Travel to Honduras

People waiting to cross the bridge

We woke up this morning to the sound of rain, so no beach day for us! We decided to just take a boat to Puerto Barrios, across the river to begin our journey to Utila, Honduras. We huddled on this boat under a tarp, trying to stay as dry as possible. Once in Puerto Barrios, we decided to cross into Honduras, since trying to get to the island of Utila in one day was going to be pushing it. We found a bus driver calling out Honduras so we quickly went over there. He said that it was the only bus, and even though it was pretty full he'd fit us in. Whether or not it was the only bus I'm not sure, but it was definitely full. It was another mini van packed to overflowing, literally. We counted 26 people, including driver, in a van designed for 12. At one point both sliding doors were open and 3 people were hanging onto the van on each side. I keep getting surprised at how many people can be packed into these buses.

Collapsed bridge!

The bus driver let us off at the border where we had to wait in a long line at immigration. The buses leaving from here into Honduras were huge tour buses, but unfortunately the first one I saw was full. I struck up conversation with these two American guys in front of us in line, who were driving through Honduras and they offered us a ride to San Pedro Sula. After driving a little ways, we came to a traffic jam. After getting out of the car and investigating, we found that the river had caused half the road to fall away along this bridge. We talked to a police officer who thought we may be able to pass that afternoon or the next day. There were no alternative routs, only to go back into Guatemala. The river was still rushing by, slowly eroding the side of the road, and they weren't doing anything to stop it or fix it. A lot of people were walking across, and we thought about joining them and then catching a bus later on.

More flooding!

Luckily, they finally decided to let some cars drive pass. What a relief! They were not letting the big buses or trucks pass, so we were very lucky to have hitched a ride with those guys! Also, if we had left tomorrow as we originally planned, I'm not sure if there would have been any road left at all. It seemed like it was going to end up getting washed away. Later on, we got pulled over at a check point, which made me a little nervous because I have read how the police can be a little corrupt. He asked each of us, Esta tranquilo? and shook all our hands. He was really friendly, and it seemed like he got a kick out of talking to us. There was also one other part in the road that was severely flooded, but other than that we made it to San Pedro Sula without a hitch. This large Honduran town seems to be an American fast food haven, I've never seen so many fast food places! Multiple on every street, there were 2 pizza huts around the corner from each other, and I haven't even seen any normal restaurants.

Overall, we had a very serendipitous day, with everything seeming to fall perfectly into place. We saw a couple arriving in Livingston that we had befriended in Rio Dulce, and they had had a miserable experience on the boat tour of the river in the rain that we had thoroughly enjoyed the sunny day before. They were planning on heading to Utila tomorrow, but I'm not sure that there is even going to be a road there anymore into Honduras. I'm curious to see how they'll make it to Utila.