not everything in costa rica is traumatic

http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=1441327642262&ref=mf


While rafting sent me into a panic, right after we got to do some of the coolest shit ever. We went canyoneering which I have never done. We started on this hanging bridge with an open part in the middle which you just stand over and then while attached to a rope, plummet straight down into the waterfall below. There were 4 of us 2 girls and 2 boys and wouldn´t you know it, the boys refused to go first and I knew Whitney wouldnt so I did. I imagine this is how badasses feel when rapelling out of some airplane and I loved every second of it! Then we did some spiderman rapelling down some waterfalls which was so much fun! The link above is the video the tour agency made of our trip...check it out.

Then we did a Tarzan Swing. Its a platform that you stand on, get harnessed in the then the guide pulls you back and swings you forward...suspended from a single wire and swinging above a canyon...its insane! Again, I had to go first which I am starting to like. You could lay back and stick your feet in the air...all while swinging over this canyon! Theres no evidence of this on the video but here is video of some strange girl doing it so you get the idea of just exactly how cool this is. http://www.travelpod.com/travel-photo/andersontravel/anderson_travel/1190066220/tarzan-swingxxxso-funx.avi/tpod.html

flopping around in class v rapids

Were arranging all of our adventure tours through an agency in La Fortuna Costa Rica and so far it´s been great. That was true until 2 of the guys convinced us to do a canyoneering-white water rafting trip. I went rafting before in Chile and didnt love it but I REALLY wanted to do the canyoneering so I agreed. Too bad we had to do the rafting first...in class 5 rapids.

Whit has never rafted and my experience is in like class 2 or 3 so it hardly qualifies me to be in class V rapids. The guys insist that as long as we listen to the rules and follow safety rules we´ll be fine. I wasnt so sure and I wish I had said no because it ended up being the worst adventure sport experience of my entire life...all jokes aside. Horrible.

There were 3 of us regular people and 2 guides in our boat. After less than like a half hour of these ridiculous intense rapids in which I was scared for my life, the f-ing raft flipped over and dumped us into that furious river. We were going through huge rapids and all I remember is a huge wave in the face, opening my eyes and seeing the entire left side of the raft in the air and people falling on top of me...all of us flipping into the big rock face to the right of us. The raft flips in the heat of the rapids and theres like a pocket you stick your foot into to use to hang on while you paddle. Well my freakin foot would not let go and I start panicking because I am in the class 5 rapids, on the underside of a raft with my foot caught in it gasping for air and instead just choking down buckets of water. We were told if this happens to get out from underneath the raft so 1. they can see you to rescue you and 2. you dont get slammed into rocks. So theres 4 of us under this raft and youre trying to use the raft to launch yourself out from underneath it but it feels like your getting your ass kicked inside a washing machine. The sheer will not to drown forces you to somehow get your ass out from underneath there only to get sucked downstream in the rapids. The whole time you are savoring every .1 second you get with your face above water so you can manage some kind of pathetic attempt at a breath. Half the time you just breathe not knowing whether your head is truly above water because all you see when you open your eyes is either sheer black or churning white...all signs that breathing is not really an option.

After god knows how long of this terrible game, I look over to see my rescue options. Whitney and the guide are on top of the flipped over raft, the guy that went with us is sitting on a lone rock in the middle of the raging river and while by some freak accident I still have my paddle but no one anywhere near me is looking in my direction and I can´t get enough air in my lungs to yell. Just as I find a rock to hold onto the rapids suck me back in. I end up a little ways past them down the river and have to get rescued by the kayak which is horrifying in itself. First theres a wall of rock to my left, across the rapid and he tells me swim to shore! I look left and say where!? because as far as I can see there IS no shore and the rapid is either going to slam me into the rocks or im gonna get washed away because I cant hold on to the rocks. So my ass ends up in yet another sufficiently sized rapid and im struggling to climb belly first onto the back of the kayak which allows the rescuer to paddle you to shore. The crap part about this is the entire time your legs are still in the water slamming into every boulder underneath you with the force of the rapids propelling them. Altogether the most horrifying experience of my life.

I ended up squatting on the shore, coughing up water and saying to the guide ¨I dont want to do this anymore!¨ Turns out on the otherside of the river on the bottom of the flipped raft, Whitney was uttering the same words to the other guide. What we both failed to realize at the time is that there was no End button on this trip and all we could do to get it over with was get back in the raft and close your eyes hoping not to ever end up back in that river again.

Traumatic is the only word I can think of to describe this experience. Seriously, horribly fu(king traumatic. Excuse the language but at a time like this it is entirely appropriate. I have souvenier bruises up and down both of my shins, on one elbow, one hip and my favorites, two on my forehead.

Suffice it to say I will never again be found in a raft, and if by chance I do, it will be an intertube in Lake Erie with a MichUltra in my hand...as far away as possible from any Class V rapid.

Don´t cry over spilled milk...or soup.

San Pedro Sula is a large city in Honduras, or as close to a large city as we´ve seen in Central America thus far. In the center there is a nice park with markets all up and down the surrounding streets. We spent a day wandering through the market stalls to see what kinda junk they were selling and just to see the culture. These markets are very different than anything we have in America...the closest comparison is a Flea Market on Sunday. And that doesn´t even do it justice.

Weve had some issues with constantly being stared at but more annoying is the complete and utter disregard for personal space in these countries, Honduras being the worst. Whitney made a comment in the market about how this is a very touchy feely culture which is an excellent preface to this story.

Not ten minutes later as we´re walking through this market, I I see some guy walking towards Whitney and I with googley eyes. I adjust my path to walk wide of him just to be safe. A minute later from behind me I hear in clear, LOUD English ¨ew! WHAT THE F$(*!!!!¨ I turn around panicking because I knew it was Whitneys voice. I see her standing there with her arms out and her jaw on the floor with her face contorted with sheer disgust..directed towards none other than the googley eyed guy I walked away from.
I yell... Did he touch you!?
Whitney¨-- Yes he KISSED ME!!!
Me--On the face??
Whitney--No..on the...arm!?

We walked away with him standing there looking all sad and pouty. Then Whitney informed me that when he kissed her, before screaming obscenities she turned and swatted him with her water bottle on reflex. As shes telling me this I either kicked a ramen noodle bowl or had it thrown at me because it hit me behind the knee and covered my sandaled feet in day old, cold, smelly, dirty noodle soup. After that, it was time to go back to the hotel.

Lunching with a Naked Boy and Transvestite

We arrived in Managua, Nicaragua after about 10 hours on a bus and had only eaten grapes and a turkey sandwich all day so we were starving. We got directions to a place to eat that apparently did not exist. Instead, we ended up walking around for like 20 minutes before asking a group of drunk old men where to eat and a police officer. All of them answered with ïts so late to eat food!´and laughed because nothing is open. Mind you, its 430pm.

We stumble into this place that looks like a restaurant given it has tables set up out front with tableclothes and a menu is on the wall. We walk in and theres a boy watching TV so we say hola, hola and he ignores us. We look around for signs of food which is when Whitney sees a naked boy in the back and questions what is happening here. Some other little boy comes from out of the woodwork, fully clothed, and asks us what we want. We say is there food now? He says, let me go ask. So he comes out and tells us no, no food...from behind him come a group of people that consists of 1 adult woman figure and 3 children. The naked boy is upfront and hes filthy and flappin his wee wee around asking us something in Spanish we dont understand. The woman figure, who up close is CLEARLY a man, pushes the naked boy out of the way and tells us that no, in fact there IS no food right now.

Good thing because in retrospect, I dont know how comfortable I would have been eating there.

12 Hearts

After a long-ass bus ride to Tegucigalpa we retired to our rooms to get settled and ended up turning on the TV. It had maybe 6 channels, all it spanish. So we settled on one called 12 Hearts. There were 5 girls and 3 boys all lined up based on their astrological signs and then they asked all kinds of questions, most that I did not understand. Then the girls would get called 1 by 1 to the middle and would call up one of the 3 guys and answer Ïs she your heart?¨ and the boy would either say yes or no. If he said no, the girl got booted off and the guy went and sat back down hoping the 1 of the remaining girls that he wanted would call him up. Then when the two that liked each other got together they would essentially announce this and then the two would wildly make out and grope in the center of the stage...on tv...in front of an audience of people and viewers. The best part was the hostess was wearing a coat, as a dress. It was all a very interesting cultural experience, haha.

Chivalry Is Alive and Well

After an incredibly stressful and somewhat fruitless trip to Lago Yojoa in Honduras, we boarded a bus headed to the colonial town of Comayagua (We did this by standing on the side of the road with all our stuff and sticking our arm out to busses speeding by and asking them where they were going). It is not at all uncommon for even nicer busses to stop and pick up travelers on the side of the road just about anywhere. Even if there are no seats left and technically they are the kind of bus that ISNT supposed to do this, they will, for the extra money. Such has been the experience on every bus weve been on so far except for King Quality which functions more like a greyhound bus in America...buy a ticket at the station and board there or youre out of luck. So, on this NON greyhound-like bus to Comayagua, by the time we got on there were no seats left. We put our huge packs underneath and stood in the aisles with our daypacks on..which I must mention, are not particularly light especially after the Honduran souvenier expedition we completed. Anyways, we stood in the aisles for about 10 minutes as the only foreigners on the bus. Two little boys probably no older than 11 were sitting next to each other. They looked at us and giggled a few times before scooting together on one chair, making eye contact and pointing to the seat next to them, motioning for one of us to sit down.

Probably about twenty minutes later I made eye contact with another local guy who was turned around in his seat looking at me, half out of his seat and motioning for me to sit down. Then, because of the lack of seats he ended up standing in the aisle for at least 25 minutes. We were both very grateful to have a seat to rest our wary backs.

Beans, eggs, rice, repeat

It turns out the staple in all of Central America is eggs, rice, beans all in some form with a tortilla. I am loving these refriend beans and that will be a staple in my diet when I get home so I was thoroughly excited to find the newest version of the egg, cheese, beans, tortilla mixture in Honduras known as the Baleada. Essentially a hot tortilla with all these ingredients plus creme all melted in the middle. Delicious. I was not as pleased to get up this morning in Nicaragua to find eggs, yum, and a bean and rice mixture on my plate. Beans and rice in the mornings? Only in Central America...

quote

“Adventure is a path. Real adventure – self-determined, self-motivated, often risky – forces you to have firsthand encounters with the world. The world the way it is, not the way you imagine it. Your body will collide with the earth and you will bear witness. In this way you will be compelled to grapple with the limitless kindness and bottomless cruelty of humankind – and perhaps realize that you yourself are capable of both. This will change you. Nothing will ever again be black-and-white.” – Mark Jenkins

Kidnappings in C.A.

We made it to San Pedro Sula and spent the last few days just hanging out...shopping for crap to make our bags heavier and eating at american chain restraunts. Its been refreshing. Not to mention our hotel has air conditioning and a hot shower and a tv...3 things we have had very little of in the last month or so.

Anyways, the place we are at is owned by a couple and their 2 teenage children. They speak good english and have no idea I can sometimes understand them. So they are all sitting downstairs talking loudly about god knows what and the daughter is on the porch by herself. All of a sudden they hear a car door shut and the dad gets up and flies out the front door and starts freaking out when his daughter isnt there. The brother and mom say they dont know where she went and everyone is starting to get really really loud and frantic and I have not a clue whats going on. Finally the mom yells to the coworker upstairs, he yells back and they all settle down. Whitney and I, sitting there confused, finally get an explanation of the chaos.

Apparently kidnappings are tremendously common around here. Locals who work at the banks have deals with criminals...the bank workers inform the criminals which families have money and then they go kidnap their daughter and then ransom her for money. Knowing how much they have in their bank account, the kidnappers know how much they can ransom her for. The dad that owns the hostel said for this reason he puts all his money into things and never into bank accounts because it is not safe.

Significantly freaked out, ya?

Travel only with thy equals or thy betters; if there are none, travel alone

Well I have some news to report. In about 3 weeks or so I will be travel partnerless. Whitney has decided she is homesick and cant do the full 3 months so she is upping her flight to leave early November instead of early december. This means I will be on my own until I decide I cant hack it...or get bored, broke...or move here.

As of now we dont have a plan. We have a 5am bus to Copan so we can see some ruins in Honduras and from there we will just make our way to Costa Rica where she will fly out. After that I will probably travel Costa Rica and Panama by myself....maybe do some more Spanish school or do an extended volunteer program. Its nuts because I literally have no plan. Ill just have to see when Whit actually leaves and where I end up. So no worries but definitely a change in the plan.

Another reason to love Guatemala

After all that to get to Belize to go to the embassy we ended up back in Flores Guatemala and took a 9 hour overnight bus to Guatemala City. I showed up at the embassy, skipped a line of about 100 people because they were locals and I have a US Passport, strolled in, told them what I needed, paid for it and voila! there it is, new pages and all in less than an hour in total.

Again, I love guatemala. I also love having my cab driver, who is cute but short, tell me that I dont speak very fast but its very cute...and then giving me his number to call him when I come back. Haha, Guatemala is the best place on earth! I then drove all over the city trying to get a bus to Honduras and it cost us less than ten bucks. So do you want to book your vacation here now or later..

The Turd of an American Embassy

Before I left America I knew at some point Id have to get some new passport pages as I think I only had 7 or 8 spots left when I left. Well I used them quicker than I thought so I did some reasearch online and you pay 82dollars and get new pages added to your current passport. No big deal. So I figure this out in Caye Caulker, look for the nearest embassy which both our guidebooks (2009 and 2008) say is in Belize City. We get a ferry to the city with a bus booked the next morning to Flores, Guatemala which is the jumpoff point from wherever we go next. We arrive in Belize City to find out there is no longer an embassy there. But what IS there is a sprawling cess pool of a city that is strikingly similar to what I imagine Camden, NJ to look like.

Anyways, we then walked all around the city trying to get this bus rescheduled when we were told we have to take a 6am bus to Belmapan, the capital which is an hour away and where the embassy currently is. So we are up at 5, on this bus, get to Belmapan and arrive on the doorstep of them embassy. We stood outside for like 20 minutes and then had to line up and slide your passport through the security window where the guard decides to buzz you in or not. I tell her what I need and the conversation goes a little like this.
Her¨Did you have an appointment?
Me¨An appointment? For what?
Her¨You need to have an appointment to get new pages.
Me¨Ok. I need to make an appointment.
Her¨Ok you need to go online to do that.
Me¨ok well can I go online and schedule it for today and come back.
Her¨Sure but you probably wont get an appointment for today. Maybe tomorrow or in a few days.

So I get a cab to the nearest Internet cafe which is not open. Get another ride to an open place to find indeed there Are No appointments for today. Youve got to be kidding me. Its blazing hot and my bag is huge and im getting pissed.

So we go back to the terminal with busses, corral like animals around a big gate that opens when the bus arrives and whoever pushes the hardest gets through. Those little Belizean women are pushy, let me tell you. So after 2 rounds of this we shove through. We end up arriving at the border town, taking another cab TO the border, waiting there for 2 hours for a bus to come, go through customs using up my very last passport page and get the bus on the other side. Then about 2 hours later we get off the bus, on to a shuttle and arrive in Flores. Welcome back the city says.

So in a little less than 4 hours we have a 9 hour bus to Guatemala City where we HAVE to do whatever it takes to get those passport pages or I cannot leave Guatemala. Ill let you know how it goes.

Drowned Camera...round two.

Ive done it. Ive drowned my camera once again. This time I had it in a water proof camera bag and we were snorkeling in the carribean and it was beautiful and we wanted pictures. So whitney, who was still on the boat, double checks the seal and throws it in. I swim for awhile and try to turn my camera on. When it doesnt work I instantly think shit i didnt charge it! for real!?! That is about 2 seconds before I realized that somehow the damn waterproof bag was leaking and I had succeeding in drowning my camera yet again. So it is currently in rice drying out but I sincerely doubt that cameras ability to survive TWO drownings in 3 weeks. Ill let you know if thats possible and if it is, I have the most ninja camera ever.

Lost at Sea

I have a fear of large bodies of water, especially those with big waves and those that you cannot see to the bottom, and those that contain sharks and other stinging/biting animals. Understand that before you read further..and no laughing at my stupidity.

The other day we were in Caye Caulker in Belize. Its a beautiful island with like 1,000 people on it. We were staying at a beach front hostel and were pretty much the only ones there since it is low season. This was fantastic. The hostel had a beach with chairs and a pier and everything. I went out onto the peer, took my flip flops off, sat down to put my feet in the water and look around. Suddenly, a gust of wind and my ONLY flip flops went flying into the wind and landed in the water..like a foot away from me. I panicked. Get in I told myself...get it before the waves take it away! I hesitated..and then hesitated some more..looking around to find something to grab it with. Mind you, i am IN my bathing suit this whole time. Im freaking out, I cannot get myself to get in that water...especially alone when whitney was all the way at the other end of the pier. So I ran back and told her I needed help. She, who is equally as afraid of oceans, walked out to the pier with me and we realized my shoe was way too far away and neither of us had the guts to swim out to it.

Ridiculous I know...especially considering 2 days later I was in the middle of the Carribean snorkeling...flip flop less. Which is a problem when I only brought 3 pairs of shoes on this trip. Woops.