Third time is a charm, On to the Bay Islands of Honduras
 After 3 attempts to get off the Rio Dulce and out
of Guatemala, we finally made it on Sunday February 5. (We were having
problems with our depth sounder of r several weeks. We finally got a
“back up” system in place.) We motored down the river to a beautiful
anchorage called
Gringo Bay (about 5 miles from the Coast) to wait for
the next weather window).
We had already e-mailed the customs and Port
Authority with our check-out information so on Monday we took our
Launcha to Livingston (right on the coast and the mouth of the Rio
Dulce) to check out. The entire procedure took less than 15 minutes.
Guatemala has the best and easiest check-out procedure of any country we
have been to so far.
Going back down the gorge on the Rio is a real
treat. It is very beautiful and tranquil. On our way back to Gringo Bay
we decided to stop for lunch at cute restaurant in a nice size palapa
hut. It was very good and cost next to nothing. Cheri had pollo
(chicken) and I had ribalo (grouper). It was very fresh and delicious.
Of course we chased it down with a few beers.
After retuning to the boat it began to drizzle
while we sat in the cockpit having a sundowner (for you non cruisers, a
cocktail) It was very serene. We were having a conversation when all of
a sudden we heard this wonderful music coming from somewhere on shore.
We scanned the area and saw a man (Verner) standing on the a dock
playing an Alp Horn transporting us all to Switzerland. It was the most
perfect music for that moment. We got on the phone and called a couple
of friends in Houston to share the wonderful experience. The next thing
we know is he is being swept away in someone's Launcha headed to our
friend Jennifer's house where we and
 others gathered to listen to this
music sent from heaven.
A cold front passed thru on Tuesday evening so we
pulled up anchor just before noon on Wednesday and headed down the river
where we would “cross the bar” and headed East to the Bay Islands of
Honduras about 120 miles away. (Crossing the bar refers to an enormous
sandbar, very shallow in places, that goes completely across the Rio
Dulce just outside Livingston). We had a wonderful sail with following
seas until about 10pm. We spotted 3 large squalls on the radar about 15
miles away so we headed further off-shore to dodge them. We did great on
the first 2 but the third one hit us right on the head for about 5
hours. Somewhere around 3am things lightened up and we continued on
toward Utila, the first of the Islands we would stop at.
Namaste’ had done a great job of keeping us safe
but we would be remiss in our duties if we did not share with you we had
a pretty rough time of it for several hours. We weren’t the only ones as
Namaste’ suffered a ripped out lower mainsail panel in the middle of all
this. The damage was due more to operator error than anything else. We
have a great Sail maker’s sewing machine aboard so we will repair it
when we get to Utila.
We are learning more and more about reading the
weather and in retrospect we think we had left about 12 hours too soon
after the front passed. We wound up sailing the rest of the way under a
completely cloudy, drizzly sky. As we approached Utila the skis cleared
so we had an easy entrance into East Harbor, Utila, Honduras.
Here is a little history taken from the Honduras
web site.
After the collapse of Mayan culture, different
groups slowly settled in various parts of the Honduran territory. Their
languages reveal a relationship with the Toltec's and Aztecs of Mexico,
the Chibchas of Colombia, and even tribes from the southwestern United
States. The western-central part of Honduras was inhabited by the Lencas,
who spoke a language of unknown origin. These autonomous groups had
their conflicts but maintained their commercial relationships with each
other and with other populations as distant as Panama and Mexico.
 By October 1537, the Lenca chief,
Lempera, a warrior of great renown,
had managed to unify more than two hundred Indian tribes that had been
ancient rivals in order to offer an organized resistance against further
penetration by the Spanish conquerors. In the village of Etempica he
announced his plans to expel the Spaniards and gave instructions to all
his allies for a general uprising when he gave the signal. On top of the
great rock of Cerquín, an impenetrable fortress, he gathered all the
neighboring tribes as well as abundant supplies and made trenches and
fortifications. He finally gave the signal to attack by killing three
unsuspecting Spaniards, who happened to be in the region.
Governor Montejo ordered Captain Alonso de
Cáceres to attack the stronghold, but it was impossible to take. Montejo
then gathered a large number of Indians from Guatemala and Mexico as
auxiliary forces, mobilized nearly all the Spanish troops at his
disposition, and ordered them to storm the rock. Yet Cerquín remained
invincible. At the same time, Lempira ordered a general insurrection,
Comayagua was set on fire, and the Spanish inhabitants had to flee to
Gracias. Gracias was threatened by the surrounding tribes; San Pedro de
Puerto Caballos and Trujillo were placed under siege and the Spaniards
were hard pressed to maintain their ground.
While Montejo sought help desperately from
Santiago de los Caballeros in Guatemala, San Salvador, and San Miguel
and even from Spain, Alonso de Cáceres resorted to treason to get rid of
Lempira. He invited the chief to a peace conference; and when Lempira
reaffirmed his desire to continue the fight, a hidden marksman shot him
in the forehead. Lempira fell from the highcliffs; and with his death,
his 30,000 warriors either fled or surrendered.
Montejo regained the Valley of Comayagua,
established Comayagua city in another location, and vanquished the
natives in Tenampúa, Guaxeregui, and Ojuera. The conquest of Honduras
was consummated and later consolidated by the founding of new
settlements.
Enough of the history, back to the story.
Back to the present. We settled into the
anchorage and went into town to scope it out and find our land legs. We
found a cute restaurant,
The Bundu Café, that seemed popular with locals
and decided to have lunch there.
We sat down and were waited on right away by a
very friendly waiter. The menu looked great and we ordered. There was a
lady going around to all the tables talking with everyone, it turned
out to be the owner. She came by our table and talked a while. After
being served a very nice lunch she came by again and invited us to a
piano concert being held at the Methodist Church and a small impromptu
wine a cheese party across the street at the clinic, which turned out to
be out side the clinic in the dark. Thank God for dive lights. We hung
it up on a nail a proceeded to have a wonderful time with several of the
locals and our cruising buddies on Island time, Jim and Janice. The
young man named Ollie is from England. It was wonderful and a very nice
surprise. Who would of thought, two wonderful music experiences in
Central America just days apart.
Sunday morning around 5am our 4th day
here another cold front came thru. Cold fronts seem to always come thru
in the middle of the night but this one came in the daylight hours which
made it a lot less nerve racking. It blew a steady 25 knots with gusts to
30 knots so we were sort of confined to doing the anchor watch thing
until it calmed down Monday morning. Several of us had cabin fever by
now so we all headed into town and had lunch at The Bundu Café. They
serve the best hamburger we have had since we left the states.
We have become very good friends with
Mandy who runs the bar at
Colibri Hill Resort , Brad and
Andi the owners of The Bundu Café and Jeff and Brad from
Utila Realty. We
have been here 5 weeks and will return again before heading to Belize in
May. That’s when the kids will come down from Houston.
Now it's time to head to Roatan, Honduras.
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