The first time I went to Honduras I transited through on my way from Nicaragua to El Salvador, so it didn’t count. I knew I had to go back. Honduras is incredible, and I did not experience anything even remotely scary or violent despite warnings from all the places. To be fair I didn’t go to the 2 biggest cities, so I did not visit the former murder capital of the world. However, I am confident even if I had I would have the same response.
Copán Ruinas – The Town
I made my way from Guatemala and began my Honduras travels in the town of Copán Ruinas. Which is, as you may have guessed, home to a major Mayan ruin site.
The town was a very approachable place to start, extremely cute and clean. Also tourist-y, but in a tolerable and slightly pleasant way (is there such a thing?!). There isn’t a ton to do in Copán outside the ruinas, eating baleadas, and drinking Salva Vida (Honduras’ national beer). There is a central park and mercado, but they are both small. There are also an abnormal number of pharmacies.
[And Then I Drank Beer with Locals After Dark] Since everyone associates “murder” and “Honduras,” I feel I should write about safety. It felt very safe in Copán. So safe, in fact, on my first night I decided it was acceptable to hang out in the park with some locals and drink beer they offered me. About 2 sips in, I started to get paranoid that somehow it was drugged – I mean, there was some dust/debris around the rim of my can that was mysteriously absent from the 2 mens’ beers…clearly date rape drug in some sort of congealed form! I became increasingly concerned, pretended to drink the rest and made a swift exit, yelling at myself the whole way home for breaking key travel rules – Rule 1: Do not take drinks from strangers, Rule 2: Don’t walk around alone in Honduras after dark. Off to a good start.
Copán Ruinas – The Mayan Site
The Copán Ruins are a large Mayan Ruin site in western Honduras near the border with Guatemala. They are pretty incredible. I saw maybe 10 people while there, and you can still climb on the ruins in the woods. See photos of Copán Ruinas & learn more here →
Onwards: Exploring Western Honduras
Of course I needed to experience more than the tourist town while backpacking Honduras. So, after Copán I set about taking local buses into the country. I wound up visiting 4 places in total: Copán , La Entrada, Santa Rosa de Copán, and Gracias.
Backpacking Honduras: La Entrada
La Entrada is a small city that’s mostly a transit hub. I got on/off here and explored a tad, given I was going to be standing on the street for hours waiting for my bus anyway. There is not much to see. On my final venture, I saw a lady with a stick yelling at people about which bus to take and gesturing wildly with the stick. Shortly thereafter, a child took the stick, ran around wielding it, and eventually hit the aforementioned lady with it. Not alarming at all.
Backpacking Honduras: Santa Rosa de Copán
Santa Rosa de Copán (“Santa Rosa”) is a larger city in western Honduras. It took about 4 (ok, more like 5) hours to get there via local buses from Copán, and was quite the ride given the roads were somewhat destroyed from recent floods/landslides and there were cattles milling about. Also, the filthy curtain got loose and touched my mouth (again) which wasn’t ideal.
Santa Rosa is cool and worth a few days visit. It is off the main tourist track, so it provides an authentic experience. There is nothing super-noteworthy about the city; cobblestones and architecture, churches and a nice park. There are a plethora of amazing food and coffee shops to try, too. The shopping wasn’t bad either; shirts with strange slogans were aplenty as were rope vendors and pharmaceuticals! Note: I did not purchase unknown drugs streetside (pictured left).
The city boasts its own special, regional liquor called Timoshienko. It is a traditional fruit liquor (you can learn about ti there) , and there is a new coffee flavor apparently. It’s served at some bars around town, but there is one bar completely dedicated to it. I attempted to visit this establishment at 10am (not relevant why I was attempting to drink fruit liquor alone at 10am). But, likely due to the time, it was closed. Well, the door was open and I went inside and looked around. But there were no people and the bar was roped off, so I determined I should leave.
I guess the main “attraction” in Santa Rosa is the La Flor de Copán tobacco factory. I attempted to go to it, however upon arrival it was closed off by a large metal gate. I attempted to gain entry (failed), then attempted to speak to street food vendors about gaining entry (failed). In the end, I did not gain entry. Overall, Santa Rosa reminded me of Santa Ana El Salvador except but less sketchy.
Gracias
Yes, the town is actually called Gracias! I have included photographic evidence of this below. The moment I stepped off the bus, got covered in dust/exhaust from the bus station (field), and nearly got hit by a car crossing the road (user error), I knew I liked the place.
Gracias is small-ish, and feels more like a town than a city. There is a nice park at center, made all the nicer by the fact it’s lined with Honduran candy vendors. I made multiple [unnecessary] purchases, and felt mildly ill on the bus back from a sugar overload.
Eating in Honduras
The most popular food in Honduras (at least in the west) is Baleadas. Which is something between a taco and pupusa. It’s a tortilla with black beans, and then something else of your choosing to fill it – generally eggs or meat. You can get it with veggies at times. By veggies I do mean like 1/8 of an avocado or 1 tiny piece of a tomato. It also usually has cheese. Which I thought was some sort of delicious “sauce” and ingested greedily. Which was a mistake ideal given I am lactose intolerant.
