We were There!

Yesterday’s news reported a 7.1-magnitude earthquake rocking Honduras. It rocked us too. A mere four months ago we were there … right at the epicenter. Or close.

We spent almost a week on Roatán, one of the Bay Islands off the north coast of Honduras. That island—a favorite stop on our seven week trek—was a 1-1/2 hour ferry ride from the mainland. It was also nearest to the reported epicenter of the earthquake, just 80 miles northeast of La Ceiba in the Caribbean Sea.

We traveled through many of the areas reportedly affected by the earthquake. Our journey took us from Cancún, Mexico, through Belize, and on to Honduras via water ferry. From there we bused from Puerto Cortés to La Ceiba. En route we changed buses at a shopping mall in San Pedro Sula. There a hotel receptionist, Raul Gonzalez, reported to the Associated Press that guests ran into the street in their pajamas when the 2:24 a.m. earthquake struck. “It was really strong,” he said, “I have never felt anything like that.”

Our bus continued on to La Ceiba, crossing the Democracy Bridge in El Progreso. That bridge spans the country’s largest river, the Ulua. It collapsed yesterday. We passed over that river. We took that bridge.

We also stayed two nights at the Gran Hotel Paris in La Ceiba in mid-January. Our stay was accidental. A previous hotel, the Monserratte, where we’d roomed both before and after visiting Roatán and before flying to Guanaja, was filled. It was raining. In desperation we hauled our backpacks to a nearby plaza where we’d seen another hotel.

The Gran Hotel Paris had space available and, as it happened, was a much better choice. Rooms were smaller but the hotel itself was cleaner, livelier, and had a more relaxed atmosphere than the Monserratte.

“People were running for the door,” said Alfredo Cedeno from the Gran Hotel Paris, about yesterday’s tremors. “You could really feel it and you could see it—the water came out of the pool.”

We sauntered past the aforementioned pool on our way to breakfast at Gran Hotel Paris. And we watched children playing in that same pool through the restaurant’s glass windows. We walked next to that pool. We ate beside it.

According to the Associated Press report two children died and 40 people were injured as a result of yesterday’s earthquake. It terrified residents through much of Central America. And, since we rode a bus—twice—over the now-collapsed bridge, breakfasted—twice—next to this now-waterless pool, and swam and snorkeled in the Caribbean waters near where this six mile deep earthquake occurred, it almost felt as if we were still there when the earthquake struck.

It’s curious that just a few days or a week in a hotel, on an island, or riding a bus can make a city, a hotel, a bridge, or a country seem so familiar … and almost like home.