Rio Cangrejal, Honduras
| Minutes away from La Ceiba on Honduras' north coast flow the
Class III-V rapids of the Rio Cangrejal. Originally named for the crabs that crawled
in droves across its lower extremity near the ocean, factories have poluted the river
sufficiently that not even crabs (very hardy little critters that they are) will live
there. But this is not the worst of it! A dam has just been approved that will fill 14 kilometers of the canyon and wipe out all rafting opportunities along with many others. Many members of the tourism trade are fighting the measure now, but...? In this picture, our guide Juan Carlos and another guide of Jungle River Rafting (440-1268 or jungle@laceiba.com) steer us (Shaun & Leo) back upstream to purposefully flip the raft. We did this half a dozen times here. |
 |
| Juan Carlos demonstrates the true way to fly from this
eight-meter cliff. Moments before, we watched a sea otter (rare) twist its way along
the river below. We also stopped at this spot and ate a great lunch of the sweetest fresh fruit on the planet under a thatched roof in a perfectly warm jungle rain. Two pools of water also sit right here atop the cliff where you can hang out and enjoy the scenery. The right bank of the river is the boundary to the Pico Bonito (country's tallest mountain) National Park.
|
 |
| Shaun takes his turn off the cliff while Rafael watches.
Rafa later spent about 20 minutes standing on the edge in the downpour and
deliberating, sometimes stepping forward decidedly but always stopping. "Next
time!" he promises. You can see in the background of this photo how much higher the river runs after heavy rain. Juan Carlos once ran the river when it was that high with another guide to "see if it would kill us," and it nearly did a few times. The trip costs about US$38 apiece, but tip big!
Also from Honduras: |
 |
| Feet go flying as the entire crew takes a dive beneath the boat. |
 |
| Want some excellent, humorous and detailed information on life
in Honduras? Read these emails from a Peace Corps volunteer who stayed in La Ceiba
and mapped rivers in 2000. http://scnc.pas.k12.mi.us/~hslab/camp/lovnews.htm Excerpt: 'I actually got to use a washing machine at my new place. Up until now, I have been washing everything by hand. I had gotten so tired of rinsing all the soap out by hand, that I had started just putting them in a large blue plastic tub and stomping on them with my feet, like I was stomping grapes. I had the cleanest feet in my barrio, but stopped doing it when my feet got burned. It was probably the lye in the soap. It kind of reminds me of the time my wife and I came out of a Costa Rican jungle one night covered head to toe in thick mud. I led her into the hotels swimming pool, and we washed our clothes while we swam. The next morning when we checked out, the manager proudly asked if we had found time to use the swimming pool during our stay, because he had just cleaned it yesterday afternoon and it was "clean-clean-clean !" ' |