So I left Colombia for Guatemala, my flight was not a direct on. It was scheduled to stop over in Miami. However, when I arrived in Miami, I found out my flight to Guatemala was cancelled. I was in line for 2 hours, finally when I got to the counter; I was put on another flight for the next day and told that because my original flight was cancelled due to bad weather, which was not their fault, I would be responsible for my hotel and expenses in Miami. How nice American Airlines, this will mark my first and last time I will travel with AA. This meant I arrived a day later than planned, the only good thing was that I met a person from Turks and Caicos, which mean that whenever I visit Turks, I have a place to stay.
In Guatemala City I stayed at my favorite bed & breakfast – Dos Lunas Guest House – the owner, Loretta is super nice and helpful, plus the guest house is very clean, breakfast included and free transportation to and from the airport. Next morning, I took the Alamo bus to Quetzaltenango (Xela) to visit my former host family and Spanish teachers. It was great being in Xela again, for one, instead of the cold rainy weather; it was pretty warm in Xela. I met with a friend and my former Spanish teacher at my favorite café – Café Baviera. Sad, I could only spend a day in Xela, next day I left for Belize.
The journey to Belize was long but sort of comfortable with linea dorada bus – 5 hours from Xela to Guatemala City, 8.5 hours from Guatemala City to Flores (overnight bus) and 4.5 hours from Flores to Belize City. Once in Belize City, took the 12noon boat to Caye Caulker. Caye Caulker was amazing as usual – the slogan is ‘GO SLOW’. Folks start drinking the smooth coconut rum pretty early in the morning. I went on a snorkeling trip and my Belizean friend made dinner using the fish they caught – tasting :).
The snorkeling trip was amazing until the Captain got pissed off at some folks in the boat for not following instruction. The instruction was not to stand on the coral reef because it gets destroyed. Well, folks decided not to follow the instruction and the marine police issued a warning to the captain.
So dear tourists, while you pay about $100 or a bit more to go on snorkeling trips, remember to follow instructions given to you in order to reserve these coral reef so others can enjoy them too. When you go back to your respective countries, these Belizean captain and tour companies rely on these trips to feed their families, so when you don’t follow instruction they face the risk of losing their licenses or being fined or being banned from taking tours to these areas. So be respectful of the nature.
Two days later, I made my way back to Flores so I would catch the bus to San Pedro Sula, Honduras where I’ll then transfer to La Cieba. I took the Maya del Oro bus service, they take you from Belize City to Flores for $25 (same price as other international bus service – note – chicken buses might be cheaper), it was less comfortable than linea dorada or San Juan express shuttle bus. I slept the night at Flores and took the morning bus to San Pedro Sula, Honduras, with Maya del Oro bus which was scheduled to leave at 6am but did not until almost 7am. The bus was not comfortable at all; it doesn’t worth the $42 I paid. I finally made it to La Cieba at 8.30pm.
All decent hotels in La Cieba were filled up due to the 1st annual summit on Afro-Descendents which is the reason while I was there. At the summit, the president of Honduras, president of Costa Rica, president and ex-president of Guatemala and other top officials of Central American government were in attendance. There were over 500 persons representing 42 countries and 4 continents in attendance. I felt blessed being among talented and passionate intellectuals, activists, community organizers and persons of African descent.
I ended up staying at the Banana Republic Guesthouse, not my favorite place but I didn’t care this time around because I was at the summit for most of the time. At my last night in La Cieba, I had to jump over the fence of the hostel because the gate was looked and the person with the key was not around. It was 3am in the morning and I didn’t feel like standing on the street to wait for him to come back so jumping the fence was it.
I stayed one night in San Pedro Sula at the amazing place called ‘La Posada B&B. I paid $14 for a dorm bed (pretty nice, just three queen size bed in a spacious room with clean bathroom), a kitchen, swimming pool, walking distance to the mall, AC in all rooms, free internet & Wi-Fi, free pick up & drop off to/from the bus terminal and free breakfast.
Well, am on my way back to the U.S. Classes starts on Tuesday.
Until my next travel
Thanks for reading my blogs throughout the summer
La Nigeriana (The Nigerian Girl)
The Adventures of a Nigerian-American 