Mayan Revenge: A Not So Settling Experience

A view over the ruins looking at mountains in the Copan Valley

A well framed mountain view while standing
outside of a gas station in Guatemala.

When I arrived in the small village of Copan Ruinas, my insides were gurgling with a fury. Although we had stopped for snacks along the way, Guatemalan gas station food was not exactly the sustenance my stomach was hoping for that day. We arrived at the Hostel Berakah as the sun was setting over a mountainous hillside just beyond the border of town.

The buildings were no more than a couple stories high, and the hostel was located on the cobblestone Avenue de Copan, only a few hundred feet from the Parque Central. As you exit the hostel to the right, just before reaching the parque, the archaic yet still useful road hangs a left downhill over a small stream and into the surrounding farmlands. This would be the route I would take the following morning to visit the crown jewel of this small valley in western Honduras, the famous Mayan Ruinas de Copan (Mayan Ruins of Copan).

Since my stomach was empty, however, I turned left out of the hostel that first evening and around the next corner was a small indoor market, Dispensa Familiar. Grateful for some regular food choices, my stomach decided that a salad would be the best option for the evening - nothing like a bowl of fruits and vegetables to make up for such Central American gas station delicacies as "meat wrapped in dough" and "stale crackers with fat cream and red flakes."

I returned home from the market with a bag full of grapes, tomatoes, broccoli, and other greens. Having had my full of the plato tipico de Honduras (eggs, beans, fried plantains, and tortillas - a traditional plate of Honduran food), I prepared what I felt was a healthy, delicious meal that would give me the right boost of energy for my final few days in this part of the World.

The fog burning off the mountains during my first morning in Copan.

I felt fine when I woke the next day, and it was only a short walk to the entrance of the ruins which were designated a UNESCO World Heritage property in 1980. I initially walked right past the main entrance where I should have bought a $15 ticket, but it wasn't too difficult to remedy my mistake. Once I reached the main path leading to the ruins, a path lined with tall trees and flocks of colorful macaws flying overhead, it hit me - the kind of hit that can only come from some terrible bug destroying your insides.

From the moment I saw the first bricks protruding from the ground to form either a temple or a ceremonial alter, my stomach was rumbling and the pain was almost unbearable. Apparently, the salad I consumed the prior evening was not as healthy as I originally thought. Something was wrong. Something was oh-so-terribly wrong. However, I had just paid $15 to see some Mayan ruins and dammit I'm gonna see some ruins.

Although I snapped a few selfies of me smiling while looking over the ancient courtyards and surrounding mountains, the only happy memory I have from that day was returning to my hostel and laying in a hammock for many hours (only getting up to use the bathroom multiple times). My two hours of attempting to be happy while enjoying Copan Ruians will surely be remembered - just not for the ruins, and more for the runs.

After a miserable evening of trying to calm my innards and find a few moments of sleep, I woke early and walked along the cobblestone streets where a town map indicated I would find a farmacia. I purchased what I assumed was the Central American equivalent of Pepto and Pedialyte (they were pink and orange, respectively). I consumed both bottles and spent the entire day either in the hammock or in the bathroom. However, I relished knowing that I had just seen my second of three ancient civilizations in Central and South America (the first was the Incan ruins at Machu Picchu in Peru back in 2011), and now all I have left are the Aztecs in Mexico to complete the set.

A view into The Great Plaza. The tent to the
right is covering an active restoration site.

I returned twice more throughout the day to the farmacia to purchase more colored liquids, and slowly my body's urge to regurgitate itself in various forms began to subside.When sun began to rise the next morning, I was able to muster the energy needed to once again walk down the cobblestone roads, but this time to a bus stop. Here I would begin my final leg of this journey back to San Pedro Sula (SPS) where I flew into Aeropuerto Ramon Villeda almost three months prior.

Back in SPS, the bustling transit station on the outskirts of town was just as it had been on my prior visit to the terminal before traveling to the port town of La Cieba (before spending two months on Utila). The station is lined on the outside with a seemingly endless number of white vans - all with at least one hype guy ensuring that if you pay them money they will get you where you need to go. Although I had been through this dog and pony show many times over the course of my trip, this one proved an extra difficult task as I was now searching for transportation to the airport. The "aeropuerto" is a buzz word for most of the profiteering taxi men as they know it is their final opportunity to squeeze as much money as possible from a well traveled, but exhausted American - and I can only imagine their increased pressure tactics work quite well.

A monument that sits outside of
the main walls of the ruins.
In other words, it's free to see.

After one failed attempt to find suitable transportation, I found myself somewhere in the heart of SPS. The driver and hype guy had ensured me the airport was one of their first stops and I gladly gave them most of my remaining lempiras. However, once the little blue dot on my google maps began drifting away from the airport and towards the middle of the city, I decided to express my disdain with the best broken Spanish I could, and I must have made a few solid points as something happened that can only be described as a miracle to most weary travelers - the van driver gave me my money back! Although that didn't make up for the fact that I was still in the middle of an international city for which the U.S. State Department has a continuous travel warning.

I suppose it was serendipity rendering its little face that afternoon as a white taxi was idling just around the corner from where I exited the first van. However, it didn't take the form of Kate Beckinsale or a stripping Selma Hayek, but that of a dark skinned man wearing a hat, sunglasses, and a New York Knicks t-shirt who spoke nearly perfect English. After three months of practicing and struggling to speak another language, it was nice to find some familiarity for my final ride to the airport:

Me: Where'd you learn English?
Driver: I use to live in New York.
Me: Why'd you move back?
Driver: Oh, I was deported.
Me: Oh, really? What happened?
Driver: Felony drug and attempted murder charges...
Me: (Silence)
Driver: But that was a long time ago...

--

Back at the airport, someone had a puppy.

Thank you again for reading and following along with my impromptu journey through Central America. As usual, my time there was not long enough to see everything I would have wanted, and now there are new places I will need to return to see in the future (it's funny how that works, uh?). I returned to the States just in time for my friend Evan's bachelor party at Oyster Fest in New Orleans in early June. I will continue to write about stories from when I returned earlier this summer, including a motorcycle road trip to Yellowstone, a mother moose encounter in Rocky Mountain National Park, and my return to living in Denver. Hope you had a great Thanksgiving and a good start to the Holiday season!

-Dustin

El Salvadoran Wedding Registry

The Man. The Legend. Evan Mario Luthye.

I met Evan while attending Cornell College. We both played football. We both pledged to the same fraternity. We both liked cheese. It was a good friendship from the start. Since then, Evan has been a fantastic friend, way better than I could ever hope to be, so I felt compelled to make an effort to get him and his beautiful bride-to-be, Becca, a thoughtful gift for their wedding. Evan's father's family is from La Libertad in El Salvador, so I traveled to the small Central American village to find a gift there...

...well, full disclosure, I was already in the area and figured I'd stop by.

I departed Nicaragua aboard a shuttle that cost approximately $40. It left early in the morning so we could cross two international borders and arrive in the small town of El Tunco before the day was over. Although I am comfortable taking the cheaper local buses while traveling within one country, I had heard enough border crossing horror stories from other travelers to encourage me to take a more accredited shuttle company.

When I arrived in El Tunco, I procured a shared room at a hostel just around the corner from the main road. The Tunco Lodge is located across the alley from the Rio El Tunco, a small murky stream that slowly flows from the surrounding mountains into the Pacific Ocean. Although I only paid for a shared room, the owner mistakenly grabbed the key to a private room. By the time he discovered his error he didn't want to retrieve the correct key, so he gave me the private room instead (for the same price). I was happy to accept the upgrade.

After exploring the beach-side restaurants and walkways, I ordered four pupusas from a small roadside stand. A thick tortilla shell with a cheesy savory filling, the pupusa is the official dish of El Salvador. After lunch I returned to the hostel pool where I conversed with fellow travelers. The majority of individuals who visit this town have one intention, to ride the epic waves pounding this part of the Central American Coastline. So surfing was usually the topic of most of my conversations, however, I'll gladly listen to someone else tell me something about which they are passionate (even though I have never surfed a day in my life).

The next day I paid twenty-five american cents to board a local bus and travel the short distance south to Puerto de La Libertad, the home of Manolo Flamenco, father to Antonio Flamenco, and grandfather to Evan Mario Luthye. As soon as I got off the bus in La Libertad, however, it was clear this "small village" was really more of a city and thus any hopes of running into someone who may know the Flamenco family vanished. I made a few attempts at talking with shop owners as to whether they knew the family, but combined with my broken Spanish this request was not received all that well.

I spent the day at the fish market located on the long wooden pier jetting into the Pacific Ocean with wall to wall vendors. The most captivating fare was a bag of baby hammerheads one gentleman dumped directly onto the wooden planks of the pier. Before I could take a photo all the little sharks had been snapped up by local consumers. This market is probably not up to FDA standards, but fresh nonetheless.

In the end, I found some local vendors along the boardwalk from which to purchase my wedding gifts for Evan and Becca. The first, a small framed piece of art featuring a feather on which the artisan painted a few brightly colored Macaws. The second, two young girls who made jewelry for a local organization that supports young female entrepreneurs. I figured a necklace made of some local beads would be sufficient to fulfill Becca's hippie standards.

After a few more nights in El Tunco, complete with a few cafes (solo negro, por favor) in the mornings and more conversations with new friends, I hopped a shuttle with a few other travelers to traverse the final length of the small coastal country to its northern border, observing the remnants of past volcanic activity and a plethora of colorful flora, before entering Guatemala. About an hour later we crossed one more border taking us back into Honduras where my Central American adventure began almost three months prior.

This final border crossing allowed me to utilize the full extent of my knowledge of the Spanish language. We had just exited El Salvador, entered Guatemala, was exiting Guatemala and attempting to re-enter Honduras, all within a couple hours. It should have been a straight forward process, however, the gentleman at the Guatemala port of entry had post dated our visa stamps in our passports. Because of this oversight, the port of exit from Guatemala couldn't just give us an exit stamp with the correct date because, according to their system, none of us had technically entered the country yet. Although our driver quickly stepped in to help, I still had to explain my three months of travel itinerary to the immigration representative - all in Spanish. Although I'm sure I sounded like a toddler to her, I must have made a little sense because she ultimately stamped my passport with the correct date and I was allowed to leave the country.

Content with my recent accomplishment of troubleshooting an international immigration problem in another language, I settled into the rest of the trip as we made our way to the town of Copan Ruinas in Honduras. However, I still had one more adventure remaining before returning to the United States. Stay tuned for that in the next blog.

Thanks again for reading. I apologize for the longer interval between the last post. I'm moving around bit and will hopefully get back on a better routine soon. I'm settling down in Denver now and will continue writing from here. Talk with you soon!

Dustin

Probably what Evan looked like as a kid.

Decompression Redemption: The Day I Died in a Volcano

Diving in Laguna de Apoyo

I became a certified open water diver over ten years ago. I completed my two open water dives between the Santa Barbara coastline and the Channel Islands after I relocated to California for a new job. My final certification dive was highlighted by an adult harbor seal who swam around me as I ascended the rope back to the boat at the end of the dive.

A look back at the Santa Barbara Coastline

The seal circled around my legs, then once more around my waist before stopping directly in front of me - her head only a few inches from the front of my mask. She hovered in front of my body for what seemed like an eternity. Her eyes were dark in color, but maintained a tone of softness as if she was just as curious about me as I was of her - which I can only imagine was the case.

Humpback whales surfacing in the waters near the Channel Islands

My arms instinctively went around her waist but I was still a bit cautious to pull her any closer than the few inches currently separating her blubbery skin and the soft material of my wetsuit. However, she then leaned in and kissed the tempered glass of my black framed dive mask. Clearly embarrassed, she turned and escaped into the shallow waters surrounding the island of Santa Cruz.

As the weeks turned to months and the months turned to years, I slowly watched the time pass since my certification dive and the stolen kiss from my aquatic mistress. Ten years would pass before I would once again do a safety check with a dive buddy, and it would take place on the small Caribbean island of Utila off the east coast of Honduras. I was a bit scared when I began my first descent into the warm tropical waters to begin my refresher course. I bobbled around a bit until I gained control of my buoyancy and slowly began to re-learn what it's like to live underwater.

A sunset on the island of Utila

Squirrels, angels, and spotted drums would be just a few of the many types of colorful fish that would scurry around as bubbles would escape my mask. Giant crabs and black colored coral would pass by my field of vision as I swam through rock caves and over small shipwrecks during my six dives on the island. Rays of sun piercing the shallow waters and clouds of sand after an eel would scurry past - these are the scenes that can make up the underwater world. I was glad to be back.

The balcony of The Peace Project Hostel on Laguna de Apoyo

Once I left the island, I assumed it would be a while until I would strap on an aluminum dive tank again. Although I had redeemed my ego by literally diving back into this hobby, I wasn't sure when I would plan to take that giant step again. So when I arrived at the edge of Laguna de Apoyo - a twenty-two thousand year old dormant volcano in the middle of Nicaragua - and learned that my hostel shared a building with a dive shop. It was an easy decision to schedule a day of diving in a volcano.

My tent site while staying near the dive shop

My dive master, Elois, gave me and my dive buddy, Braedon, a brief introduction to the unique wildlife that exists inside of the ancient crater that has been filled with water since its last eruption. Cichlids, lizard fish, sardines, and enormous schools of freshwater fish engulfed us as we traversed the steep rock walls of the inclined slopes of the ancient caldera. As the tiger fish parents protected their babies from predators, we found exposed vents where warm water and gaseous bubbles were still escaping from the grasps of the underlying, albeit dormant, magma chamber deep below bottom of the lake.

Schools of dish swarm near the dive site

Our second dive was more pragmatic. We stayed in the shallows and used our increased allowable bottom time to pick up trash that had accumulated in the soft bottom algae that covers most of the lake bottom. In a relatively short period of time, trash can be consumed by the algae and almost disappear from sight, with the top of a bottle or the strings of a forgotten shoe as the only evidence of the foreign object stuck in the muck.

Thankfully Braedon had a camera with him!

My lips were smiling and my soul was happy when we returned to the dive center to clean our gear and sip some coffee with my new friends. As the afternoon continued, however, I would get one more opportunity to strap on my tank and go underwater. Another instructor, Michaela, was finishing a Rescue course for a local diver, and they were in need of some help. They needed someone to rescue.

At the bottom of Laguna de Opoyo

Now on my third dive of the day, I found it quite comical that someone would find themselves in my position - one that requires me to pretend to be unconscious, while breathing compressed air at the bottom of a lake in a twenty-two thousand year old volcano crater. The trainee finally reached the point of his checklist to bring me back up. Once at the surface, he inflated my BCD and continued his checklist of items to "save me" properly. 

I hope it's not another ten years before my next dive. I'll make sure that's not the case.

The entryway to The Peace Project Hostel

A big thank you to The Peace Project Hostel and Volcano Divers for allowing me the unique opportunity of diving in a volcano, and making this part of my trip in Central America even better. The Peace Project is a NGO that fosters community development and educational opportunities. I was fortunate enough to spend a day in one of their classroom with the students, not too mention all the workers are just great people with whom to spend a few days. If you don't mind waking up to monkey's throwing mangoes onto the top of the metal roofed buildings, then I highly suggest planning to stay here for a few nights and supporting the organization.You can check out their website thepeaceprojectnicaragua.org for more information. 

Volcano Divers is located in the same building and is the only Padi Certified dive shop for Laguna de Apoyo. The underwater photo credits go to my dive buddy, Braedon, who was there for his honeymoon. 

Cheers!
Dustin

Me and my pink fins