From snow in New York.... to sun in Honduras

THURSDAY:

On February 14th (HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM! :), my sister Belinda came to visit from New York. I picked her up from the airport Thursday morning, her flight arrived at 12 noon. The trip back home from the airport was a little frustrating and interesting to say the least. I took a bus to San Pedro Sula, where the airport is (about 2 hrs away). From the bus station, I had to take a taxi to the airport (another 20 minutes). The taxi driver agreed to bring me to the airport, wait for me to meet my sister, and then take us back to the bus station. The driver knew a little bit of English, and so he wanted me to talk to him in English, and he would talk to me in Spanish, so that we would be able to practice both languages. He was nice enough, and said he would only charge 300 lemps for the entire trip(about $15), instead of the usual 400 lemps.

My sister didn't make it out of customs and the passport line until about 1:15, so after we waited a bit, we got back into the cab. The cab driver was really excited to hear Belinda was from NY, he has three daughters that live there right now, so acting all chummy and excited, we were all talking in English about New York and Honduras. Belinda made a comment about the many American fast food chains we were passing, and I explained that Hondurans LOVE fried chicken here. Not only do they have local Honduran fried chicken chains, but they have many KFC's, Church's, and Popeye's. When I said KFC, the driver erupted and said very excitedly, "Oh yes! KFC we have that here!" Thinking that it was no more than a random comment that meant he was agreeing with us, we went on talking. Then 10 minutes later I realize we've passed the bus station and are heading towards a different part of town. Alarmed that he misunderstood where we needed to go, I repeated in Spanish "the bus station" and he said "Yes, yes, I know," then we started to think that maybe he had thought we had wanted him to take us to KFC, so again I said slowly and clearly in Spanish "Only the bus station, we don't want chicken!" he said he understood, and we drove on......still in the wrong direction! So I said yet again, this time in both English AND in Spanish, "WE ONLY WANT TO GO TO THE BUS STATION, AND DO NOT WANT TO EAT CHICKEN!!!" still, he insisted he understood, so we drove on. It wasn't until we reached a KFC about another 10 minutes later, that I again said, "We don't want chicken!!" that he finally got my point!!! Wow, talk about lost in translation. He wasn't very happy that he had driven 15 minutes out of the way in traffic, I apologized, but clearly, it was him that misunderstood! Anyways, after my sister's confusing introduction to Honduras, we finally made it back to the bus station which was another 15 minutes in the opposite direction!

We arrived in Tela around 4:30, and decided to stop by Paseo Juniors (mine and Sara's favorite restaurant) and grab a bit to eat. After that, we headed back to my house. When we got home we had to quickly unpack/pack up our things and catch a bus to La Ceiba (about 1 1/2 hrs away). We arrived at the Jungle River Lodge later that night around 9pm, had a delicious dinner, and then headed to bed. The plan was to stay the night in Pico Bonito (the national park in La Ceiba), then wake up on Friday, and go on a white water rafting tour. The picture below shows the lodge, which is the only hotel right along the Rio Cangrejal in Pico Bonito (you may remember, Sara and I stayed at the same place in November).

FRIDAY:
We woke up early to eat breakfast, and get ready for the rafting tour which started at 9:30. When we went out to the restaurant at the lodge, we saw many other travelers who were taking different tours, like the canopy and hiking tours. We had 6 other people going on the rafting tour with us (3 travelers from Russia, an older man from Canada, a man from Italy, and a young girl/ recent graduate from Harvard that has been traveling on her own for about 6 months).It was very different from when Sara and I went rafting, there was only the two of us, and two guides. The picture below shows my sister and I with Darwin, our rafting guide. The picture below shows our room at the Jungle River Lodge.I went into our bathroom and found this spider with enormous legs peeking out from under the toilet seat! Good thing I looked down before I was too late,.....EWWWWW!!! There are so many crazy bugs here, and they always seem to be at least 3 times the size of bugs in the states! The tour quickly proved to be more physical than the one Sara and I had done. They had us do a number of things to help us practice and get accustomed to the river and what to do in different situations while rafting. They had us swim back and forth across the river many times (against the strong current, mind you) to practice catching the rope in case we fell out of the raft, and letting our bodies float with the current. Also, we had to climb up huge boulders while pulling ourselves up with the rope, then jump off the top of the boulders back into the river, and swim back across the river to the other side! I felt so bad for not warning my sister about this beforehand, I didn't realize that it was going to be so different from the first rafting tour I took, and be so physically demanding! Needless to say, my sister and I both agreed we were more out of shape than we thought! After all the drills and the practicing, we all split up into 3 different rafts and made our way down the river. Darwin, Belinda, and I had our own raft. In the end I was soooo proud of us for doing it, and especially proud of her, she had never gone rafting before and was a little weary at first, but by the end she was an rafting expert yelling back at Darwin the different rafting commands like "Forward, Forward!" while plowing through the water with her oar! We had a blast, all while getting a great workout!
After the tour we headed back to lodge to eat some fresh fruit and relax a bit before heading back into town (La Ceiba) to catch a bus back to Tela. We sat out on the lodge's pool and deck, all built within the boulders looking out onto the river, the view was amazing!
We arrived back in La Ceiba at at around 2pm, and then headed out to try to find a few restaurants my sister had found while researching good places to eat on the Internet( the most important part about traveling is the food, right?!). The bad news was that many of the places we wanted to eat at had early lunch hours, closed for a few hours, and then opened back up around 5pm for dinner, which meant we would miss our bus to Tela if we waited to have dinner. Plus we found this out AFTER we had already taken a cab and walked around a bit. So we wandered around more, until we found a small merendero (like a small restaurant). It was a perfect time and place for Belinda to try some typical Honduran food and where better to eat, than a typical merendero! We ordered beleadas (with beans, avocado and tomato) and chicken pastelitos (fried empanadas that you can get with salsa and chopped cabbage on top). It was delicious! After lunch, we jumped on a school bus and headed back to Tela. While riding on any of the buses here, there are always people getting on and off of the bus selling everything from cds and sunglasses to various drinks and snacks, we had a chance to sample "agua de coco" (of course it came in a bag).

When we arrived back in Tela, Belinda decided to spoil me by getting a room (with an ocean view, TV, and hot water in the shower) in a hotel called Cesar Mariscos situated right along the Tela's main beach.
This picture was taken on our balcony facing right towards the ocean. After going back to my house to pick up some things, we headed across the street to have a tasty cantaloupe "licuado." Licuados are sold everywhere in Tela, they basically are smoothies made with fresh fruit, ice, milk, and sugar (again, this came in a bag). After that we enjoyed a nice dinner at the hotel restaurant later that night. The restaurant had a great atmosphere, it opened up right onto the boardwalk and beach. We feasted on fried fish and steamed shrimp with garlic, YUM, YUM! It was sooo good that Belinda cleaned off her entire plate, and I was literally drinking up the cream sauce from my shrimp, and eating chunks of garlic as if they were french fries!...Can you tell that a lot of this weekend was focused around eating!! :)SATURDAY:

We woke up bright and early to take advantage of the free breakfast that came with our room before heading out to Punta Sal for a day trip. We met up with Sara and set out on a day tour with Garifuna Tours. You may remember Sara and I had already gone on this day tour back in September, but we loved it so much, we decided we should go again with my sister. We took a boat to the Blanca Jeannette Kawas National Park, where we stopped to take a short hike.While we were hiking, we passed a giant tree whose roots were sticking out right in the middle of the path, it must have been pretty darn windy to knock that tree down!
Our guide led us up a steep path so that we could look down over the ocean.
After the hike, we got back on the boat and arrived on Cocalito Beach where lunch and snorkeling were on the agenda. Cocalito beach, is a very small, secluded beach where only two families live in little thatched roof huts. The beach is beautiful and very idyllic with palm trees and hammocks lining the shore. The families prepare lunch for the many tour groups that stop by throughout the day.We didn't get to go snorkeling because the waves were a little strong, and the water wasn't as clear as usual, but we did enjoy a typical Garifuna meal of fried fish, plantains, beans and rice, followed by a nice nap on the beach.
There were only three other women in our tour group. One of the girls we met, whose name was Sarah, was from Australia. After we arrived back in Tela we all decided to eat together at Paseo Juniors ,our favorite hangout, where we ate (for the second time in two days) pupusas and tacos. Nothing beats tons of good food and relaxation!After our second lunch, we still were not finished yet......Belinda and I treated ourselves to dessert! She ordered a gigantic banana sundae, and I had a monster serving of neapolitan ice cream. Later that night we enjoyed a nice dinner of seafood soup and carne asada at the Sherwood Hotel, also right along the beach, next door to our hotel. I must have gained at least 5 pounds in my sister's 3 day visit!! That night we opted to stay the night at my house so my sister could get the full experience of living here without a TV, nice ocean view, and with a cold bucket shower just like in the Philippines! Sunday morning, we headed to the airport. This time, we decided to save ourselves from all the hassle and confusion from last time, and take a taxi straight to the airport. I was sad to see her off, but I was so glad she came! She was able to see a little of the jungle, a little of beach, and was able to sample tons of good Honduran food, but most importantly... spend quality time with her favorite little sister :) all in only 3 days!!! I just wish my Ate (my other sister, Valerie) was there with us.....we missed you!!! Thanks again for coming to visit Ditche, love you!!!