Welcome to the zombie march! If you don’t know why we call it that, you soon will!

Sometimes the best moments of a journey come from being in the right place at the right time…

We arrived in León, Nicaragua with little plan of what to do. We had just met up with my mom in Managua, and León was the first city on our agenda. She wanted to travel like we do, which for us often means arriving in a city and letting it tell us what sights to see once we get there. We knew we had to check out the Cathedral de León, a UNESCO world heritage sight. As we sat down on the sidewalk outside the cathedral to contemplate our next move, we ran into a couple that we had dove with in Utila. They told us all about a full moon lava-viewing volcano hike they were doing the next night with one of our favourite Central American organizations, Quetzaltrekkers (we had hiked with them before in Xela, Guatemala and were already planning to check out what they had to offer in León).

This sounded too cool to pass up, so we ran over to Quetzaltrekkers to sign ourselves up. At this point, we still didn’t even know the name of the volcano (Volcan Telica, as we later found out) and didn’t care. We paid our $30 USD each (normally $35, but there is a discount if you’ve hiked with them before) for guides, return transportation, supper, midnight lunch, breakfast, snacks, and water; and headed back to the cathedral to check out the almost-full moon.

Almost-full moon through the window of the Cathedral

The next night, after a full day of walking and museums, we met with our guides and sixteen other full moon hikers at Quetzaltrekkers at about 9:30 pm. We sat down for a huge meal of spaghetti, rice, and vegetarian tomato sauce and after a quick ride in the back of a pickup, we arrived at the the trailhead.

The start of the hike

We started hiking at 11:30 pm. The trail was fairly easy and flat, though there were lots of loose stones to deal with. The full moon was often obscured by clouds, so we relied on our headlamps a lot.

Full moon

Near the end of the hike, the trail started getting quite a bit steeper. The guides wanted to keep the group together, so there were lots of breaks and it was an easy ascent.

Full moon over Volcan Telica

At about 4:00 am, we reached the summit of the volcano. We dropped off our gear at a camping spot, and spent 15 more minutes walking to the crater’s edge. As we approached the crater, wafts of sulfur invaded our nostrils. It made our eyes water and our throats burn, but there was nothing stopping anyone from crawling up to the edge to see the glowing lava.

Lava!!!

I don’t think I could find the right words to truly describe how incredible it was to see and hear the lava, and our pictures definitely don’t do it justice. We could hear it roaring below us and the pools brightened and darkened as the lava moved and cooled. It was seriously one of the coolest things I’ve ever experienced.

We didn’t stay long at the lava. Despite it’s awesomeness, the chemist in me knew that the burning in my eyes, throat, and chest was from the sulfur dioxide in the air reacting with the water in my lungs and throat to create highly acidic hydrogen sulfide. Not wanting to subject my body to these conditions for long, we took in the sights and sounds and returned to camp for a “midnight” lunch.

As we sat finishing our lunch of cream cheese and veggie sandwiches, with the guides working hard to keep people from nodding off, the sky began to brighten. We climbed up one last hill to watch the sun rise over several volcanoes in the distance. The view kept getting more and more spectacular and, despite the fact that most of the hikers around me were complaining about being tired and cold and wanting to get back, I felt re-energized. This was the first time I have ever just watched a sun rise in its entirety and it was beautiful.

Sun rise

We watched the sun until it was completely up (the camera battery died at the start of the sun rise, which allowed us to watch it away from the viewfinder) , turning around every once in a while to watch the full moon set over the volcano behind us.

Full moon setting behind us over Volcan Telica

We hiked back to the entrance and, looking around me, I understood the zombie march reference. A lot of hikers looked like they were having a hard time staying upright, but as I said, I was invigorated from all that I just experienced and really enjoyed the early morning hike. We returned to the starting point at about 9:30 am, and were back in León celebrating our experiences with a tasty breakfast of yogurt, fruit, and granola by 10:00.

Summing up our time in Honduras is fairly easy… we spent three and a half months in Utila, Honduras (and the neighbouring Jewel Cay).  The only other cities we visited (La Ceiba and San Pedro Sula) were required stays to get in and out of Utila.

Honduras Statistics:

Length of Stay: 107 days
Average Cost per Day for Two People including ALL of our scuba diving courses: $52.97 CAD
Average Cost per Day for Two People NOT including scuba diving:  $25.28 CAD
Cities/Towns Visited: 5
Distance Traveled: 997 km  in 3 automobiles and 18 boats
Days Sick:  4 for Ashley, 0 for Mike
Number of Items Lost: 0
Biggest Tourist Traps: none
Exchange Rate: $1 CAD = 19 lempiras

For more great travel statistics, check out our stats page!

Good bye Jewel Cay!

Our Route:

Puerto Cortes – La Ceiba – Utila/Jewel Cay/Little Cay – La Ceiba – San Pedro Sula – Nicaraguan border (through Tegucigulpa)

Highlights:

• DIVING!!!  We came for a week and stayed for three and a half months, need I say more?
• The people.   Staying in one place for three and a half months really allowed us to get to know some fabulous people that we now miss dearly.
• Swimming with Whale Sharks
• The abundance of cheap and delicious baked goods on Jewel and Pigeon Cays.
• Having a place to call home (with an oven!!!)

Great friends and good baking!

Lowlights:

• Getting fat from the abundance of cheap baked goods.
• The principle language on Utila is English.  Which, incidentally, is not the best way to cement in your mind the six weeks of Spanish lessons you just took.
• Living on the tiny island of Jewel Cay meant that our muscles forgot how to walk.
• The safety factor.  Honduras is the most dangerous country in Central America and San Pedro Sula is the violence capital of the world.  We didn’t experience much of this since we were on the tiny island of Utila, rather than mainland Honduras.  We did, however, feel that our personal safety was threatened for the first time in over seven months of travel on a bus from La Ceiba to San Pedro Sula.  There was a very drunk (likely more than drunk) man sitting across the aisle from us who told us, through a combination of Spanish and English, that a lot of people die all the time in Honduras.  Luckily for us, he said, we were gringos and he likes gringos so he wouldn’t kill us.  In fact, we were his brother and sister, so we should blow off our prearranged transport to our hostel and go home with him.  He refused to take no for an answer, and just kept yelling louder and louder.  After about an hour and a half of this, and several complaints to the driver from other passengers, security settled him down at one of the bus stops.  Happily, they forced him off the bus on the outskirts of San Pedro Sula, before the terminal we would exit at.

A wonderland created with glass at Treetanic Bar in Utila, Honduras

Surprises:

• I think we always expected that we’d like diving, but we had no idea how quickly we fall completely in love with it.
• Even though we loved what we had to do each day, we were surprised by how difficult it was to wake to an alarm each morning.  It didn’t seem to matter that it was diving, or that the alarm was going off the same time we had been waking up for most of the trip… having to get up at a set time is exhausting.
• All the expensive toys we bought ourselves for Christmas… after being hard-core budgeters for so long, we spent a small fortune on a second laptop (turns out we don’t share well), a dive computer, and an underwater camera enclosure.

I got to experience a tarantula in my mouth in Tikal, so Mike wanted to one-up me in Utila

Lessons Learned:

• You can make anywhere home.
• The quiet, laid-back vibe is the right vibe for us.

Honduras Journal – Where Did We Spend Our Time?

La Ceiba – 2 nights
What we did here:  Nada.  We waited for the ferry to Utila to start running again (bad weather kept it from going).  It was pouring rain so we mostly just hung out in our hostel.

Utila – 16 nights
What we did here:  We researched dive shops, and killed some time until Talon (from 1 Dad, 1 Kid) was free to teach us our first courses.  We hiked to a crashed drug plane.  And we also crashed at a few friend’s houses here (thanks Lisa, Shell, and Talon!).

Jewel Cay – 86 nights
What we did here:  Dive, dive, and dive.  We also managed the dive shop’s hotel in conjunction with another DMT for about a month and half.  And don’t forget swimming with whale sharks!!!

Little Cay – 1 night
What we did here:  What better way to say goodbye and celebrate our completion of the divemaster program than to rent a private island with our best buds? (Complete with a shore dive, of course)

San Pedro Sula – 2 nights
What we did here: Waited for a spot to open up on the Tica bus to Nicaragua.  Met Carlo & Geneva from the TravelBudgetCouple at our hostel and joined them for some Hondurian Chinese food and reverse culture shock at the city mall.

We miss you Miss Kary!

Sunset on Little Cay

If you want to check out some of our Honduras photos, check out our photo gallery.

Coral

Bluebell Tunicates

Mooring Line

Coral

Pilot Whale Skeleton

Divers at Halliburton Wreck

Coral

Great view

Bike at the Wreck

Sand

Coral

Coral

Divers at the wreck

Butterflyfish

Horse-eye Jacks & Barracuda

Burrfish

Flamingo Tongue

Hermit Crab

Coral

Lizardfish

Banded Coral Shrimp

Green Moray Eel

Feather Dusters

Sea Urchin

Hey guys, I need your help.  I’ve entered the 2012 Best Dive Job Competition.  In order to win I need you, my beloved readers, to comment on my entry post found here: Mike Lenzen – Best Dive Job in the World 2012.

Here’s the catch, the competition closes on February 28th, so there’s not much time left.

Thanks so much for your help, feel free to spread this around facebook, twitter, google+, email, telephone, or whatever you’ve got.  It’s all appreciated.

We’ve been going on and on about how we decided to become divemasters in Utila, but it’s come to my attention that most people outside of the diving world don’t really know what a divemaster does.  So let’s change that, shall we?

We, as divemasters, can not teach you, our lovely friends and family, how to scuba dive.  We would have to become instructors for that, another course that comes with a hefty price tag.

What we can do is lead certified divers.  That means that once you get your open water certification, we can take you out, let you know what to expect on the dive, point out some interesting aquatic life, and get you back to the boat with plenty of air to spare.  That’s what divemasters are for… they take the stress of navigating out of the equation and they know where to look to see the cool stuff.  A good divemaster makes the dives smoother and more enjoyable for everyone.

Find the boat may not always be easy, but it doesn’t feel like magic anymore

Divemasters can do a few more things too.  They can refresh your diving skills if you haven’t dove in a while.  They can certify skin divers (snorkelers).  They can also teach a few specialities, given the appropriate additional certifications and take out discover scuba divers (someone that is not certified) after an instructor has taken them out at least once before.

There are several stages of training between landlubber and PADI divemaster.

First, you need your open water diver certification.  In Utila, this is typically a three day course.  The first day is spent in confined water (a pool or off-dock pool-like environment) learning the skills, and then four open water dives are done over two days from the boat.  There are five knowledge reviews and a final exam to complete.  Once certified, you can dive with a buddy to a depth of 18 m.

Then, you need your advanced open water certification.  This course is much less rigid than the open water course.  You need to complete five adventure dives, typically over 2-3 days.  These dives must include a deep dive (between 18 and 30 m) and a navigation dive.  The other three are up to you!  We chose to do a wreck dive, night dive, and peak performance buoyancy.  There are five knowledge reviews to complete, but no final exam.  Once certified, you can dive with a buddy to a depth of 30 m.

The last step before the divemaster program is to become a rescue diver.  Before you can become a rescue diver, you need to have a valid EFR certification (emergency first response/CPR and first aid), taken within the past 24 months.  If you don’t already have it, it will be an extra afternoon of instruction and practice, a couple of knowledge reviews, and an exam.  The rescue course typically takes about three days and involves a lengthy confined water section and then two scenarios and a dive from hell off the boat.  You learn how to deal with all kinds of problems and emergencies in and out of the water, including how to respond to panicked, tired, and unresponsive divers underwater and at the surface.

Finally, the divemaster program.  To begin the program, you need to have 40 logged dives under your belt (all of the previous course dives count as logged dives).  If you don’t have 40 dives, don’t worry… in Utila, you don’t have to pay for them once you’ve signed up for the divemaster program.  The actual course can take anywhere from two and a half to eight weeks, depending on your schedule.  The course includes:  nine knowledge reviews, a final exam, a skills circuit assessment (of your ability to demonstrate the open water skills), a swimming skills assessment (400 m timed swim, 800 m timed snorkel, 100 m timed tired diver tow, 15 float/tread), an underwater equipment exchange, dive site mapping project, deep dive scenario, search & recovery scenario, dive briefing assessment, dive site & boat set up assessment, five workshops where instructors, divemasters, and DMTs act as your divers (discover local diving, skin diving, discover scuba diving confined water, discover scuba diving additional dive, and scuba tune-up), and four actual scenarios (assist on confined dives for open water course, assist on open water dives of open water course, assist on a continuing education course, and lead certified divers).  You also need a total of 60 logged dives to finish the program (this is no problem by the time you’ve met all the other requirements).

So You Think You Might Want to Become a Divemaster? (and tips for choosing a dive shop)

Choosing a dive shop is always an important factor for any certification, but because of the time involved it is especially important with the divemaster program.  One of the instructors at the shop will be your personal mentor.  Depending on the set up, they may also be the person you do all of your skills with during the course (we got the opportunity to work with several instructors while completing our divemaster program, which I would highly recommend).

The best way to choose a dive shop in a place like Utila (which has something like 14 different shops) is to spend a day walking around and talking to them all.  Obviously, you need to ask the cost of the program (remember, these are often negotiable, especially if it’s low season).  Also find out if the cost includes any extras… Are the dives required to start the program included?  Does this include reef fees?

Related to the question of price – what are the perks? Do you offer free/discounted accommodation?  If so, for how long?  Do you offer any free/discounted specialty courses to divemasters-in-training?  We managed to get our nitrox, wreck, and deep specialties for the cost of the certification.  Do you get free diving for life after you’re done the course?

Also, if you’re planning to stick around and work as a divemaster, ask about the possibility of continuing on with the shop – some shops guarantee work for their graduates (though the amount of work might be sparse).  If you’re interested in making a few bucks back, ask if you can work in the shop while you’re completing your course.

Probably the most important factor in choosing a dive shop is the people.  The prices are usually pretty close from shop to shop and you can walk around checking out equipment, but it’ll probably be similar as well.  When you chat with the shops about prices and get tours of the facility, note the vibe of the place… is it a party place?  Is it quiet and laidback?  Does everyone seem to get along well?  Are there experienced instructors around for everyone to benefit from?  Is there an instructor that you can have a good mentor/mentee relationship with?  Do you get to choose your mentor or will they be assigned to you?  Can you set your own schedule, or do you need to follow theirs?  If at all possible, make sure you get out on the dive boat at least once before committing to any shop.

Painted DMTs... a seriously great group of people

Ultimately, we didn’t choose the cheapest shop (I know, I know… how out of character for us), we chose to pay a little more for a shop that fit our schedule, and our vibe.  All in all, the time we spent picking our shop was well worth the effort.

Hanging out in front of our dive shop

That’s it. Three months after arriving in Utila, it’s time to say goodbye. It’s bittersweet in a way, this is the only time so far in our trip where we’ve had to move on. We are scheduled to meet Ashley’s mom and her mom’s boyfriend in Nicaragua. A plan that was hatched just before we decided to take a trip on the vomit comet… before scuba diving.

But that’s life… if you work, you probably need to book your holidays, and Ashley’s mom was no exception. “Where are you going to be in February?” she asked.
“We have no idea,” was our response, “Does Nicaragua sound good to you?”
“That could work.” And so, we agreed to meet in Nicaragua.

Don’t get us wrong, we are plenty excited to see Ashley’s mom. Overwhelmingly so, in fact… how could we not be? It’s been a whopping seven months since we last saw her, along with everyone else from home. It’s just that saying goodbye can be tough. Leaving Utila is almost as tough as it was to leave home. We know and have become attached to so many wonderful people.

But We Also Had a Reason to Celebrate

Now three months in, we’ve completed the PADI divemaster program. The typical course of action is to invite everyone out to what’s called a snorkel test. The snorkel test is exactly what you are imagining. You sit perched in front of all your friends at the front of a bar while your mentor pours a copious amount of booze into a funnel attached to the top of your snorkel. You sit there and drink until you can’t drink anymore, then you wretch. There’s usually some applauding, followed by some dancing, and occasionally a medical emergency requiring minor first aid.

Shane’s Snorkel Test

We’re too damn old for that nonsense. We’ve become quite tame, living on our little Jewel Cay. We needed a more fitting way to say goodbye, something that suited us a bit better. Where someone that had spent the past 3 months living in the grand metropolis of Utila may have found a visit to Jewel Cay calming and relaxing, that wasn’t an option for us. We needed something else, something smaller, something like… a private island!

Little Cay

Little Cay

Little Cay is a private island for rent. It’s a bit pricey, costing $150 USD a night for up to 6 people, and an additional $10 USD per person after that. I’m not sure what the total capacity is, but I would hazard to guess that it would sleep around 15 if need be.

The house is really really nice. There’s a huge kitchen and common area. Two fridges – one for drinks, the other for food. An electric generator and solar powered lights. The rooms are spacious with their own bathrooms, and there’s even a guest house. The island is covered in soft sand, coconut palms, and hermit crabs.

Little Cay

What Do You Do on a Private Island?

Anything you want. That’s the beauty of it. There’s no one there to tell you no, or give you funny looks. For us, an island full of divemasters, divemasters in training and instructors, we chose to go on a shore dive. It was fun getting out to a new site that we hadn’t seen before. We made the most of it, staying under for about an hour, and saw some critters that are a little bit more rare, like a Spanish Lobster. It was nice, but not the most spectacular diving we’ve seen.

After the dive, it was time for food. We had tuna (purchased filleted on Jewel Cay for about $1.50USD per pound), bread fruit, salad, potato salad, ham and cheese buns, cinnamon buns, and some coconuts to hold our rum.

After the meal things died down considerably, we drank a bit more, and eventually nodded off to sleep. Great time, great food, just the right amount of sleep. Our kind of going away party. We are going to miss you Utila. So much so, that I wouldn’t be surprised if we crossed paths again sooner rather than later.

The House

Hanging Out in the Kitchen

Preparing Breadfruit

Preparing the Fish

Rum in the Coconut