We spent our last few days in Belize reading up on our next destination – Honduras. Now, sensible Janneke definitely advocates reading the foreign office advice about the countries you are going to visit. But, well, overthinking-things-Janneke probably would just leave it. Ignorance is bliss, as they say.

Reading the foreign office advice about Honduras was a little bit terrifying. Admittedly, something you probably wouldn’t mind watching on Netlflix, but definitely not something you would want to experience. To quote the UK government –

“Crime and violence are a serious problem throughout Honduras and the country has one of the highest homicide rates in the world. You should exercise a high degree of caution”.

Yay! So, it was with a little bit of trepidation that we hopped on a boat from Belize to Puerto Cortés in the north. The boat took most of the day so there wasn’t much opportunity to get on the road and out of the port the same day.

The boat to Honduras

But, at least we had some time to verify our route with the locals. We were keen to try and avoid the main roads and the town of San Pedro Sula (infamous for being one of the most dangerous cities in the world, although if Wikipedia is correct, it has now lost that honour).

“So, urm, what way would you go to La Ceiba”, we asked a fluently English speaking taxi driver.

“Oh no, don’t take the back roads, you must stay on the main roads. It’s really dangerous, and you’ll probably get lost in a banana plantation. You need to just head south on the 13 and turn left at the burnt out toll booth”.

“The burnt out toll booth?” We asked.

“Yeah, in the protests last year every toll booth in the country was burnt out. Apart from the one here, it’s the only one still existing”.

The next day we headed out, excitedly passing the ONLY toll booth in Honduras (what a tourist attraction!!).

A burnt out toll booth

Honestly, we were a little worried about cycling through San Pedro Sula. The previous night we’d watched the news flashing up stories of a recent massacre in SPS, so the foreign office worries didn’t seem like hyperbole. But, despite witnessing two car accidents (and being a little nervous someone might pull a gun out as part of some extreme road rage) we got through without incident.

Lunch in San Pedro Sula

A little later we stopped at a roadside shop to just get some cold water, and Konstantin saw a guy tuck a gun into the back of his trousers and jump on a motorbike. As you do.

But, as is the case with a lot of “dangerous” places, ultimately the most dangerous risk for a cyclist is still the traffic. And, well, Honduran drivers are insane. If having one of the highest homicide rates in the world wasn’t enough, they seemed desperate to kill themselves in head on collisions. Neither of us had ever seen anything like it. We had countless near misses, getting run off the road by beeping, aggressive idiots on more than one occasion. We ended up dropping down onto the dirt tracks that sometimes follow the road – slower going, but 100% safer.

A beautiful cycle path for about 5km…shame the day was 130km

Cycling next to the perfectly good roads

Realising quite quickly that northern Honduras wasn’t exactly throwing up beautiful cycling, we pushed on and completed 250km in two days to make it to La Ceiba. There we hopped on a ferry to Utila, one of Hondura’s Bay Islands. After the heart-racing, stressful two days of cycling, this was a beautiful, welcome break. Utila is famous as a place to go diving – and Konstantin had booked himself into a free-diving course. This is basically like diving but without any of the equipment. Just you, some goggles, and a really big breath.

Konstantin free diving

It was nice to actually spend some time apart! Konstantin learnt the basics of free-diving (and got down to 18m…impressive right? Well the record is a crazy 124m!!). And I sat and read in hammocks, and went kayaking, snorkelling and cycling round the island.

Exploring the island of Utila

Doing a lot of relaxing

And some water based activities

The pier of the free-diving centre

The beach on Utila

After Utila we unfortunately had to head straight back onto the same hideous roads we’d already endured. We were getting a little fed up with the craziness of the drivers. It’s hard to stay positive about a place when the inhabitants seemingly want to murder you with their trucks. By day two of this we were both feeling pretty anti-Honduras.

A bit difficult to see – the bridge is only wide enough for one car. But many cars are trying to cross from both directions at the same time. Photo evidence of how awful the drivers are.

The one way bridge from on the bridge

We stopped in a little restaurant and ranted about the ridiculousness of the situation.
“I mean, seriously, do they all have death wishes?”
“I really, desperately wanted to like Honduras” I declared, “But I just can’t get over the anti-cycling stupidity”.
“Yup, this is one of the worst countries I’ve ever cycled in”. Konstantin agreed, with very little hyperbole.

As we were finishing up (ranting, and breakfast), the family from the next table came over.
“You don’t need to pay anything, we’ve bought you your breakfast”.

Ah. Okay. So, maybe not all Hondurans were awful!

Free lunch

In fact, after we moved away from the north of the country, the drivers got a lot better, the scenery got much more gorgeous (and hilly, very very hilly), and people were just so friendly. We also got to experience our first ‘sex motel’. One of the problems with cycling is you can’t always get as far as you might want. And, after cycling for about 80km we came upon a hotel. Where, conveniently (!), you could pay by the hour. In fact, the guy seemed utterly bemused by our need to stay for a whole night. We pulled into the garage, closed the door, and the man came to take our money from a little hatch (the height of discreteness!). The room was equipped with dirty channels on the TV, a button for music, lots of tissues next to the bed, and about 5 sofas. It was definitely not as clean as you’d hope. We tried not to touch anything.

Classy sex motel

Helpful guide to where the dirty channels are

We continued south and stopped in at D&D Brewery, which was a lot classier than the sex motel! It was also an interesting ‘tourism’ case study. Basically, in setting up the brewery, restaurant, and cabins near Lake Yojoa, they had spearheaded the start of the tourism industry there. Before, there was nothing. Now it was a pretty regular stop for people on the backpacker trail. We spent a nice rest day there reading, taking a little kayaking trip, and drinking less beer than we would have liked (they had run out!)

D&D Brewery

Canoeing Lake Yojoa

Canoeing out on the lake

After the success of our little side trip to the Jaguar Reserve in Belize (see Belize blog here), we were keen to take more side trips if we felt they were worth it. So, we headed to Panacam National Park – only about 13km from D&D Brewery. I had carefully planned the route and was sure there wasn’t much ascent. Ha! Turns out I’d planned the route to the bottom of the valley. Panacam was at the top of the other side of the valley. Oops. It was a very, very steep trip up. I had to push my bike for 2km. It took about an hour.

Route to the Panacam park

But, the park was really worth it. There was great infrastructure and lots of different hiking trails to try.

In the evening we set up camp and one of the chefs came down to chat. I am pretty sure he fancied Knut, which I can completely understand!  We were the only guests in the whole place, and we ended up going to share a bottle of wine with him and some snacks. It was pretty cute.

The next day we headed further south towards some caves that a few people said were good. At the caves we met a young Guatemalan-Salvadoran couple, who excitedly approached us.

“Yes, you’re here!” They exclaimed.

We looked surprised at their enthusiasm.

“We passed you a while ago and we were waiting for you to get here. You see, we want to do the extreme caving tour and we need four people. Please say you’ll do the extreme caving tour with us?!” They pleaded.

This was not in the plan. I’m not the biggest fan of small spaces, caving is not my forte. But, they looked so cute and desperate that we went ahead. It was actually brilliant, particularly as it wasn’t something we would usually have done. The couple were also super sweet!

Caving

From the caves we continued to head south towards to El Salvador border. The roads got quieter and a LOT better to cycle.

Cycling along the lake

A sign that definitely is not getting obeyed…

Target practice…

We got very off the tourist trail – the road to the border is not paved and so it isn’t ‘officially’ recognised as a border. Thankfully, unpaved road =  slower drivers and less drivers, so our last few days in Honduras were actually cycling bliss.

Unpaved roads of Honduras

A bus actually giving us enough space!!

The border was at a high pass, so it took us quite a long time to get there. We got stopped at a military checkpoint, mainly so the army guys could get a photo with us.

Slightly blurry photo with the army!

But, eventually we made it, just as the heavens opened. A dramatic end to our time in Honduras, and equally to our start in El Salvador.

Final thoughts on Honduras – well, it certainly isn’t a mecca of cycling, but as we got further down in to the south we had a lovely time. The scenery is beautiful, the people were friendly and it is nice to visit a country that is simply a bit ‘raw-er’. Less touristy and obviously struggling to get a handle on violence, drug gangs and lawlessness.