Day 32 - Rancho Lokoo Resort, El Zonte

We were up early and had breakfast at the hotel, which was essentially a bowl of fruit and a cup of coffee. We did a quick video to say how much we had enjoyed our time in El Salvador and in particular, in El Zonte, and then loaded the bikes up and were on the road by 09:30am. We had opted for the more interesting route along as much of the coastline as we could. It was still ridiculously hot and humid, and it really took it out of us. There were plenty of breaks for drinks and to top up water as we pressed on towards the east and the border crossing. As we were nearing a little town call El Cuco, which took us up into a mountain range, right next to the coast, we passed 3 bicycle riders that were very slowly climbing the steep inclines. I didn’t envy them at all. Riding a bicycle in the heat and humidity must have been horrendous and certainly not something that I would ever do. We passed them and waved them along to wish them good luck, and then pulled over a few minutes later at a little roadside café arrangement for a coke. We had finished up and were just getting back on the bikes to carry on towards La Union and then the border, when the 1st bike came slowly trundling along up the hill. He was travelling seriously slowly, but moving forward so I wished him well and told him to keep pressing on as he went past me. A few minutes later, the other 2 bikes came slowly up the hill. A young lady was 1 of the riders and she stopped to say that she had seen the “Keep Tahoe Blue” sticker on the back of Jules and was wondering if we were from there. Of course, Jorik was straight in there with the chat and explained that we had been on the road for about a month and had a few more weeks to go until we finished the trip in Panama City. She mentioned that they had been in Tahoe in November last year, so it has taken them over 6 months to reach the point that we are at. That is just hectic and hats (helmets) off to them for taking on such a huge challenge. It’s not for me. The route didn’t take us into La Union itself, we could have gone in, but then we would have had to turn around and do the same road to get back to the main highway towards the border at El Amatillo. So, we pressed on for the border. It was pretty chaotic once we arrived, loads of trucks and people everywhere causing a right mess. We were directly along a route for vehicles, but then told we had to go into another area until we got out Temporary Import Licence (TIP) sorted, which we had already done. Once that was established, we then went through immigration with relative ease, although the line was very long, and it was just so hot and sticky. My shirt was soaked through pretty much constantly and we were sucking back water as fast as we could get our hands on it. The El Salvadorian side was straight forward, but a fixer dude had easily spotted us and said that he could help us out to get across and into Honduras. We were a little reluctant to get help as it should be straight forward, but there are so few instructions and as we needed to get copies of passport stamps, and various other things sorted, we simply caved and let the guy help us get across the El Salvadorian side with relative ease. However, when we pulled up on the Honduran side of the border, things went to absolute shit. A guy called Orlando met us where we pulled up the bikes. He was very friendly, and his English was spot on as he told us that he had lived in the States for a few years. He really was a very personable chap, but he lulled us into a false sense of security. He had a bunch of other guys with him and told us to give him our paperwork and that he would sort out the fumigations for the bikes, the various stamps and we just needed to give him the appropriate copies, which we had with us. We mentioned that I did not have my original title with us, but we did have a digital copy on the phone as my original had been damaged and then lost in Guatemala. A small misdirection, when in actual fact I did have the original title, but it was still back in Lake Tahoe. Orlando jumped on this bit of information and explained that this was not ‘Bueno’, very bad in fact and that I may have to turn around and wait until I got the original title sent across from the States. For info, they didn’t even look at Jorik’s original title, just took copies of everything and then disappeared with all our papers whilst we went to the immigration office to get our passports stamped. We only paid US$3 each to get into Honduras, but Orlando was insistent that it would cost about US$70 each for the bikes and the fact that I didn’t have my original title would mean they would have to bribe 3 different officials so that no questions were asked. This was supposedly going to cost US$100 for each official, plus the US$140 for the 2 bikes, plus the tip for the 3 chaps helping us out. it took about an hour, but then Orlando and his band of crooks came back to us to say that it was all sorted, they had all the paperwork, including the appropriate signatures and that they had convinced the 3 border guards that they only needed US$40 each, so a total of US$120. With the tip added in, we were fleeced for a total of US$300 to enter Honduras for the grand total of 1 night. It also happened to be pretty much exactly how many US dollars we had on us. It was like they could smell the notes in our wallets, and I even had US$50 stashed away in a jacket pocket for an emergency. They sniffed that out as well. Bastards. Having taken nearly 3 hours to get through the border in the ridiculous heat, and having been fleeced by the hustlers, we still had an hour’s ride ahead of us to get to our destination. We had found a hotel called the Casa Vieja online, which didn’t look great, but there was an adventure bike parked outside the hotel in the google photos online, so we figured that it might well be a spot that bikers stop at as they pass through the area. The ride was not particularly spectacular. I got the impression that the people try to look after their properties a bit better than in previous countries, the walls were generally of the same colour paint, the roofs were a little more complete, and the gardens looked like they were tended a little more regularly. I suppose I was looking for positives after the horrendous border crossing experience, but when we stopped and Jorik and I were chatting about the road into San Lorenzo, he made the point that he felt that Honduras was just as crap, if not worse than all the other countries we had been through to date. Regardless, Honduras was not filling us with excitement and even if I was trying to find positives, when I reflected on the route in, Jorik was probably right, it was just as shit. San Lorenzo itself is also not great. The streets are filthy, there was a pretty bad smell through a lot of the roads that we passed along in order to get to our hotel, which was not in an ideal location. When we arrived, a young lad came out to us and was generally helpful and showed us to our room, which had 1 large bed and a single bed. Jorik kindly offered up the large bed as I still must sleep diagonally to have any chance of my feet being in the bed when I sleep. We needed to get a copy of my Title printed. Melody had sent it to Jorik at the border so that I had a digital copy, but after Orlando and his mates cleaned us out, having a copy would be better than nothing at all when we crossed the border from Honduras into Nicaragua the next day. Orlando reckoned that the Nicaraguan border guards would be even more diligent in their review of our papers and that they would insist on all documents being original, including the Title. He even suspected that we would get turned around and have to head back through Honduras to El Salvador or Guatemala as they were so strict. However, we weren’t to worry as he had a mate who could help us when we got to the Nicaraguan border. Whatever, dickhead! So, with our mission of getting a hard copy of the Title, we needed to draw more cash (obviously, as we had been cleaned out), and for an opportunity to explore San Lorenzo, we headed out onto the streets. We didn’t go far as the town doesn’t have much to offer. We pulled into a little restaurant/bar arrangement with a swimming pool that was right next door to our hotel, but within about 2 minutes of sitting down, the mosquitos started on our ankles and quickly swarmed us. It was too unpleasant to hang around so we headed back to the hotel to see if we could get some food. When we had checked in, the young lad had explained that breakfast was included, but as the next day was Mother’s Day, it was declared a public holiday, even though it was a Sunday, and that the kitchen would be closed. That was a bit odd, but he did explain that we could offset the cost of the breakfast on our dinner, so it was a no-brainer to have dinner at the hotel. We met the owner, who was also the owner of the same adventure bike parked outside the hotel in the photos on Google. It was still there, but under a tarp. It was a Chinese knock-off 350cc that I can’t remember what the brand was. It was pretty plastic looking, but he was chuffed to bits that some proper adventure bikes had arrived at his hotel. He was in the restaurant when we had dinner and he was very friendly, but in the end only knocked off about a third of our food bill, which by the way, was not the greatest steak sandwich I have ever had. The meat was like leather. We retired early as it was clear that no matter what happened, we were getting the hell out of Honduras as quick as we could.