Utila & Lago de Yojoa, Honduras

"Keep out or you will be shot". While Hondurans are certainly welcoming people, there is an echo of truth in this ominous warning. From the delights of El Salvador we are heading north for Honduras. Our next destination are the Bay Islands, located off the north coast, but getting here means a 2-day journey with a stopover in Santa Rosa de Copan.

Welcome to Honduras

Santa Rosa may well be a nice little town. Unfortunately, our short stay here was overshadowed by some truly horrific accommodation. An infestation of giant cockroaches, bedsheets that were last washed in the 1970's and rats scratching at the room door during the night weren't even the worst of it. That honour was reserved for the bathroom. Truly reminiscent from common depictions of South American prisons, this was fascinating in its awfulness. What may well have been intended as a shower was instead a pipe sticking out of the wall, and the toilets bore a troubling similarity to the infamous scene from Trainspotting. If only we had had the release of heroin we might have actually slept during the night. Or at least blacked out enough to forget this nightmare. Instead, the light remained on and our eyes alert to fend off the onslaught of insects and rodents. We've never been so happy to have a 6am departure just to get out of this hellhole.

Pier at the bottom of our garden

Thankful for the 6 hour bus journey, we finally took the chance to get some sleep as we headed north to the coast. After a somewhat choppy ferry ride, we made it to Utila, one of the Bay Islands set in the Caribbean sea. Utila is famous as a dive spot and there are plenty of tours and guides offering guaranteed swimming with whale sharks . Unfortunately, there's little else to do on Utila outside of diving. We made several failed attempts to visit one of the small uninhabited islands off-shore, but we couldn't overcome the typical Central American mentality of, "the Captain might show up with his boat. Or he might not". We also made the trek across Utila to visit what was billed as the best beach, but, typically, it was locked. At this stage, we were beginning to suspect that Honduras had it in for us. In the end, most of our time here was spent snorkelling and swimming of the pier just a few yards from our room. We also enjoyed some great seafood, including barracuda steak and fresh grilled snapper.

Looking for sharks

A few days on Utila was enough for us to experience all it has to offer outside of diving, so we made our way back south to a lake about 3 hours from the capital. Lago de Yojoa is in a beautiful setting, surrounded by mist-wreathed hills and quaint villages. Our accommodation, D&D Brewery, was located on the outskirts of Los Naranjos and, as the name suggests, it specialises in brewing its own beer. It's a lovely little place with great food, very welcoming staff and hammocks arranged around a fire-pit for the cooler evenings. More than one evening was spent chilling out and sampling their amber ale and porter.

Watching the sunrise while waiting for the Captain

From Los Naranjos, we made the short journey to Pulhapanzak Falls, a series of waterfalls culminating in a 42m drop. While on our visit, we hired a local guide to show us a path leading behind the waterfall. However, we didn't fully realise what this would entail: jumping into the cascading pools and fighting against the tide to reach the other side, and lurching blind through the ferocious curtain of water falling from above. At more than one point we doubted whether we'd make it back alive, but the final view of the sunlit trees from behind the waterfall made it all worthwhile. Unfortunately, this particular time of our trip was one of 'lost and found'. While Babs left her hat on a bus and we miraculously boarded precisely the same bus 2 days later and found the hat on the same parcel shelf, our small camera didn't fare so well. It was last seen heading for the Honduran capital, but is now likely in the hands of some dirty thieving gypsy. It did leave a slightly sour taste in the mouth after enduring so much in the waterfall trek and having no pictures to show for it. So here´s one from Google for you:

We went behind it.

Overall, Honduras was an interesting place. We met some really friendly people and stayed in probably the best and worst accommodation so far. There were plenty of sights and some great food. But it just didn't have the same feel as El Salvador. Perhaps it's down to the larger number of tourists that Honduras receives each year, but it just didn't have the same vibrancy to make us want to stay longer. We're looking forward to Nicaragua next to see if it can claim the title of 'best country'.

El Tunco & Juayua, El Salvador

Our journey to El Salvador was one of the most straightforward of all our border crossings. The only drama occurred when one of our two fellow passengers, a Chinese girl named Liu, was denied entry at the immigration desk. After having proven herself useful with recommendations for accommodation at our destination, we felt a little guilty ditching her in no man's land between Guatemala and El Salvador. But the guilt quickly receded as we looked forward to arriving at Playa El Tunco, a sleepy surfing village on the Pacific coast.

El Tunco's surf

Our room in El Tunco was one of six in a lovely, local-run place complete with balcony, swimming pool and plenty of hammocks to relax on. Jose, the owner, is a surfing fanatic who lives in one of the 6 rooms and offers surfing lessons, which is the main pastime here. When we head down to the beach, it's easy to see why: the waves here are massive and, while the black-sand beach itself isn't the best, it's a great place to sit in one of the bars and watch the visitors and locals ride the waves.

Jose's place

There are several beaches along the Pacific coast of El Salvador, so we decide to visit one of the neighbouring villages and see if the beach is any better. Unfortunately, we wouldn't quite make it to the next village. Our walk along the beach was cut short thanks to the high tide and large waves crashing into the beach-head wall. Diverted up 10 flights of stairs to the road, we continue on only to be confronted by a rampaging cow down a lane. After a narrow escape, we find ourselves back on the beach, but we knew it wouldn't last. We soon come across a river leading out to sea that blocks our path. Defeated, and fearing any further plagues of locusts or frogs, we decide to make the trek back to El Tunco along the road.
 

Confronting the raging bull

The only other event of note during our time here is finding ourselves receiving a masterclass in brewing from a Californian who has opened what might be the smallest craft brewery in the world. This even extended to tasting the different types of barley used to create the different flavours of beer. Naturally, we also had to sample the corresponding beer, including one brewed entirely using wild yeast. The result of this experiment is a 'beer' of about 40% that tastes more like vinegar than ale. At least that's how we remember it... 

Learning how to make home brew

After a few relaxing days by the coast, we decide to make our way in-land to the town of Juayua. Our journey here is quiet and painless, in large part thanks to the generous offer of a ride from the beach to the capital with our host, Jose. Juayua is a small town set in the highlands of El Salvador. At an altitude of around 1,000m, it's a lot cooler here than on the coast.

Juayua central park

 Without a firm schedule when travelling, it's easy to find a place you like and stay a lot longer than you originally intended. Listening to stories from fellow travellers, this can extend to months or even years. Juayua is just such a place for us. While we only stayed a week here, it could easily have been a lot longer. Our accommodation was in the process of being sold by the current French-Austrian owners to the new English-Salvadorean owners, and while you might think this could impact on the quality of the place, the opposite was true. Everyone went out of their way to make sure we were comfortable and give us recommendations on the best places to visit.

Our accommodation in Juayua

The highlight in the town was definitely the food (as per!). We discovered a fabulous pupuseria where we spent a wholly unacceptable amount of time. They come with all sorts of fillings, but our favourite was definitely the local specialty of spinach, cheese and spices. This place was so good and at about 20p per pupusa we just kept coming back. Juayua is also famous for its food festival held every weekend. Dutifully, we made our visit and enjoyed great steak, giant prawns and chocolate-covered strawberries, all for less than a tenner. After a day of food tasting, we were sure we had earned a night out so made our way to the Cadejo Cafe, the heartbeat of Juayua's nightlife, where we spent the evening enjoying the local rum in the beautiful indoor-garden.

Inside the Cadejo Cafe

In an effort to burn off some of the calories, we decided to book up a local guide to take us on a tour of the surrounding countryside. This area is famous for its coffee plantations, which means lots of hills and even more waterfalls. Our guide clearly thought we wanted to visit all of them as he led us for 4 hours up and down hills and across streams. The best part was probably abseiling down the middle of one waterfall, which must have been at least 20m high. Tiring stuff, but no fear, we recovered with another visit to the pupuseria and another evening of fine food.

Abseiling down the waterfall

During our week here, we also spent a day visiting one of the neighbouring villages, Ataco, which is famous for its murals painted on most of the walls of the town. It's a fantastically bright and colourful place and we even chanced upon one of the local artists creating a new mural as we watched.

I hope he paints eyes on those kids...

We loved El Salvador. Everything about it was how we imagined Central America to be: a land of volcanoes and waterfalls framed by the ocean, with hugely friendly and welcoming people, delicious and interesting food and a place we could really experience something a little different.