We left Copan with the usual bird intestinal explosion. This is becoming a regular early morning departure time.  It is tiring, so an early bedtime is recommended.

From Copan were heading  across the border to Jocotan in Guatemala,  a Mayan Chorti village where there is local market. 

But first, it was time to check out the coffee bean industry.  I had never seen coffee growing before, let alone a raw, unroasted bean. Have you??

At this particular plant, the beans arrived on the back of pick up trucks, brought in by individual farmers.  They are paid by weight.

They are tipped into huge shallow washing baths into which the river water is pumped, the beans are rinsed and then there are several other cleaning and sorting processes until they are all laid out in rows to dry. Once dry they are bagged up and sold on to the coffee roasting trade.

Honduran coffee tastes really good, I have had some in my room for the last two nights, but I'm not sure we can get it in the UK?

The border crossing was pretty uneventful but a bit long winded.. Ivania did all the form filling and we just sat around looking a bit touristy.

So back to the market.  Along the road we have been amazed to see people stood up and crammed into the back of a pick up truck, many of them children, with just a centre rail or each other to hold onto. Ivania told us that this was the cheapest way for people to travel en masse to the markets.  So much for Health and Safety!!

There were numerous fruits and vegetables for sale and also kitchen wares and live animals. It reminded me very much of the markets in Turkey that we have visited, everything fresh and negotiable. 

The people there were Mayan and their faces are so photogenic. Especially the older people. These were the Chorti Mayans. Each branch of the Mayan have their own language. There are more than 20 of them and each is individual. They must have been isolated from each other for decades in order for their languages to develop separately. 

It was a long journey to Guatemala City, on the way we stopped at a shopping mall for lunch. Not my idea of a great meal, I have to say. I ended up at Mackie Ds, I hate Mackie Ds. I ordered a McPollo (chicken burger), great, so then he's asking me a question, so I assume he's asking what fries, so I say yeah, fries, then I hear the word Coke, so I say yeah Coke, then he asks me for a large amount of Quetzales.

Enter Sharon, stage left. She tells them I just want the Meal Deal, he asks, with fries? She says Yup. He says with a Coke, she says Yup. 

I have now ordered four meals, the price of my lunch is soaring...... So she says, cancel the lot and restart. We reorder and .....  we are now the proud owners of eight McDonalds meals. 

Eventually we get my Mc Pollo meal deal and  I found out later that she has the cheek to say, I'll have what she had! I look round and the queue is about 20 deep, so I take my tray of carbohydrates to a secluded table and get stuck in.  She joins me less than a minute later, looking smug. 

'I don't know how you could have had so much trouble.....' she said with a grin. 'I just told them I'd have the same as you !!'

Eventually, we rejoin the bus and wend our way through the Guatemalan countryside. On the way, Ivania explains the gun culture in Guatemala. Anyone with a licence, ie over 25 with no criminal record and, allegedly, all their marbles, can buy up to three guns. They are free to wear these guns in public. If they use these guns and the result is a gunshot wound or a death, they are put in prison until they can prove themselves innocent, the complete antithesis of our laws. 

Oh yes the carrot story ......

This holiday has been subject to numerous stops along the way, so that we could interact with the locals, see their crafts being made and generally observe their way of life.

Fine.

We did actually make an unscheduled stop to see the farmers piling all their freshly gathered fruit and vegetables into a Chicken Bus, a kind of joint project to cut down the costs of transportation.

This did not prove at all riveting to me, but everyone except Sharon and I leaped out to take photos.

What??     Why??????

All we two little rebels wanted to do was to get to the hotel, have a shower and find a cold beer, and they're all outside the bus taking photos of small Mayan gentlemen throwing sacks of vegetables into the back of a bus!

AAAARRGGHH!!

But the carrot fetish does not end there, oh no, most certainly not.....

A couple of miles down the road, there are actually people out in the fields, pulling up handfuls of those little orange b*****s. Wow !

Cue to slam the brakes on and everyone (except us) piles out for yet more photo opportunities.

'Ivania, can you take a picture of us next to this bunch of carrots?'

Oh get real people, they're carrots, you can buy them in Walmart, can we go now please?

Yes, the carrots cut seriously into our bar time.

I digress.

Again there is this private protection of businesses going on. The businesses employ private companies to provide their business and also their customers with security.They are all heavily armed but if they do actually shoot someone, they will find themselves in prison.

 So what is the point!  It's a macho thing, I suppose.

We finally rolled up to the hotel which is a Best Western Plus or something. We have all been given rooms on the ground floor. I walked into mine and it smelt of drains and worse , Yuk. Also, there was no safety deposit box, as promised. 

Back to Reception I go. Please can I have the key for the safe? They gave me the key, OK I said , now show me the safe! They came to my room, and ...oh no, we can't find your safe! 

We can get you one in the morning. 

Crap, said I , I want a new room!. 

My new room is on the next floor, but smells fragrant and has a safe, Bingo, 

So I trot off and find Sharon, who fancies a small drinkie poo.  No surprises there then.

Our hotel bar was in the restaurant and you would have to sit at a dinner table and blah blah, and it had no atmosphere, not to say a total lack of, well, ambience. 

So Ivania rang around to find a bar that was open on a Sunday night (bless her, above and beyond the call of duty) and she came up with Shakespeare's Bar. 

All very appropriate, what with Will and I being from the same part of the world.  And it was walkable, which was a bonus.  Ivania would show us the way.

I felt a little worried after her chat about the three guns per person rule and I felt a little more worried when we went down some steps into what looked a bit like a basement.

Inside it was mostly bar with a few small tables scattered about and it was a bit gloomy. The bar itself was one of those vinyl padded ones, with the vinyl all cracked with the stuffing hanging out and there were a couple of guys leaning up against it.

Ah well, nil desperandum, here we go.

A glass of vino blanco and a draught Gallo please Senor Barman.

It was then that we found out he was actually from Texas and we no longer needed our shocking attempts at Spanish. Thank God for that.

It's funny how sleazy bars become less sleazy, the more you drink, isn't it? So after my second pint of draught, it was starting to feel quite congenial.

As luck would have it, the restaurant where our paid meal was to be, was just across the road. So we toddled over at the witching hour and joined the rest of the party. Party, being a loose term, you understand? 

Once again there was so much food. I really feel that they are maybe over catering but then again, I am not American and maybe they do eat three courses every lunchtime. Who knows? Well Sharon probably does, if I remember to ask her.

Another early night but with a 6am start, do you blame us??