Beanland Diary #10 - La Mosquitia

Dear Beanland Reader,

The adventure started on an ominous note. After telling my neighbor Idalia that I was headed out for a 10-day trek into La Mosquitia, the remote jungle of Honduras, her smile flattened into a look of deep concern. Her eyes watered over as she tried to hold back her tears. In a cracked voice she said,

“Dejame una carta para la familia en caso de que nunca regreses” [Leave me a letter to give your family in case you never come back]

Whoa. I knew Idalia, an avid telenovela watcher, was prone to melodrama. But even your perpetually optimistic correspondent was a little shaken up by her words.

Let’s start with a little background. La Mosquitia is the lawless, undeveloped wilderness that makes up the far north-eastern corner of Honduras and Nicaragua. It is home to the indigenous Miskito people, although the vast majority is dense jungle, teeming with a dazzling variety of flora and fauna without a human in sight. La Mosquitia exists in physical and cultural isolation - there are not even roads connecting it to the rest of Honduras. You have three ways to get in and out: Dugout canoe (preferred by the Miskito), Hiking (preferred by granola Gringos) and Low-flying aircraft (preferred by, ahem, entrepreneurs who specialize in import-export).

Apparently certain ports of La Mosquitia form a very important part of the Colombia-US supply chain, and the narcotraficantes wield tremendous power in these areas. Rumor has it that when the Honduran govt. tried to bump up anti-trafficking measures in far-flung Puerto Lempira (with the help, presumably, of Tio Sam), their efforts were completely thwarted. The newly assigned agents could not find anyone willing to sell them gasoline for their patrol boats. How odd. Fijese que, we just ran out.

Our adventure started in a little town called Bonanza, literally at the end of the road in eastern Olancho. There we met up with our team of three guides, led by Mino. Mino is the Honduran cross between Indiana Jones and Macgyver. He was barefoot throughout the entire 10 days of the trip. He is fluent in English, Spanish and Miskito, and seamlessly glides between all three in the course of an average sentence. Rather than take a spot in a tent, he slept commando-style in the mud. He hunted with his bare hands or, if absolutely necessary, a pocket knife.

Mino sat us down before leaving Bonanza to orient us on the challenges we would face. He presented a series of numerical scales which your correspondent, inclined towards quantitative analysis, found quite comforting. The first scale was the class system of whitewater rapids, which many Beanland readers are already familiar with. Rapids are classified between Class 1 (happy little bumps) and Class 6 (absolutely treacherous). The Rio Platano, he explained, only had few serious rapids this time of year, and that we would be portaging over some of the sketchier spots when necessary. Cheque.

Next, he outlined the pain scale of insect and reptile bites that we were likely to suffer. Class 1 was a garden-variety bee or wasp sting, with minor pain and swelling. Kid stuff. Class 2 jumps quickly up to scorpion bites, which yield hours or days of swollen tongue. A Class 3 sting would come from the gargantuan bullet ant, who’s name derives from a bite so painful that it feels like you’ve been shot. Moving up to Class 4 we have the infamous black widow spider, which will bring a healthy adult to the very edge of the great abyss. Beyond Class 4 there is no point in counting any more, since the scale merges numerically and spiritually with the Infinite. Here we find the many highly-venomous snakes which call La Mosquitia home, like the Fer-de-Lance, the Matabuey (Ox Killer), and several members of the “familia peet veiperr”. I was starting to wonder if Idalia was right about that letter, after all.

Our trip started by strapping all our gear, rafts and paddles backpacks and food barrels, onto a platoon of donkeys and horses that Mino had arranged. We hiked a full day to reach the headwaters of the river, where we inflated the rafts, loaded in the gear, and started paddling. From that point, we didn’t see another person for the next week, which we spent meandering rio-abajo through endless sheets of gorgeous green foliage (see new photos on Snapper).

Some days were super tranquilo, when the current was fast enough for us to coast without paddling but not too fast to require much attention. Some days were grueling. Three times we had to empty the rafts and hump everything over sketchy boulders and twisted jungle paths. Everything means everything: bulky dry bags, 60lb food barrels, water jugs, the folding toilet-seat contraption (dubbed “La Reina” in memory of the BBC reporters that donated her), and sometimes the rafts themselves. Tough work. We usually arrived at camp exhausted. If there was enough daylight, we would wash our clothes or ourselves in the river. After devouring some bean baleadas or sardine pasta or whatever chef Mino had planned as the plat-du-jour, we would pass out hard in the tents. The next morning, up at 5:00AM en punto. Coffee, cornflay, back into your river clothes (still wet) and into the boats.

At every bend in the river there was some new animal that most of us had never seen outside of a zoo or the Discovery Channel. Dozens of species of birds, from hummingbirds to hawks, were constantly buzzing overhead. Most entertaining were the scattered gangs of monkeys, who would break into a routine of spastic branch-shaking and howling to get our attention. We were fascinated. “Look, they’re so cute! So curious!” we said dotingly. Mino responded, “Yeah, the curious ones are the first to be eaten by the jaguars.”

Another source of entertainment were the iguanas. First of all, they were mutant huge. Four feet from tip to tail is not an exaggeration. Think komodo dragon from “The Freshmen”. Like many reptiles, these iguanas spend their days slothing on a warm branch minding their own business. Since most of their predators are non-aquatic, their reaction to any unknown presence is to simply roll off their perch, plunging in a lumpy belly flop to the river below. Upon hearing their distinctive “plop”, Mino would drop his paddle in mid-sentence and dive into the murky water after them, intent on preparing garrobo soup at least one night. Iguanas have teeth like saw blades, he explained. The trick is to get them at just the right place. Where is that? The hips. Grab them at the hips and they can’t get around to clamp down on the meaty flesh of your forearm. Sounds easy enough, catching a huge biting lizard underwater. You go first and I’ll be right behind you. No, really, I insist.

Finally on day 8, we caught sight of a few thatched huts raised up on tree trunks – civilization! We had reached Las Marias, a small Miskito fishing community. We met the family of one of our guides, Rosendo, who displayed the traditional Honduran hospitality and offered us chocolate cake and other homemade sweets. Then, the tables were turned and Rosendo offered US to them. He announced that there were some eligible bachelors in our group, introduced Dylan and me, and told his daughters and nieces to choose quickly because there were only two of us. In the ensuing frenzy, sadly, we lost Dylan. He generously sacrificed himself and allowed me to escape with only Class 2 injuries.

In Las Marias we deflated the rafts and loaded the gear into a few pipantes, long single-file dugout wooden canoes onto which we strapped outboard motors. Relaxing in a pipante is not easy, since it seems like you’re always on the verge of capsizing. Our navigator was constantly barking in Miskito at the guy manning the motor. After six hours puttering through lazy river bends, tight mangrove canals, and coastal lagoons, we arrived at Palacios. In Palacios we had arranged to stay at the local hotel, which we were very excited about – a shower and a real bed after over a week of camping. As we got closer to Palacios, we giddily asked Mino to describe the hotel. “It’s, you know, a hotel. Made of cement...” Cement, huh? Sounds cozy. No swim-up bar in the pool? No room service?

In Palacios we cleaned up and nursed our wounds. Nothing serious, but we had accumulated a pot-pourri of minor infections, fungi, blisters and cuts that needed some attention. We showered, washed down a dinner of camarones and rice with a few cold beers, and trudged back to our luxury concrete hotel. We were up at 4:30AM the next morning to complete the final leg of our trip. Covering an incredible distance in pipante, truck and bus, we managed to arrive in the beach town of Tela by sundown, just in time for the pending festivities. Your faithful correspondent turned 29 that day and we celebrated with steak and tequila. Perfecto, absolutamente perfecto.

I returned to Cantarranas to find a very relieved Idalia greeting me with her normal ear-to-ear smile. “Esta vivo mi gringuito!” she cheered. Such a worrier, that Idalia. Once in the house, I dumped my stinky clothes in the hamper, opened the windows for some fresh air, and ripped that “just-in-case” letter I’d written into a million little pieces...

Atentamente,
Your Correspondent, San Juan de Flores F.M., Honduras

[Please send comments and criticisms in writing to 5 Ridgewood Rd, St. Louis MO 63124 attn: Jerome]

ps. May you rest in peace in the endless squirrel-filled pastures above, George the Dog (a.k.a: Innis, George Beauty, Buchy von Buchenstein)