Off to Honduras Copan 20th - 22nd June

So we finally dragged ourselves away from the Budda Bar and got on our way to Honduras. We jumped on a bus to Copan which was hard as there is also a Coban which is in a totally different country and we didn´t want to go there. The people talk so fast and p´s and b´s can be mistaken very quickly so we were glad to get on the right bus. We arrived and found our hostel with ease and we decided to head to the Ruinas wich is why people visit Capan in the first place the next day.

The ruinas were amazing wonderfully restored monuments and buildings. There was an undergroung tunnel that you could go into to see more but it was $15 and we were ruinas´d out (and cheap) so we decided against it. As we walked round we saw a hole in the base of the grand stairs so decided to stick our heads in it and take a picture. It wasn´t untill we looked at the picture did we see all the HUGE spiders on the rood of the hole crawling towarde us. Very Indiana Jones.

So back to the hostel, mooch around town and then we found a magazine all about Honduras with places to go and trips and things in it. I was really excited to see that there was a Shopping Centre just outside of town it was descirbed as "The El Jaral Shopping Mall, located only 10 km (6 miles) from Copan Ruinas offers a variety of shops, eateries and even features the only first class cinema in the area, showing some of the latest released movies! Where locals and tourists can mix while exploring the mall¨ I was sold, I needed some new close and felt like a bit of retail therpy.

We jumped on a Chicken bus (yes I have gotten over my harrowing experience and am travelling on them again). So we are sitting on the bus waiting for a shopping mall to appear on the horizon like a shining becon of shopping goodness, after what felt like an age the driver said that we were there. What can I say it didn´t really live up to my expections. We were told to go round the back of the ¨Water Park¨to get to the Mall, in the ad about the place it said that it was safe for you and your family as there was tight gun control now. The gun control was really tight with a little sign telling us not to bring in our guns!!!!!! I felt very safe. We walked in to the Mall and we just had to laugh. Of the 4 shops that were in the ¨Mall¨3 of them were closed and the state of the art cinema was showing a Hillary Duff movie and the Simpsons (very up to date). The swimming pool that we had dreamed about was an Auqa Park full of kids and one slide and water that came up to your knees. We just felt wrong going in.

The one bonus was that the Cow Museam yes the COW museam, was open. So we had a look at all their cow stuff, stifling our giggles as we went and tried to figure out what to do next. The bus was gone and we had no idea when it was coming back and there was no way that we could stay in this twiglight zone for much longer. We decided to walk to the gas station to see if we could flag down a collectivo. We didn´t have to wait too long to get one. We hopped in and away we went, unfortunatly the guy collecting the money took a shine to me and concentrated his staring to one area only (my boobs) for the whole trip, until I had to move and he tried to look up my skirt. Oh the fun.

Back in Copan we thought about our day, we had had a choice to either go to the hot springs or the mall with a swimming pool, hmmm I think we made the wrong one. I don´t know why we both had such high expications of this Mall. I was invisaging loads of shops, some air conditioning, a pool on the roof and we got 4 shops in a shed. It was a great day!!!!!!!!!

We did go to a bar and watch "In Bruige" that night which almost made it ok. To paraphrase the lovely Colin Farrel - "It was like a Fairytail or something¨, ¨Maybe if I grew up on a farm and was retarded I would have thought El Jaral was good but I didn´t"