Saturday, June 20, 2015

Copan Ruinas

Back in October, the Streett clan took its first trip outside of Tegucigalpa and visited the Mayan Ruins of Copan.  (I'm not counting our 1-day cruise ship stop in Roatan last Christmas.)  Neither kid seems to be designed for long car rides unfortunately.  But we made it before dark to all our intended stops!  The hardest part of the trip was making it out of Tegucigalpa, we ended up in a very poor, unsafe neighborhood and barely made it out of there.  There were so many confusing streets and people milling about in the small little shops scattered about.  It was terrifying!  No GPS, gangs, worried about carjackings.  I don't think I've ever feared for my family more than that moment.

After successfully escaping Comayaguela, we had an uneventful trip to Lake Yojoa where we made it to a hotel called Finca Las Glorias where we were spending our first night.  We ended up being the only guests and so they had to open the whole place up for us.  In a B&B it is a good thing to be the only guests, at a full scale hotel, not so much...  A freshly opened kitchen means freshly thawed dinner that takes an hour.  I've heard great things about this hotel for other times, so I'd be willing to give it another shot.

Here are some pictures of the first hotel:

Trying to coax N onto the horse
Here we go!
N did not like to hold on.  I had to hold onto him and the horse







M was only 2 months old, but still wanted to be part of the action (or at least the pictures!)






For our second night, we stayed close to the Mayan Ruins at a beautiful hotel called Hacienda San Lucas.  Fabulous room, location, view and food...but not kid friendly!  Only glassware and the rooms are light by candle after dark.  There was a solar electric light in the bathroom though.  The staff loved the kids and were wonderful, but we only ended up staying one night.  The road getting there was so bumpy so I was holding poor little M's head for the 20 minute journey (remember, she was 2 months old at this time).  Pictures exploring the grounds:


















The next day we packed up the car and headed out to the ruins.  Below is our tour guide who couldn't figure out a way to do a shorter, cheaper version than his normal $40 a person talk/walk.  While informative, with two little kids and two exhausted parents, we had to keep shooing him along.  Eventually we just said enough and walked back to the entrance.  He was not amused and kept trying to guide us to things on the way back.  He can't complain too much because we paid full price!  He was a nice guy though.














N was exhausted and refused to move any further, but didn't want to be carried.  We kept walking, figuring he'd eventually come.  Some Honduran decided we were bad parents and went and picked him up and brought him to us...oops!
After the long day at Copan, we decided to hit a smaller site before leaving town the next day.  We had moved to the Clarion hotel and this was within walking distance.  N and S walked up and I drove M up in the car.  Enjoy:







Our final stop on the trip was Macaw Mountain, a beautiful bird sanctuary with swimming hole.  Unfortunately for the Streetts, there wasn't enough water in the creek so we couldn't swim, but we enjoyed the walk around:



Trying to navigate 

This leaf is as big as me! 


Swimming hole is normally on the right of the waterfall, I guess the water covers the whole area when open for swimming?
N could have spent ALL day watching the water
 












 A few final pictures: