Gearing up for diving

I arrived in Honduras on Saturday and, so, have been here for three full days now. I've been in Tela, on the north coast, and I've been quiet because, honestly, there hasn't been a whole lot to write home about. Downtown Tela is a bit rundown looking and not all that pretty to look at. On Sunday when I actually took my camera with me to see if I couldn't squeak something out of it, 95% of the shops were closed and that would've meant just lots of corrugated metal gates and barred windows, so I didn't bother. 

I was actually staying a bit outside of Tela in a place called Triunfo de la Cruz (Triumph of the Cross). It's a Garifuna village that I was initially dismayed to see required a 15 minute taxi ride to get into town, but after seeing that Tela isn't much to look at and a taxi ride is only 25Lps (lempira; $1=20Lps) anyway, I was okay with the decision. It's a sleepy village with not much to do besides walk along the beach, chat with locals, read, watch videos, and nap in hammocks. I didn't take many pictures, a few cloud challenged sunsets shots is about all. I'll try to get those posted in a couple of days, but my internet connection is deadly slow right now. Done!

One kind of funny thing to mention is that kids seemed to love me in Tela. During one of my walks along the beach and through the village, kids would stop and wave. Quite a few pointed to my tattoos and made comments (that I mostly didn't understand). One even laughed, pointed, and called me gringa (white/foreign person)! I hadn't been called gringa or any of its variations in some time, so it kind of tickled me. Also, the youngest daughter of the family running the place where I stayed took an instant liking to me. She'd always run up to me and grab my hand or jump into my arms to give me a hug. Her name was Mia and I didn't understand most of what she said either, but that didn't stop her from chattering along anyway. It was kind of sad when she burst into my room (she had a habit of doing that, enough of one that I made sure to keep the door locked, usually), saw me packing, and asked "a dónde va?!" (where are you going?).

Today my four hour trip consisted of a 2 1/2 hour ride on one of those legendary chicken buses, a 25 minute taxi ride, and an hour long ferry ride. I'm in Utila now, the smallest of the three main Bay Islands, located in the Gulf of Honduras. Tomorrow I'll do a refresher course to bring me back up to speed in the ways of diving and I'll go on two dives the following day. Depending on how that goes and how I'm feeling, I may do two more on Friday, but we'll see.

(I don't know who they were, but so romantic, right?)