaba frecuentemente (no os riais pero me gustaria veros a vosotros con un traje de buceador que mantiene el calor de tu cuerpo, con tantas burbujas a tu alrededor y tanta agua....) Las dos primeras inmersiones las hice con traje y las cinco siguientes sin traje porque para mi era...... mucho mejor! Eramos tres alumnos, Lauren, Omri un chico de Israel del que ahora os cuento algunas anecdotas y yo. Cada vez que ibamos al agua teniamos a una persona pendiente de nosotros, Annie, la profesora y dos masters de buceo o al menos estudiantes del master de buceo con mucha experiencia, de forma que habia tres vigilando a los tres alumnos. Eso nos hacia sentirnos mucho mas seguros..... Omri era el otro alumno aunque hacia lo que a el le daba la gana. Al acabar la primera inmersion, Annie dijo, vamos al barco y Omri dijo.... ah no, yo me voy para la playa...hahaha... la profesora, que no, que tu te vienes al barco. Otro dia saliamos a las 7 de la mañana y Omri no estaba alli. Se habia quedado dormido y la profesora fue a buscarle a las 7.15 a su habitacion (que afortunadamente estaba en lamisma escuela de buceo) y dijo... aahhh dejame 15 minutos mas. tengo sueño. Annie no podia creerlo y no sabia que hacer. Uno de los Masters de buceo, Jared fue a buscarle otra vez y esta vez dijo que ya iba. Aparecio para montar su equioo a las 7.50!!! increible. Otra vez, despues de la clase nos mando Annie a comer para estar listos para la inmersion de la tarde y despues de unas horas el aparecio diciendo que no habia comido y que se iba en un momento a por algo! Cuando Lauren y yo estabamos ya montando nuestro equipo.....

Bye Bye Belize, Hello Honduras

16/10/09

So after just two weeks our time in Belize has come to an end, something which we´re actually not too sad about. Don´t get me wrong, we have had some good times and met some lovely people, but apart from those few highlights, Belize has been quite a disappointment and we are really looking forward to moving on to Honduras. From Placencia you can take a boat to Puerto Cortes, one of the major ports of Central America according to our taxi driver. The journey is only meant to take a couple of hours, but that's if the boat doesn't stop off somewhere for hours for no apparent reason! Efficiency is severly lacking here :) The journey was quite interesting though as there was a kind of debate going on between the Honduran passengers...the point of discussion of course being the current political situation in Honduras. There was one man passionately defending the deposed president Mel Zelaya, while a couple of others (a man and a woman) were more in favour of his replacement, Roberto Michelletti. The former was arguing that there had been an uncalled-for state coup, while the other two were adamant that there had been a mere constitutional succession because Zelaya had violated one of the core principles of the Honduran Constitution. Zelayer's defender went on to say that you can't call it a constitutional succession when the President is forced out of his home in the middle of the night dressed in nothing but his pyjamas, to which the woman replied: "I would have dragged him out naked if need be!". It was an entertaining exchange and helped to pass the time :)

So instead of arriving in Honduras at around midday, we arrived at about 2.30pm, and no sooner were we out of the boat, than we were surrounded by taxi drivers offering to take us here, there and everywhere, furiously bartering to win the custom of the confused tourists trying to work out where we had to go next. Our passports had already been taken from us and we had to make our way to passport control, which for some strange reason isn't located at the port, but a ten minute drive away in the centre of town...hence you need a taxi! We eventually managed to negotiate a good price for all five of us to be taken to the passport place, then to a cash point, and finally dropped off at the bus stop so we could continue our journey to San Pedro Sula (we have since heard that there have been cases of dengue fever reported here....eek!). When we got out of the taxi we were again confronted by several people, this time offering a ride to San Pedro....a direct bus for this amount of Lempiras (the local currency in Honduras named after a famous indigenous warrior), one that stops along the way for a bit less...the desperation was palpable. People were trying to grab our bags so that we would get on their bus, telling us to follow them, ensuring us that their bus was direct and therefore quicker! Dave, who had done this journey before was our chief negotiator and managed to get us a good price :) We were quite surprised to get away with paying the amount we did, especially as a few of our backpacks were occupying two extra seats....but Dave is obviously good at persuading people!

San Pedro Sula wasn't the end of the road, however. Ultimately we were trying to get to Utila (one of the Bay Islands situated off the north coast of Honduras). We were never going to make it there, so we were at least aiming to reach La Ceiba, a town on the north coast and departure point for the Bay Islands. We arrived at San Pedro in time to get one of the last buses to La Ceiba, even having a few minutes spare to grab some food before the 4 hour bus ride. Dave, again having been here before, knew which hotel to head for and we soon had a room for the night for a mere $5 each. After dumping our bags we headed out for a few drinks to relax a bit after the long day of travelling. I didn't feel like a beer but the rest of the group ordered the typical life jackets...the most popular Honduran beer is called Salvavida, which is life jacket in Spanish :) And neither did they waste any time in sampling the local cuisine: baleadas. This is a flour tortilla, standardly filled with beans and cheese (spicy sauce optional), which you can often add meat to as well. These ones in particular contained a meat medley of I think beef, chicken and pork. I didn't partake at this point in time but the others assured me that they were very good, and they were extremely cheap as well at just 50p each!

The difference in atmosphere here was incredible...Almost everywhere we went to in Belize, it was always so quiet during the evening, and you only ever saw a few people out and about. Here in La Ceiba, there were people everywhere! There was so much noise and life...it was a refreshing change and we felt right at home, although we did manage to attract a few strange looks from the locals. I have no idea why!! This being the transport hub for the popular Bay Islands I think they must be pretty used to seeing tourists by now :) The next morning we made our way to the port to catch the morning boat to Utila and the crossing took just over an hour. The owner of a local dive shop who Dave knew from his previous visit was at the port to meet us and so we all headed straight for Parrots (the dive school where we would end up doing our PADI Open Water Diver course).

Hacia Honduras y La Ceiba, 16 de Octubre

A las 8 de la mañana esperabamos el barco en el muelle de Placencia. Llegaron mas turistas, incluidos unos americanos que habian conocido a Miguel dos semanas antes en Guatemala. Tomamos unos batidos de frutas y compramos unos platanos para desayunar en el muelle. Al montar en el barco, con una decena de Hondurenios, se podia sentir otro ambiente al de Belice. Bromas, risas y discusiones sobre la crisis de Honduras. Nosotros como turistas escuchabamos sin dar nuestra opinion aunque la discusion parecia mas una comedia que una diferencia de opiniones. Un hombre de unos cincuenta anios defendia a Mel Zelaya y decia que habia habido un golpe de Estado en Honduras porque Mel habia subido un 60% el salario minimo. Un hombre mas joven, ejecutivo de ventas de una empresa Suiza de fertilizantes agricolas, decia que no habia habido tal golpe sino un cambio constitucional para librar al pais del comunismo que venia.... El hombre de cincuenta años dijo: Constitucional? pero si han sacado al presidente en calzoncillos!! ... tras lo cual, otra mujer empezo a reir y dijo: ¨anda... en pelotas lo habria sacado yo.... por corrupto¨. Asi estaba el panorama en el barco. Otros hondureños intervenian en la conversacion y cada vez mas risas. Al llegar a Honduras y sin saber muy bien que esperar (por la crisis politica) nos sorprendio la normalidad de todo. Una docena de taxistas camioneta se pelean por llevar a los 7 turistas que habiamos llegado a puerto. Cada vez que nos daban un precio otro bajaba mas el precio para que nos fueramos con el y asi conseguimos un buen trato para que nos llevara a aduanas, que incomprensiblemente nos estaban en el puerto sino en el centro de la ciudad. Al subirme a la camioneta de un salto se me rajo el pantalon asi que ahora ando con un agujero en uno de mis pantalones que tengo que coser... o intentar coser. Desde Puerto Cortes tomamos un bus hacia San Pedro Sula, la segunda ciudad mas grande del pais y donde en vez de disturbios encontramos tranquilidad con la excepcion de los taxistas y conductores de autobuses que persiguen a los turistas para que se monten con ellos. Uno de estos nos estaba llevando hacia su autobus entre una marea de otros conductores y autobuses mientras nos agarraban para que nos metieramos en otro en vez del que habiamos acordado. No habiamos visto algo igual antes. Tras todo un dia de viaje llegamos a la Ceiba, en el norte del pais donde pasariamos una noche antes de ir a nuestro destino, Utila, Islas de la Bahia. Dejamos nuestras cosas en nuestro hostal (cinco dolares la noche por persona con baño privado) y fuimos a tomar algo a la llamada ¨zona viva¨o donde la gente sale a tomar algo. Una vez mas recordamos lo muerto que estaba Belice y lo distinto que era aqui. Habia gente por todas partes, bailando, cenando, bebiendo. Nosotros tomamos unas Baleadas que son unas tortillas de trigo en vez de maiz, rellenas de queso, frijo, pollo, ternera y cerdo. Por solo 75 centavos de dolar cada una. Otro de los grandes temas de conversacion aqui entre los hondureños es el futbol. Son fanaticos del futbol y estan emocionados con la clasificacion de su seleccion para el mundial de Sudafrica. No se habian clasificado desde España 82. A la mañana siguienre regateamos con otro taxista que nos llevo al puerto para tomar nuestro barco hacias las Bay Islands, Islas de la Bahia.

Belizean Beaches: Dangriga and Placencia

12/10/09-15/10/09

Eager to leave the phantom city of Belmopan behind we took a bus to Dangriga, a small fishing village on the east coast of Belize. The beach was ok, although not very clean, and by now we were really starting to wonder where all these beautiful Belizean beaches were hiding! Our accommodation on the other hand was lovely. It was only a basic room with a shared bathroom, but it was obvious that the woman running it really cared about her guests and that it was important to her that they enjoyed their stay. I felt really at home there, rather than just in yet another hostel!

The vast majority of the population in Dangriga is Garifuna, descendants of the African slaves that the English brought over from Jamaica to cut logwood in the 17th century. Because we arrived on a public holiday, there was hardly anyone around and everything was closed so we walked up and down the one street taking in the surroundings. Several of the buildings are wooden constructions badly in need of repair and in general the aspect of the town is quite poor. We got chatting to one of the locals and asked if he could recommend us a place to eat, and he said: Burger King :) We were thinking, there is no way that there is a branch of Burger King in this tiny village, and our thinking was correct. King Burger, as it is officially called is a small restaurant specialising in local cuisine, but when it was first opened the owner had named it Burger King, unaware of the huge American chain of the same name. The local we were chatting to, having spent various years in the US, advised him to change it rather than get embroiled in a copyright lawsuit, and so it became King Burger! We ate breakfast there a couple of times and the food was ok, the service adequate. It seems that everyone who works there is either angry or simply incapable of smiling!

After a couple of days we were ready to move on again and so we headed south along the coast towards Placencia, our final stop in Belize before going to Honduras (yes, in spite of all that is going on there, we think it is safe enough to risk a couple of weeks there). As we neared Placencia, it looked promising, with beautiful hotel complexes right on the beach and sparkling blue sea. One of the bus attendants asked us where we were staying and they dropped us off right outside (what service!). The place was nice with a balcony overlooking the beach complete with hammocks and semi-comfortable chairs. We didn't waste much time in the hostel though, preferring instead to check out the beach and enquire about the boats to Honduras (the next one was leaving on Friday morning, giving us two nights in Placencia, which was plenty of time). The beach was unfortunately another disappointment, but probably the best we have seen in Belize. It was wide and long with palm trees, but the sand wasn´t very soft so it wasn´t very comfortable to walk on, and towards the shoreline, it was littered with rubbish and lots of dry seaweed. The sea too was filled with bits of grass, so the one time we went for a swim we only stayed in the water for about a quarter of an hour!

The best thing about Placencia was the people we met. On our second and final day, two new people moved into our hostel: Carrie from England and Miguel from Spain. They had met on the bus on the way here and had decided to share a room to be more economical. Carrie too was planning on going to Honduras the following day, and although Miguel was due to fly back home from Mexico City in about five days, by the end of the evening he had decided that he was coming too :) By that time, a fifth person had joined our little group and that was Dave, also from England, who already knew Carrie after spending time with her in Caye Caulker. They had also done the famous pub quiz and they too had won first prize! Only their first prize was a jug of rum punch and not US$25 of their bill. As you can imagine, they felt cheated :)

All three of our new friends were very interesting people with great stories to tell. Carrie moved away from England many years ago to settle in Australia and is now on the lookout for her new home, either in South or Central America, and the perfect place to set up a little business, whatever that might be. Miguel, who spent close to six years in Edinburgh speaks perfect English, but with a Scottish accent. It's understandable that he would pick the accent up after so many years living there and it is wonderful to listen to, but at the same time it's so funny to hear a Scottish accent coming from a Spanish person. And what can I say about Dave....he has so many stories to tell, that like Vic said, he could write a book. He has travelled to so many places, seen so many things and tried his hand at so many different jobs that he always has something interesting to tell you. We had a nice night together having some food and drinking coconut rum with pineapple...I think we were all under the impression that we were getting them at the happy hour prices and we just kept ordering them, but when the bill came, only one of them had been served within 'happy hour'. No wonder that first one tasted more like pineapple juice than rum and pineapple :) Dave was also heading to Honduras the next day, and more specifically to Utila, one of the Bay Islands, from where he had departed two weeks ago to explore the job opportunities in Belize. We were unanimous in the conclusion that Belize had been a big disappointment and Dave assured us that Utila would be a welcome relief from the dirty beaches, rude beggars and expensive prices of Belize.

Utila is one of the best, and cheapest, places in the world to learn to scuba dive, which I have been hoping to do since we came away. Vic has been unsure as to whether he will join me or not, but Dave and Carrie, who are both experienced divers have been telling us both how amazing it is, and Dave knows the perfect place for us to learn in Utila. I'm definitely going to do it and I can't wait....now all we have to do is persuade Vic :)

Dangriga y Placencia del 13 al 16 de Octubre

Desde la capital fantasma Belmopan tomamos un bus hacia Dangriga, una comunidad de garifunas al sureste de Belice. Los garifunas son descendientes de esclavos del Caribe. El pueblo esta lleno de casas de madera con poco mantenimiento. Sus habitantes se dedican a la pesca y son pocos los turistas que vienen por aqui. Tienen una pequenia playa, mo muy limpia, y varios comedores regentados por taiwaneses. Conocimos a un hombre que nos recomendo el King Burger para comer. Este senior habia vivido unos anios en Estados Unidos y al volver vio que uno de los nuevos locales de su pueblo se llamaba Burger King (no la cadena americana) y le comento al duenio que se iba a meter en un lio si no cambiaba el nombre. Asi que desde entonces paso a llamarse el King Burger!! Tras dos dias en este caluroso pueblo y en busca de mejores playas bajamos hacia el sur, Placencia. La playa no era mucho mejor y en este punto ya nos convencimos que lo de las bonitas playas de Belice debe ser un mito. Conocimos a dos turistas en nuestro hostal. Cary, inglesa que vive en Australia y esta viajando por Latinoamerica con la intencion de abrir un hostal. De forma que su viaje es una especie de plan de negocio e investigacion de mercados..... Parece que de momento le interesa Bolivia o el norte de Argentina. Que raro que no quiera establecerse aqui en Belice..... El otro turista es Miguel, espaniol de Guadalajara con acento escoces cuando habla ingles. Es muy curioso, Miguel paso unos cinco anios en Escocia y habla como un escoces! Esto derivo en una conversacion sobre escoceses en la que aprendimos lo siguiente: 1. el unico sitio del mundo donde la coca-cola no es la bebida mas consumida es Escocia. 2. Los escoceses beben muchisimo alcohol, mas que los alemanes e ingleses. 3. Segun Cary, eso explica por que nunca te encuentras con escoceses viajando, estan demasiado ocupados bebiendo..... Otro turista que se unio a este grupo fue Dave, que habia conocido a Cary antes y volvieron a encontrarse. Dave es un tipo peculiar. Lleva diez anios viajando de un sitio para otro y antes de viajar trabajo como controlador aereo y como conductor de taxis. Hace muchos anios, en su viaje por Guatemala se les acabo el dinero a el y a su hermano por lo que terminaron viajando en burro hasta llegar al aeropuero. En Egipto se quedo sin dinero y tuvo que vender su equipo de buceo para comprar un billete de avion y salir del pais. Se podria escribir un libro. El se lo toma con mucho humor. A ninguno de nosotros nos gusto Placencia (Ni Belice en general) y decidimos ir a Honduras juntos. Convencimos a Miguel para que se viniera a Honduras a pesar de que tenia un vuelo en tres dias desde Mexico DF. Tomamos un barco en Placencia con destino Puerto Cortes (Honduras)

More Belizean Cities: San Ignacio and Belmopan

10/10/09-11/10/09

Having left Caye Caulker behind, we headed to the west of Belize to spend a couple of days in the town of San Ignacio. After the relaxing atmosphere and relative luxury of Caye Caulker, it was a bit of a disappointment to arrive in yet another sad-looking town, devoid of any places of interest. Our hotel was also rather grim, but at least cheap, and the owner, Kenny G, seemed friendly, albeit a little strange. He failed to mention, however, that we had to supply our own toilet paper, so I was getting quite annoyed everytime I went to the toilet to find there was none there! And on the day we left, he purposely stayed out of our way to avoid paying us back our deposit, which was a mere US$2.50. But on principal, and because it was so obvious that he was trying to get away without giving it back to us, Vic went back to the hostel repeatedly until he finally caught him in his office and he was forced to pay it back! Ha!!! Victory at last :) We have since heard from other tourists who have stayed there that he apparently supplies his guests with any drugs they might want! We should have known he was dodgy!

One thing that we really did enjoy here was our visit to an Iguana Conservation Project (hence all the iguana photos), which has been set up in a luxury hotel a short walk from the town centre. We were told about it while having lunch on our second day and we decided to go and have a look. The project was started a few years ago to increase the survival rate of the green iguana, a species which was beginning to disappear from the area. The aim of the project was to rescue young iguanas from the wild and care for them until they were old and big enough to fend for themselves, at which time they would then be reintroduced to their natural habitat. In the last two years or so, they have also begun a breeding programme to increase the iguana population. I think they must have had about 100 iguanas there when we visited, at least half of which were little babies of about 15cm long from head to tail. The iguanas tend to be ready to be put back into the wild when they reach the age of 4, but Gomez, the oldest iguana at 9 and over a metre in length, has become a permanent resident and is considered more like a pet now. Although he is a green iguana, his skin is now orange with black stripes....apparently this colour change takes place as the iguana gets older. All of the babies that we saw were bright green and very jumpy....we were given some to hold but they just kept jumping off :) They were easier to hold than the bigger ones though, as their claws were not as sharp. Vic was lucky and wearing a t-shirt, so he didn´t feel a thing with six iguanas sitting on top of his arms and shoulders, but when I had just three on my arm, I could feel their claws everytime they moved and I had a few scratches by the time we left. It was a great experience though and, as you can see, we have some fantastic photos. I also have a video of our guide telling us about the iguana's defence mechanism. Most of the iguanas at the project are very tame, hence we were able to hold them and even stroke them. There are a few, however, that are a bit more wary of humans, but even these ones give you a couple of warnings before resorting to biting you. Firstly, they have a flap of skin on their neck, which flares out when they feel threatened and secondly, they use their tail as a weapon to flick your hand away if you stroke them. If you continue to bother them after that they might very well bite you, so you have been warned :)

We had hoped to visit a community of Mennonites while we were in San Ignacio, but due to public holidays and the weekend, we were unable to get there without a car. Kenny G was apparently going to find someone who could take us there, but this mystery person never materialised unfortunately. There are two Mennonite communities close to San Ignacio: Spanish Lookout and Barton Creek, with the latter of the two probably being the most interest, as the community there is very strict with regards to the use of technology and machinery etc. Apparently they live in conditions similar to 300 years ago, using a horse and cart to move around. I´m sure it would have been really interesting. Other Mennonite communities are gradually adapting to some modern ways of the world with some using tractors on their farms and others wearing regular clothes instead of the traditional dress: straw hats, checked shirts and trousers with braces for the men, and plain dresses and headscarves for the women.

Although we had planned to visit Belmopan (the capital of Belize) on a day trip from San Ignacio, we decided not to spend another night there, and decided instead to head to Dangriga, a beach town on the east coast, and spend a couple of hours in the capital on the way. It was hardly worth it, as there is absolutely nothing to see in Belmopan. Our guide book describes it as a ghostly capital, and it´s so true. There is no life there whatsoever. When we asked people for the centre of town, they looked at us as if they had never heard of such a thing as a town centre :) We ended up going to see the government buildings, which were nothing special as you can imagine, and then for a long walk towards what we thought would be the town centre (according to some directions Vic had got), but we never ended up getting there. We got to a main road, asked for more directions, followed the directions, and still didn't find anything interesting, so we decided to go back to the terminal and get out of there! We were hoping that the last few stops along the beach would be more reminiscent of Caye Caulker....it doesn´t seem that Belize's towns are very well equipped for tourists :)