Day #8 -- heading home!

This last morning in Honduras, we ate breakfast in the hotel's cafe, called the Cafe Skandia. It reminded me of a mixture of an old-style diner and Ikea!! The food was abundant and good, and much of it was traditional American fare, for those who might've been looking forward to returning to French toast or bacon!!

Just outside the cafe was the swimming pool area.  It was clean and lovely; I wish the weather had been a bit warmer, and that Mackenzie hadn't been sick -- she would've loved to go swimming here.

The lobby of the hotel -- a lousy picture I found on the internet somewhere!!

From the dining area looking towards the lobby of the hotel.

There was a beautiful mosaic picture on the wall of this area.....

.....here's a closer look at it.

On the other side of the lobby was a sitting area, with this wood carving surrounding a support column.

Mackenzie wanted her picture taken next to these flowers to show how large the floral display was.

Back in our room, after packing, I took a few more pictures from the balcony.

I read on-line that there are actually TWO statues like this in the park; from my window, I could only see one.  They depict local women who would've done their laundry in the river in times past.

Another look at the cathedral at the end of the park.  I can find no name for except the San Pedro Sula cathedral, so I guess that's what it's called.  I wish we'd had more time -- I would have liked to have a look inside.

The bell tower.

Looking down the side of the cathedral and to the mountains beyond.

We headed off to the airport around 9 AM.  Thankfully, the drive in the "big city" is faster (and easier on the rear ends!) than the drives tend to be in rural areas of Honduras.  I had shown a picture on Day 1 of the size of the airport from the outside.  Here are two interesting shots to show how small it really is.  The departing gates are upstairs, and in these pictures, I'm standing between gate 1 and 2. 

Looking to the closest end, with a snack shop and coffee shop.

And looking down the entire length of the departure gates.  Yup -- that's it!!  No way you'll get lost, like in Atlanta, BWI, or Chicago!! Just one long room with 8 "areas" for departure!  If you can't figure this one out, you should NOT be flying alone!!

A few shots out the window, just to show how uncluttered and slow the airport is.

You'd never see a tarmac this empty at any local airports in the MD/DC/VA area!

At the gift shop in the airport, I found some Honduran jewelry in orange -- Mackenzie's favorite color!  Here she is modeling it -- and even smiling though she felt so sick -- what a trooper!

And finally, on the plane, getting ready to head to Atlanta and then home.

A few last photos taken from the window....

....and then we're off....

.....as we head higher into the sky.....

.....looking at the beautiful land below...

.....and hoping we'll get to return someday....

'Bye, Sowers family and Honduras!

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Day #7 (Part 2) --The trip to San Pedro Sula, Honduras

After getting the LandCruiser loaded and all the passengers loaded as well, we took off on the long, bumpy trip to San Pedro Sula.  We stopped not too far down the road to take some pictures.....

Mackenzie kept herself occupied by playing the Nintendo DS most of the day.  Sometime that evening, I found out she'd had a sore throat since the AM and was feeling pretty bad, but for most of the day, she kept it pretty well hidden!

On the day we had arrived in Honduras, we had seen a street vendor selling these strange-looking fruits.  With the busy days leading up to the wedding, there really wasn't much time to find out about them, but now on the way back to the "big city", we realized if we didn't find them soon, we'd NEVER get to try them.  My niece, Kirstin, had described them to us as having an outer skin that peeled like an orange, contains a white fruit like the inside of a grape, and a small pit in the middle, rather like a peach.  With that strange description in mind, we decided we MUST try one. Trish was able to find another person selling these on the street -- here's a bagful of them.

We studied them rather suspiciously -- even my rather adventuresome father (in the background) didn't think they looked terribly appetizing!

Displaying the strange-looking fruit for the camera.

Some way of getting the outer skin punctured is needed to start eating this fruit.  In our case, it was suggested that we use our teeth to pull off a spot.  Once that was done, we could see the inner fruit -- which indeed DID look rather like a grape, and which was sweeter than probably any other fruit I've ever eaten.  It was REALLY good -- but a lot of work for such a small piece of fruit.

During this drive, we were able to stop at a small roadside stand, rather like a souvenir shop, and buy some interesting items to bring home.  The long drive also gave all of us the chance to chat and get caught up a bit, as we really had been pretty busy in the days leading up to the wedding.

We arrived at our hotel, the Gran Hotel Sula, around 4:45 pm. Here's a picture of it from outside --

-- and from the park across the street.

Our room looked like this --

(BTW, the three pictures above are NOT mine -- I found them on other places on the web!!  For some reason, almost all of the room shots I took are no longer on my memory card -- weird.)

These pictures below ARE mine!!  This is a view from our balcony to the park directly across the street.

Here's the local municipal building.  I like the sculpture of the bird on the building just above the clock. Why the clock says almost 9:00 is a mystery -- obviously, it would've been too dark to take these pictures at that time of night!!

A beautiful church towards the end of the block.

And you can ALWAYS feel at home if there's a McDonald's nearby!!  (And NO, we did NOT go there to eat, in case you're wondering -- but I suspect that even there, your burger might come with a side of refried beans, tortillas, or fried plantains!!)

Sunset over the mountains surrounding San Pedro Sula.

Around 6:30 or so, we all loaded back into the LandCruiser and headed off to a local steakhouse that Allan knew of.

Outside the restaurant was a pond full of turtles -- Mackenzie found this fascinating!

And as we waited to be served, we got a view of this critter on the outside of the window!

The place looked pretty much like any American steakhouse you might find, and was even decorated with cobwebs and scary stuff for Halloween already!

Last photos of family --  my sister Trish and her husband Allan.....

......my dad and mom......

..... Mackenzie and me.....

....and "Cousin" Bob!!  I'm not sure I've even written about Bob this week.  He's a friend of the Sowers family; I'm not even sure how they all met originally, and interestingly enough, his last name is also Sowers!  Even though there seems to be no family connection that any of them can find, they've decided to jokingly nickname him "Cousin Bob"!!  So that's pretty much how we referred to him during the week!

The area we were sitting in was all eating area; I realized later that outside the eating area, under a pavilion, was another eating area, the grill where the steaks were cooked and a bar.

I wandered outside for a few minutes to get pictures and watch our dinner being cooked!

A view of the bar....

...the entrance/exit to the restaurant, and the display case on the right with the yummy-looking desserts!!

And Mackenzie posing with the cow!

By the time we got back to the hotel, it was pretty late, and Mackenzie was DEFINITELY not feeling well, so there are no photos from the evening, except for this..... (Kenzie's favorite stuffed animals!!).....

Then she crashed, sound asleep, while I stayed up entirely too late and watched the first of the rescues of the Chilean miners!  While I couldn't find any broadcasts in English, it didn't really matter -- the relief on the faces of the rescued miners, the pride of their co-workers and the joy of the families were things easily understood, no matter what language barrier there might be!

And then off to sleep for a long day of travel the next morning.......

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