Olancho

Well, like most of you, we're hanging in there these days. Our day-to-day mainly involves the quotidian scenarios that are much the same as your own in their predictability and pleasantness. Work, sleep, watch football, etc. However, Elisa and I have the opportunity at this present moment in time to occasionally step out into the wild and wacky Latin American world around us. And that might be where our paths diverge. For example...

This past weekend Elisa and I, along with our trusty Canadian sidekicks Mike and Mavis, headed into an area of the country, Olancho, that is known as the 'Wild West of Honduras.' This is a somewhat disturbing regional moniker when you stand back and realize that "the rest of the country already feels like the Wild West, so what the heck is going on in Olancho?" Folks readily tell you that "everyone walks around with a pistol in their pocket and a cowboy hat on their head." And so again you stand back and scratch your head thinking, "Isn't that what the rest of the country is already doing?"

Well, Hondurans are real friendly. And gringos are still fairly untouchable here so, with these assurances in mind, the four of us headed off into Olancho...the Wild West of Honduras.

The first observation that you make is how remarkable the roads are! For nearly 2 hours out of Tegucigalpa (which I remind you is the capital) you slog along through horrific half-paved pseudo-roads, god-forsaken tendrils of tar and strands of concrete so thin you could chop through them with your butter knife, and then--all of a sudden, everything goes quiet as a crypt. No bumping. No thumping. Just cruising. The road has become amazing. And I mean amazing, like I-81 amazing. You have crossed over into Olancho.

Again, the head starts itchin' and you start wondering..."why in the heck is all this road out here in the middle of nowhere? Nobody lives out here! I haven't seen another vehicle in 45 minutes! The road my farm in West Tennessee is on wasn't paved until about 10 years ago but this is freakin' state-of-the-art!" It defies all logic. In fact, if you keep going, the end of that very road literally drops off into nothing at a town called Catacamas...and you can't go no further! This is a road that literally dead-ends. There's nothin' east of Catacamas except jaguars and jungle and...umm...ohh...narco-trafficantes! Drug lords, that is!

That's why, my friends, this stretch of pavement is so fabulous. Former President Manuel "Mel" Zelaya (a proud Olanchan who now thankfully resides in the Dominican Republic) and his narco-buddies funneled millions and millions of dollars, euros, yen, marks, pounds and what have you out to their pet project in the jungle. So, there you have it. A thoroughfare Germans could be proud of. And, man, it sure is fun to drive!

So, we headed all the way into Olancho looking for... something. And we saw some cowboys and dodged run-away steer along the roads and we drove around the empty streets of Jutigalpa on Saturday night vainly looking for somewhere to eat, only to find out later that a blood feud is going on between two families and no one is going out after dark...seriously.