Lake Izabel, Rio Dulce Guatemala

Day 10 (151 miles)

   Got up around 7am and after a good breakfast in 'Vamos a Ver" in Copan, the owner is Dutch, so I had a real Dutch cheese treat (Edammer). The owner of the Hotel said it would be impossible to cross without plates, but we still wanted to try it. Reaching the border a Hedman Alas bus was just before us and that made the scene a little more chaotic as it was already, and I thought this is good for me. The Honduran guy told me to pull over, but I had my title papers already in hand and crossed quick, without incidents, The immigration went fast, It was the last immigration guy Utila had, we knew each other and we stayed silent, (We had some problems in the past in Utila, he wanted to check my papers, when I went for a day trip on the Yate to La Ceiba and on the end he didn't see my papers, because I told him, I was in Utila, before him), I crossed this border in the last 30 years more as a 100 times and know how the system works and now, because there is a treaty between 4 Central American countries (CA4)The idea is to promote tourism and give all residents and locals access to the other 3 countries without having to have passports (Foreign residents do)  and use their vehicles without having to do temporarily importation and without charging nobody a one cent and in 5 minutes we went through this obstacle.

The Guatemala immigration officer charged me a Dollar, what was not correct, but today I was not going to argue with him and besides that I received my first dollar from a reader who donated, using Paypal
This is by the way the maximum you can donate and it is for a good cause!

       Then  we pulled up by the next boom and the SAT guy (Aduana) of Guatemala, said we couldn't go further without plates, even putting in all my charm didn't help, so 2 minutes later we passed, next stop would be the local police, which is another 100  meters further and driving on the blind side of a 18 wheeler, the police didn't see or stopped us and we continued.

Rest Stop Guatemala, the Tigo sign caused the dent.

 

Knowing how the transito operates in Guatemala, we kept a low profile on the road and used mainly good highway to reach the east part of Guatemala towards the main port of Puerto Barrios. About halfway we took a rest stop, during this stop my bike felt over, caused by the breeze and hit a galvanized traffic sign and dented my gas tank, what made me sick after keeping the bike scrape less for 10 days in the worst conditions and then this.

Dent in tank

          

                Any way we continued to Rio Dulce and crossed a high bridge and saw all the sailboats all over the place in the Harbour 

 Rio Dulce is the place in Central America to store their sailboats during hurricane season and play the rest of the year in the Caribbean and most of them visit Utila from here. Lots of sailboats have Yanmar engines in them and me being the only guy in Central America, who actually stock these parts, lots of these boat owners bought from me and actually looking for one guy tonight, I guess, he would be surprised to see me!!

Found a small hotel with A/C and Internet, besides this, the recession must have hit hard here and the place is dead and deserted. Tomorrow visiting the local castle ( Castillo San Felipe)