Chicken bus journey - part two
Trip Start
Jul 04, 2008
1
14
31
Trip End
Oct 22, 2008
Placencia,
Stann Creek,
Belize
Friday, August 29, 2008
so...28.08.08 we get up at 7am turn in the key for our room and walk 1 kilometer to the main highway, looking for pastelitos for shane... thankfully, today he still has both his shoes... kirstin graddeb a healthy looking green apple (which ended up being transported through 3 countries) for breakfast and at the bus stop we stopped at a little place to eat. 1 coffee, 2 gatorades, 2 baliades... around 8am ish we jump on a chicken bus headed to the border town Corinita. we were sitting next to the "student code of conduct" sign which read "character matters in West Virginia... from WV all the way to little town Honduras... interesting...
It only took 1.5 hours to the boarder... the bus dropped us off at the boarder and we walked about 100 yards into guatemala - there were exit immigration for honduras, but no guatemalan immigration.. then we took a small collectivo to puerto barrios for about an hour. to the market was 15Q and to the ferry dock was 20Q ($2.5 each). as soon as we stepped off the collectivo there was a guy there waiting to sell us ferry tickets for the 1pm ferry... - ferry might be an exaggeration, small motor boat with tarp ceiling is more accurate - we bought our tickets for the ferry..
houses on the lagoon
175Q ($25) each... we had 2 hours to kill before the boat left, so we headed over to guatemalan immigration to pay our exit fee.. evidently the price has gone up .. its now $10 usd each to leave... ouch considering we were only in the country for about 4 hours total...so after enjoying the lovely air conditioning in the guatemala border control we went back out into the heat and a 10 minute walk over to the market...shane thought the market was big and sweaty.. but he did manage to pick up a grotesque pair of bright blue plastic sandles for $3... on the way back to the dock to catch the boat we spotted an internet cafe, which is where we typed yesterdays blog post... and off to the boat...\the boat ride from guatemala to belize was about 1.5 hours long... although it felt more like 3, the boat was structionally questionable and overpowered... after waiting through customs we boarded another chicken bus to head north to placencia.. the bus and driver wer both of questionable miles and upkeep.. we had some interesting reggie to listen to for the 2 hour bus ride... the bus dropped us off in independence, where there was a cabbie telling us that the last boat to placencia left in 5 minutes.. and wanted to charge us $3 (belize) each to go to the dock... we told him $2 (belize) each and he took us for the 5 minute cab ride down the road... where suprise.. the boat wasnt leaving for 25 more minutes... but yes it was the last boat for the day...so onto our second chicken boat for the day... 15 minute ride into placencia... its a nice quite little beach town on a peninsula.. we decided to stay 2 nights here and take the express bus to ambergies caye via belize city tomorrow morning at 7.30am... tomorrow will be part 3 of the chicken bus journey, cosisting of at least 3 boats, 1 bus and 2 cabs...but then we will spend a week soaking in the sun (hopefully avoiding gustav)
