The Cayos
Hola everyone, this is my first update since departing Utila. Six of us volunteers left Friday morning for Cayos Menor, one of the larger islands of the Cayos Cachinos (Hog Islands).
We stayed in a small lodge in a Garifunan village. In the village there were about a dozen small houses and a short road. It was mostly a fishing village, and our lodge was the only thing there remotely approaching touristy. There was one person who spoke English, and no stores, restaurants, etc. It was pretty cool to be so secluded, but it also proved difficult at times, since no one in our group spoke much Spanish (at least not more than me).
Rusty brought us to Cayos Menor on his sailboat, which took about 4.5 hours. We did some snorkeling out of his boat when we got there, and eventually a canoe with a tiny motor brought us to our lodge. I was certain that we would tip the entire time, but we got there.
The islands and surrounding reef are all protected, so there is very little in development. We tried to hike by ourselves, but were told we had to take a guide. Our first hike was led by a couple of kids, but on our next one, an experienced guide showed us around. We saw at least a half dozen pink boas the islands are famous for.
Somehow, I managed to catch a 1.5 hour canoe ride to the mainland with a local. The one guy that spoke English on the island was a lot of help.
Pico Bonito y Rio Cangrejal
After waiting in Nuevo Armenia 2 hours for the bus, I arrived in La Ceiba. I started walking to my destination, Omega Tours, thinking that a bus would pass sooner or later. It didn´t, so I walked 8 of the 10km (a friendly American couple gave me a ride for a bit).
Omega was great. It was pretty slow, so I had the dorm area to myself. The food was awesome; I ate only the German food. I spent my first day there hiking-running. In the morning I jogged to the park entrance and then hiked to the waterfall.
There were a ton of reptiles and amphibians, but I didn´t see any monkeys or jaguars. I saw a frog that was larger than me (almost), and a lot of lizards. The waterfall was about 60m tall, and the hike was a nice loop instead of the usual out and back. Later in the afternoon, I ran until I found a trail that followed the river. I saw a toucan and a lot more lizards, and some great views of the river. 
The next day I did a river trek and rafting trip. First we walked-swam-climbed upstream. We did some cliff jumping, including a 35 foot jump. Then we floated down some rapids in our life preservers before getting on our rafts. The rafting had a pretty steady current with a few decent falls. There was nothing harder than Old Smokey on the Wolf River in Wisconsin though.
Traveling
I left early this morning and arrived in Gracias about 12 hours later. I navigated to my 3 buses pretty well and even found a decent hostel for 7.5$ here in Gracias. Tomorrow and the next day I am planning on hiking to the Celaque Summit, the highest point in Honduras (2849m), with an elevation gain of 1500m from the visitors center.
Took you long enough to update, almost two weeks. Pretty beach pictures that I'd much rather look at than anything outside the window. And btw, it had better be 'esta in gracias' because you ARE coming home to me at some point.
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