Holiday time!

So...

On Monday 4th we woke up at 4am, and got to Headman Alas coach station for 4.45. That was when the tearful farewells began. Blanca, Pamela, Pastor Reny, DeeAnn and Sara all waved us goodbye as we left them for the last time. Blance obviously was especially emotional as we had all formed a very strong relationship with her and she with us. It was very hard and there were tears all round but eventually we got onto the coach and left. Bummer news was that Helen had been really ill the week before so was unable to come with us to Utila! It sucked big time so we were waving goodbye to her aswell as she stayed with the family for a few more days. We took a 7 hour coach journey to La Ceiba (which was fine because i slept for 4 hours of it) and then had to wait around in La Ceiba for a little bit before getting a 1 hour boat journey to Utila aka Paradise. Utila is one of the Bay Islands off the coast of Honduras in the Carribean Sea. It was insanely beautiful. We arrived, however, hot, tired and burdened with all our bags, so we hurried to our hostel and with minimal stress got settled in to our rooms. We went out that night for a brief look around before com¡ng across something that God had specifically put on Utila for me. A curry restaurant. Oh Wow! It was incredible (we obviously went in there and then) as i hadnt had a curry for a couple of months. After that went back to our rooms and fell asleep pretty quickly despite the heat because we were all so shattered.

Tuesday morning we woke up late and had a lazy start. Then we made our way down to the beach. There was powdery white/golden sand with amazingly clear Carribean waters. It truely was paradise. We spent all afternoon there sunning ourselves, swimming, reading and generally chilling. Lunch was absolutely incredible. Faye and I went to a restaurant which was basically on the beach. We ordered our food (i had a huge plate of breaded shrimps with rice, salad and fried plantane) and sat eating it on a pier that stretched out over the sea, looking down into the water admiring the fish we could see swimming below us. It was fantastic! Easily the best restaurant i have been to in a long time. We went back to the house when it got dark, and then went out for dinner at a mexican place which was also really nice. The waiter was a super chilled Guy called Jean who came and chatted to us for a bit. Everyone on the Island was so chilled out - it was awesome. Its also alot safer than Tegucigalpa (although thats not hard...) which meant that we cold walk around at night!! That was really nice after not being able to do it for almost 2 months!

The beach - the hut is the place where we ate lunch.

Wednesday we woke up and had a devotion in the morning, before heading out to the same increible beach we were at the day before. Quite obviously, I went to the same restaurant, this time accompanied by Guy. Same amazing setting, but this time i was munching on a whole Red Snapper with all the same extra stuff. Again it was incredible... In the afternoon we hired bycicles and we went off on an absolutle epic cycle ride around Utila. We cycled for quite a while, until some of the girls decided to turn back. The lads and Heulwen decided to go on for a little bit longer. We saw some huge flat lava thingys which were basically a big expanse of smelly ooze. Not really sure how it was formed - some sort of volcanic activity but it was pretty cool. We also went through some really overgrown paths and eventually came across the airstrip! We went in and raced down the runway in true topgear style... When we got back to the hostel i realised that i was horrendously burnt under my knees which was incredibly whenever i walked or sat or generally moved. Lots and lots of aftersun later, 5 of us headed off to an Israeli restaurant for dinner (Guy, Matt, Rachel, Claire and I). It was a great meal and nice to chat in a smaller group over a meal aswell.

My Red Snapper!

Red Snapper is no more...

The bikes..

Overgrown paths...

By the sea.

Heulwen on the runway

Thursday was an incredible day. We woke up really early and went to Captain Morgans dive centre for 7am and got on the boat to the Cays (little islands about 20 mins away from Utila). Unfortunately insurance didnt cover scuba diving, but we had an incredible time snorkelling and kayaking around the islands and the reefs. The snorkelling was amazing - the water was so clear and the reefs were huge! At one point Heulwen and I saw a fish that was about 3 feet long and just under a foot wide, with these huge white eyes. It was easily the biggest fish ive ever seen while snorkelling. The main Cay was called Jewel Cay which was little islands joined together by a little bridge. Just next to that was Diamond Cay. We swam/kiaked there and had a game of rounders with a huge bit of bamboo and fallen coconuts. Then, Guy and I (who had snorkelled there) left on the kayaks (while whistling the Pirates of the Carribean music) leaving the others stranded on Diamond Cay. Then came along Luke on the 3rd Kyak, on a rescue mission. He tried to board my Kyak, which ended up capsizing. All good - except that I had mine and Guys flippers and masks on board. The flippers were fine cos they floated, however, the masks quickly sunk to the bottom of the sea. Quite amazingly, however, after a while, one of the dive masters who Luke had told what happened, turned up with 2 masks that he had found on the bottom of the sea. It was very fortunate and saved us lots of money! We had some lunch on Jewel cay (we bought all the Baleadas in the only shop on the Island that sold them!) before going out again for the final Kyak. We went for about 10 mins until we found a tiny little island with a house on it. To get to it we had to kyak through a little path in the reef surrounding the island. When we got on, we arrived onto the softest sand i have ever felt. We walked around it (no-one was at home fortunately) and sat on the pier for a bit. It was probably the best place to live i have ever seen. At about 3 the boat took us back to Utila and we chilled at the house and packed for the rest of the day. Packing is stressful at the best of times but i had Guy who was quite ill in my room asleep - so it was even harder!

Diamond Cay.

Snorkelling

Kyaking

Claire giving me a ride...

A few seconds later....!

Friday we travelled away from Utila (sad!) and back to La Ceiba. From La Ceiba we got the coach to Copan - to see the famous Mayan Ruins there. When we first arrived we were shattered so chilled at our hotel, but the next day we went out to see the ruins. They were incredible. Our tour guide, Oscar, spoke good english so we learnt alot - he also cracked some really poor jokes - about how these funky statues looked like Ricky Martin... We also saw Macaw parrots which live wild in the area. They were amazing too - bright red with blue and yellow and green (i think...) When we got back to the house it started raining! This was the first proper rain we had had all the time we had been in Honduras so it was quite welcome.

Wild Macaw Parrots

The ruins

Sunday we had a very lazy morning. We did nothing until 3pm when Luke, Guy, Kossy, Rachel, Heulwen and I set off to go horseriding! It was so much fun. We rode up a mountain where we could see the ruins in the forest, aswell as other amazing scenery. Despite it being my first time horseriding, i set of on a full on canter on my noble steed. She was actually called Princessa, but i renamed her to Shadowfax (obviously...) It was so much fun - Guy and I were wearing our cowboy hats so we fitted the bill perfectly... kinda... We went out for dinner that night and our legs got bitten like crazy under the table but it was awesome fun. Claire´s parents had donated some money for the team which we used for that meal - so thank you very much if you are reading!!

Horseriding - Luks horse was evil and tried to bite us all...

Princessa/Shadowfax

Heulwen and her horse

That was our holiday - it was absolutely immense, filled with many epic moments - none of which will be forgotten. After we were all ready to rock up for Guatemala to see what Latin Link had in store for us there....

Joel