Honduras: Parte 2

Ok, so where was I?  As far as I remember I had put photos up from Copan Ruinas.  From there I started to make my way south.  First to Santa Rosa de Copan --> Gracias -->La Esperanza.  (in case you want to see it on a map)  In Lonely Plant guidebook parlance it's known as the Lenca trail because it traverses the lands where the native Lenca people lived.  It's a mountainous region where coffee, tabacco and incredible sights are super numerous.

Flor de Copan cigar factory.  I don't smoke but it was pretty darn cool and now I also have 3 cigars to eventually share with someone.  They do everything from fermenting and drying the leaves to rolling and then even build the boxes on site.  And they make cigars for dozens of different brands - all in the same place.  Made me wonder a bit about what distinguishes one brand from another...

In Gracias - want something pickled?

Also in Gracias, but I am not really sure from whom they would need protection or who would be crazy enough to bring an army through the region.  Legend has it that the name Gracias came from one of the conquistadors who was travelling through the country and reached the relatively flat area around Gracias and said "Gracias a Dios that we have reached flat land" - in old school Spanish of course - and the name stuck.  And Gracias isnt really the flat either...

I liked this quote alot.  And he must have done something right as he served as both President of El Salvador and later as PRes of Honduras.

These bus/vans can tackle any sort of terrain!

The road from Gracias to La Esperanza is beautiful!  Get ready for a bunch of vistas...

Still the main highway between Gracias and Esperanza - the quality is a little lower though...

La Esperanza - the city at highest altitude in Honduras and as such it was downright chilly - definitely could have used some more clothing although I brought all the warm stuff I had - which is really that much given the crazy heat in El Sauce.

In La Esperanza I met up with the San Jose Partners brigade from Rochester.  Check out their site for loads of information and even a blog from a med student who spent a year working down there.  In brief, it is a project through the Department of Family Medicine at Rochester and a group of docs and residents go down for 2 weeks every 6 months to this small village in the mountains of Honduras.  IT is a beautiful but very poor region and the goal of the project is to help lift the people out of poverty by improving aspects of their health.  To this end they run a clinic(a small part of the project in reality) and have projects of water filters, improved cook stoves, better latrines and are starting projects in fish farming and experimenting with different vegetables.  There is also a scholarship program for students and a small business loan project as well.  After 8 years, the project is quite well established and the people truly trust and believe in the project.  So much so that people in the surrounding communities are clamoring to be involved.  So hopefully, things will keep going in the right direction!  I only spent a week with the project but hopefully I can return next year as an official member of the brigade (1-2 medical students also travel with the brigade each time)

This is where we eat.

THe school and guy's dorm.  If you can't tell it is steeeeeeep around here.

THe new government built health clinic, with some students, residents and translators.  The clinic was provided by the government and it's nice,  but doesn't actually have anything but rooms inside.

We attracted a group of kids everywhere we went.  My favorite part of this pic is the little guy without clothes, but with shoes.  All the others have clothes but no shoes!

The sunsets were incredible!

More brigade members.

Not a bad place to work.  I was amazed daily by the scope of roadwork going on in a place where the roads truly are straight up and down.  I am super surprised no truck of other heavy machinery hasn't slipped off the road and off into the jungle below!

As in Nica, smiling in pictures is not allowed but after a lot of coaxing this was the best result I could get.

The improved cookstove - it gets smoke out of the house and with a smaller opening than normal retains more heat - thus using less firewood.  And it looks really nice.

Giving a quick lesson on cookstoves and latrines.

The group that went to visit the outlying community that would like to participate in the groups projects.  It's only 4.25 miles but the hike lasts over 3.5 hours...I'll let you imagine the mountains that make that happen!

After leaving the brigade I headed to Lago de Yojoa for some scenery and good microbrews ( yay stouts!) and then headed on back into Nica.  After 2.5 weeks I received a lot of "you've reappeared!".  But it's good to be back and now to do a bit of work and travel a bit through Nicaragua.  After 2 weeks in Honduras I have seen more of the country than I have in 2.5 months here in Nica!  It's time to change that...

Honduras: Parte 1

So, it's been a little while since I gave an update here to the world, but as the above pic shows I was busy exploring a little bit of Honduras (oddly enough the pic was taken as I was leaving Honduras, but the idea still stands).  So I will attempt to give a photo and word synopsis of what transpired over the last 3 weeks.

The trip out of Nicaragua turned out to be quite the adventure.  I'm not sure if it made the news in the States but in the 10 days or so before I left El Sauce all of Central America was being innundated with nearly incessant rain.  In fact, here in El Sauce we had a week straight of rain -alternating between heavy downpours and a steady drizzle.  Many of the bridges in the area were inpassable due to high river levels and I was actually lucky to get out of El Sauce - a bunch of us who wanted to get to Leon got into an interlocale not knowing whether or not we would be able to pass - fortunately we were.  But this wasn't the end of the adventure.  The next day I boarded a Tica bus that was going to take me direct to San Pedro Sula in the north of Honduras.  However, after an hour or so we stopped with the explanation that we were going to wait a bit to see if the water level would drop a little so we could pass a bridge further ahead - although when I saw what was ahead I think the bus drivers just wanted some breakfast!

This was the highway for about 2 miles! I think my favorite thing was the mass of people busy fishing and hanging out in the running water! It was incredible and the first time I have actually been scared while on a bus as seen below:

Sights like this don't help calm the butterflies either...

That's alot of water.

We eventually made it to San Pedro - but rather than arriving  around 5pm we arrived at 9pm...not the best time to arrive into a city that has a rather rough reputation.  Spent a morning walking around San Pedro and the craziest thing about big Honduran cities is the incredible amount of American fast food and pizza places - I saw some super-legit Pizza Hut restaraunts.  Not sure what purpose the Coke sign serves, but it made for a nice hike.

I then went to Copan Ruinas which is near the border with Guatemala and the sight of a large Mayan ruins.  They are not as grand as those in Guatemala but are renowned for being the artesenal center of the Mayan empire.

Every new king would try and erase the memories of the previous kings but here in Copan, rather than raze the buildings, they simply built over them.  This temple was found beneath the outer structure and is actually this red color.  Apparently when the Mayans lived here  all the buildings were this red color and all the open spaces were stuccoed and white - to help with nighttime navigation.  Unfortunately tourists can't go in a see the temple...booo

Bit of a shame to cover up such nice natural colors.

Proof that I was actually there!

The great thing about travelling in the off-season is that the place was basically empty.  The tarp covers a large staircase where every stone is carved into a giant hieroglyphic.  Unfortunately, when the site was discovered the rocks were scattered and now the experts are not sure in what order they should be.  The tarp is for protective measures.

There were a lot of these columnas - and they are all intricately carved.

The staircase.

This even has a bit of the original red color...

Well the place was nearly empty - except for Los Tucanes de Tijuana - a ranchero group from Mexico that is apparently quite popular- who were recording a video for a new song (unfortunately couldn't find that one for the link).  I had no idea who they were but everyone was jumping in for a photo so I decided to follow along.

Some cooky art - preserved in the museum next door.

Honduras is a pretty place - more landscapes to come.

So that was the first couple days - part 2 to come shortly.

Un montón de fotos!

In this edition of the my evolving blog there will not be a unified story nor a long and involved story either.  Rather a collection of photos from my recent adventures with some captions to help tell the story.

Volcano Boarding: This is a nascent 'sport' similar to sand-boarding but with the goal being to set speed records (In fact watch this video to get an idea of how fast is possible) while sitting on a peice of wood with a little pedazo of formica pasted onto the bottom.  The pictures should help get the idea too.

The volcano with the road leading up to it.  It's an active volcano that has erupted over 20 times since its birth in the 1850s.  The last eruption was in 1995ish so we're due an eruption soon...

From the top - like I said, active with the steam and hot rocks to prove it.

Gotta do the tourist thing!

Absolutely beautiful.  Can't wait to see how the panaromas turn out!

These are our sweeeeet protect my skin jumpsuits.  Unlike sandboarding, volcano boarding hurts when you fall over - and I fell over a lot!  In fact I was god-awful.  They clock your speed wit the record being about 87kph at the bottom.  The max in our group was 50ish and mine was a whopping 24 - but it sure felt fast...

You can just make out our truck at the bottom...it's super steep

Laughing cause I was awful.  Laughing for joy that I didn't end up with a bloody head or black eye (both happened in my group). Laughing that I will never get all the black soot out of my hair, ears, mouth.  Or just a combo of all of the above.  And looking forward to the ice cold beer waiting in the truck...

Poneloya - or my first visit to the Pacific.  Leon is super close to the beach and it is a normal weekend excurision for the Nicas.  Turned out to be a lousy beach day but that doesn't mean the food wasnt good...

Doing the - this is the 1st time Ive touched the Pacific dance and thinking "wow i cant wait to swim in this in a few weeks!)

Sopa de marina - Riquisima!!!!  What you can't see is the half of a fish that's hiding under all the shelled goodies!  And the best part - it costs a whopping 6 dollars!

The aftermath.  It's hard work to eat all that food!

It's nice to eat with a great view.

Struck me more like Africa than Nicaragua...

Fiesta de San Jeronimo:  The Nicas love their fiestas.  The week before was the Virgen of the Merced.  This time for San Jeronimo.  But the difference was night and day.  Virgen de la Merced is a rather religious affair with masses, the rosary and very little alcohol.  San Jeronimo is a giant party with only 1 mass, no rosaries and lots and lots of rum.  I spent the Thursday night in the hospital of Leon with the surgeon who nworks in El Sauce and sutured alot of drunk guys with head lacerations.  So the next morning I had to go see what the deal was all about.

Here's the scoop and recipe for disaster.  Make a turtle-like shell to put over your head and body - without a way to see.  Fashion a head that nominally resembles a bulls head.  Find two large, preferably sharp, bulls horns and attach to the head.  Find people to bang on some drums.  Gather with a bunch of people who have similarily built turtle/bulls and buy lots of cheap rum and beer.  Put the turtle/bull on your head and while your budies pelt the shell with sticks jump up and down and spin around.  Repeat for 36 hours.

The statue of San Jeronimo.  All in all a very interesting event.  The best part - I saw at least 2 guys I had sutured the night before back out on the street the next morning - bandage on head and rum in hand.  Gotta celebrate!

El Sauce - a bird's eye view.  On the first day I walked back from the hospital I saw this little mountain top in the near-distance without any trees on the top and thought - wow I bet the view from that is awesome!  I tried to make plans to climb it but it didn't work out - until yesterday.  And I was not disappointed.  The walk was simple and I passed some beautiful houses a good hour away from Sauce and not very accessible except for on foot.  A good way to see another part of El Sauce.

That's El Sauce down there!  And a bit to the right - the Hospital.

Well worth the trek!  Another one where I can't wait to see what the Panoramas look like.

But just so I wouldn't forget the fact that I am in Nicaragua - the poorest Spanish speaking country in the world and the 2nd poorest country in the western hemisphere.  At least they have a Zinc roof.

This week I will be heading off to Honduras to experience some more Latino culture, some Mayan ruins and even a chance to hang with some Rochester peeps in San Jose.

Virgen de la Merced

This weekend saw another visit to the city of Leon, this time with another friendly and welcoming family.  The hospital here in El Sauce is an interesting place in that nearly all of the younger people who work in the hospital - doctors, nurses, techs and more- live in Leon and work in El Sauce.  Leon is about 1.5 hours away by bus or interlocale(minvan that is waaaaaaay more comfy - usually) and is the capital of this department - and some would argue - one of the better cities in Nicaragua.  So the people live in Leon with their families but spend the week here in El Sauce in rooms provided by MINSA - government department of health.  So one of the doctors invited me to Leon to experience the festival and stay with her and her family - so I did.  Just like everyone that I have met so far they were incredibly welcoming and warm - ready to chat and share their food, their house and their time.  And it was quite the sharing - since there are 7 people who live in the house that is not very large to start!  The doctor and her 8 year old son.  2 of her sisters - one of whom has a son of 2 years.  The doctor's brother.  And then their mother - la dona de la casa.  So I made 8 and then there is actually another sister and her husband who live elsewhere but spent a lot of time with us so there were really 10 people in the house!

But as for the fiesta.  This whole month there are special masses and rosaries in honor of the virgen but the real fun started on Friday.  That night they were saying the rosary all night and the church was packed and beautifully decorated.

Then at 8 and again at 9 everyone gathered in the plaza outside the church for music and event where "toros" ran through the crowd.  These 'toros' are pywood sheets that have fireworks - roman candles, sparklers among other things - attached.  Some guy carries it above his head as it is lit and then runs through the crowd - amid screams, squeals and general chaos.  I am sure it is incredibly unsafe, but it certainly was interesting.

Waiting for 9pm.  There is an unwritten Nica rule that you are not allowed to look happy in photos...

El toro.

2 toros.  There were 2 at 8pm and 3 at 9pm.  I am pretty sure the safest place to be was underneath the board itself!

The next day began bright and early with Masses at 5,6,9 and 11 am - each an every one stuffed full.  Then at noon the statue of the Virgen left from the church to parade around the town.  The procession lasts about 30 blocks but doesn't return to the church until about 10pm!  Each street that the Virgen passes is decorated by the owners to show their faith and devotion. I had the great luck that the procession passed by our house - but for the family this meant an entire day spent preparing the house - with flowers, ribbons, posters and more.  It was really quite nice.  Unfortuantely the rain arrived just before the Virgen.  However, this only served the make things a bit damp - the Virgen and her devoted rode out the storm like champs - nothing a little plastic sheeting can't take care of.

La Virgen de la Merced.