So I left you in Flores, Guatemala. From there, we started to make our way to the Honduran Bay Islands where we were hoping to do our PADI Open Water diving. Rio Dulce was the first stop along the way, a pretty small, dull town where the town loco runs around with a gun hanging from his neck and where we stayed in this unique hostel which can only be described as a big shed, where birds fly in and out freely, animals can stay in the room (and jump on other peoples beds in the middle of the night, grrrrr!) and pillows and sheets are considered a luxury. Swiftly moving on, we spent a couple of days on the Caribbean (and very un-Guatemalan) coast, in a lively town called Livingston. This little Garifuna town is only accessible by water and all in all very interesting in itself. The local delicacy is a seafood soup called tapado, made with coconut milk, plantain, loads of prawns, mussels and a whole (still completely intact) fish just dropped in - absolutely lush. We spent a much-needed day just relaxing at the only 5 star hotels pool, and attempted our much-awaited Saturday night out here, which was eventful to say the least - having the town loco roaming the streets with a machete.

As soon as we crossed the border into Honduras it rained, it rained so much that none of the boats that were due to leave for the Bay Islands could leave...for a week. So that was that plan out of the window, and I now had a week to kill before my flight left Guatemala City. So, still with Kim, we decided to give the week to exploring Honduras. It started off well, we went to stay in this jungle lodge, pretty much in the jungle, and set on the river Cangrejal where we did some white water rafting...a lot of fun! All the people that ended up staying there that night also turned out to be people that Id met in Mexico a few weeks before too so a bit of a reunion was had around the candlelight. After leaving the jungle we visited San Pedro Sula, supposedly Honduras´most happening city, notorious for gangs and definately never worth visiting again and Lago de Yojoa, a big lake set between some mountains - there were some nice waterfalls nearby (Pulpanzhak) but life had died every night by 8pm and it rained the whole week so going out became a chore - on the brightside though the guy at the hotel we were staying in did brew his own flavoured beer. The last place we saw in Honduras was just a a couple of kilometres from the Copan Ruins...yes, more (very nice) Mayan ruins...and this was actually a quite charming town, a bit lively, and warm...so Honduras last impressions were not too damaging.

So, I then arrived in Caracas, Venezuela, last week. I wont say too much about the city as there isnt much to say - it is dangerous, ugly and very expensive. So I spent one night in an awful ´hotel´and then got the next nightbus out of there, straight to Colombia.

I stopped off on the long way down to Bogota in a place called Villa de Leyva, a really pretty colonial town with all low-rise white-washed buildings. Here was a museum (!!) housing an almost completely intact fossil of a Kronosaurus, a dinosaur that lived in the water that used to cover the city and also an ostrich farm which was equally as interesting. I spent my first night in Bogota in a really sociable hostel where a group of us went out to a live salsa bar in the old town, was really entertaining. Jonny then arrived in Bogota on the weekend, so we spent a couple of days wandering around, eating lots, going up mountains in cable cars, and watching the national sport - football. We´ve also spent a couple of days on buses, stopping at Medellin on the way up to the Caribbean coast. So, we´re now in Cartagena, an absolutely beautiful colonial style town thats just lovely to wander around. We had a mud bath in a volcano yesterday (it spews mud instead of lava) and took a boat out to some tiny islands today with lovely Caribbean beaches. Colombia actually feels a lot safer than probably all of the countries Ive so far been to and the people are so unbelievably friendly, am having a great time!