Travelling latin america, a little statistic

loading...

Friends - Cass & Cam

On our travels we meet many other like minded people on big journeys as well. As a reminder for us and to give you the chance of more travel stories and pictures we will list them here. 

http://camncassabroad.blogspot.com/

We met Cassie and Cameron on Utila at Underwater Vision. They where fellow dive masters in training and had the apartment right next to us. This of course meant many crazy parties and awesome dives together! The two Aussies left the island shortly after us but returned at the beginning of the year to work as dive masters at Underwater Vision.

Leaving Utila and entering Nicaragua (20.10.2013 - 22.10.2013)

To get to Tegucigalpa you would have to take the ferry to La Ceiba, a bus to San Pedro Sula, stay a night there and then leave early the next morning to arrive in the evening in Tegu.

Another option is to take the plane, which we did! At around twice the price of the ferry-bus-overnight-stay-bus combo we had the opportunity to see Utila and Roatan from our tiny airplane ^^

The airport is just a strip of concrete and a little shack. There are some army guys sitting around but besides a senorita walking around with a piece of paper and checking if our name was on it there was no security procedure. Thats how flying is supposed to be! 

Sadly the more developed Roatan, where we did a stop-over, wasn't as relaxed and they confiscated my swiss army knife and the rest of the rum I had in my backpack! Really uncool... =(

After arriving in Tegu we took a cab into town and stayed in a run down hotel in the city centre. The centre didn't look any better during the day but at least we could do some shopping. I have proper shoes again ;)

The next day we took a TransNica bus across the border into Nicaragua. We hopped of in Estreli as the bus continued directly to Managua. Estreli was again a poor/dirty/rundown town where the only thing you could by on the streets was plastic crap and cellphones... Some food/fruit would have been nice.

So we left for Leon!

UP UP AND AWAY!

Underwater Vision, Utila

http://www.utilascubadiving.com.

Utila has plenty of different dive shops, our choice was Underwater Vision one of the biggest dive shops on the island.
The shop has a bar/restaurant (always look for the daily special), hammocks and a volleyball field. All the staff are kind of a family, so be open and they will welcome you.
Underwater Vision offer all courses from Open Water until Instructor and higher. Every course includes a few days free accommodations otherwise you can stay in the dorm for 5 bucks a night. All prices and details about the courses and more can be found online.

Rio Coco Cafe, Utila

www.riococobeans.com

Rico Coco Cafe is a small Coffee shop close to Underwater Vision run by a very friendly american couple. She bakes every day different fresh cakes, muffins an other delicious things - my advice, try the chocolate cake! And most important, they have the best internet on the island!
The Rio Coco Cafe is part of an no profit organisations, witch run's schools along the river Coco in Nicaragua.

Utila (30.08.2013 - 19.10.2013)

Melanie and I had thought about doing the divemaster training (DMT) for a while now. As our divemasters/instructors in Mexico told us about Utila, one of the cheapest places on earth to do the DMT, we decided to check it out.

Both of them, Nathan and P-O, recommended Underwater Vision to us, so thats were we headed first and got stuck ;)

During the training we were treated as part of the team, helping and assisting the instructors. We had to perform certain workshops, trainings, skills and exams. Most of it was done assisting on Open Water, Advanced Open Water and Rescue Courses. Also if there was free space on the boat we could just go fun diving! ^^ All in all, including the time we assisted, we did ♂ 55 / ♀43 dives. Including a couple night dives! =)

The first three weeks of accommodation were included afterwards we moved to a little flat right next to the dive shop. Having a kitchen again was great, we could cook some decent meals and save a bit of money. The army guys staying below us were a bit scary though, waving their assault rifles around before they would go on patrol on their golf cart. And of course we had some crazy neighbours, Cas & Cam ;)

Our daily routine would depend if we would go out with the morning or afternoon boat. Morning boat meant helping loading the tanks and setting up the gear at 6:15 (THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGTH!) So mostly not much party on the night before. The afternoon boat would leave around 12:30, loading meant being there half an hour earlier. Of course this is still a 3rd world country, a power cut usually delayed the filling of the tanks and therefore the boat ;)

Internet was unusable at our home and not much better at the dive shop. Which made us regular customer at Rio Coco, a coffee shop with the best internet connection on the island! =)

Nightlife would usually evolve around the same places and bars. Tequila tuesday would lure all to Tranquilla Bar (why?!). If we had a group of students getting certified we headed mostly to Skid Row Bar to do the Guifitiy Challenge. For which you had to drink 4 shots of cheap rum which was spiced with all kinds of "healthy" herbs. After the first 3 shots you had to take off your shirt, do 20 spins in the street in front of the bar (luckily there is next to no traffic ^^), drink the last shot, do some laps around the pool table and then choose one of the singlets. Other classics on the island were Rehab Bar or Treetanic.

As Utila is part of the Bay Islands, where the inhabitants descend from english pirates, woodcutters and slaves the main language is english, of some sorts. Which took quite a toll on our spanish =(

If You Come To Utila

If your wondering what we are up to at the moment ;)

Link to YouTube

Entering Honduras (28.08.2013 - 30.08.2013)

As we were running out of time (hehe) we decided we've seen enough and skip the rest of El Salvador. So we took a shuttle and many immigration stamps later we made it to Honduras. The lovely town of Copan Ruinas (that is really the name of it) is famous for its, you guessed it, ruins. As we only wanted to stay two night's we had to choose between hot springs and more mayan ruins. So we went bathing ^^
We had a lovely day soaking in the hot pools and left early the next morning. Really early for Melanie ;). The bus took us to San Pedro Sula, which is supposed to be the most dangerous city in the world. But nobody bothered us or our Piñata at the bus stop ;). Another bus and then a ferry ride took us to Utila... more to come!