A Comedy of Errors.

So with another three hours to go before my night bus leaves, I figured I would bring things completely uptodate with a story of the wonders of Central American transportation.

After leaving Honduras I caught the bus to San Pedro Sula, and after waiting around for about an hour grabbed the connection to Copan. Upon arriving to Copan, I found out that the normal shuttle that runs at 5:30am to Guatemala City was no longer going at that time, but only at noon. Unfortunately, that didn't work since I had to catch a noon connection, and the shuttle ride takes about 5 hours. Of course, the only other option was to take the 6:00am shuttle with Plus Travel Guate, as previously stated the worst travel agency in Central America. I took my chances, booked my ticket, and after dinner and a beer called it a night.

The next morning came bright and early, and I was waiting outside at 5:50am, as per my instructions from the agency. When 6:15am rolled around, I wasn't surprised that they still weren't there. At 6:30am, I knew there was no point in worrying about it because there was nothing I could do anyways, but I was not happy. The shuttle finally pulled up at 6:45am, before taking another 15 minutes to pick people up. No worries though, because I should still be able to make it in time for the noon bus, if only just in time. Or so I thought... About halfway through the ride, we got a flat tire, and had to pull over to change it. Fair enough. Then we stopped at a tire place to get a new spare. Again, fair enough. But then we stopped at the bank so the driver could take care of some personal finances. And then we stopped at the gas station for a 10 minute break, as if we hadn't gotten enough of them at that point. When we finally rolled into Guatemala City, it was about 12:30pm, and my hopes of the noon bus were long gone. No problem though, because another company had two afternoon buses at 1:30pm and 3:00pm, and with a 6 hour ride to Tapachula from Guatemala, I would still have plenty of time to catch my 10:45pm connection onwards to Mazunte...

After a taxi ride to the bus station that cost me almost as much as my 5 hour shuttle from Copan, I arrived at the Galgos station only to find out that the bus was at 2:00pm, and not 1:30pm as stated on the website. No sweat. Although I wasn't thrilled with the 200 peso ticket cost, the alternative was staying in Guatemala City overnight in order to save ten bucks with another bus company, but lose a day of travel. I cut my loses and bought the ticket. 2:00pm rolled around and we still weren't boarding. 2:30pm brought no such luck either. Finally, at 3:00pm, we were all on the bus and slowly rolling out of the station, only to hit rush hour traffic on the central drag. Great.

Although the bus company quoted the journey as 6 hour, it ended up taking 7 hours, mostly due to bad weather and traffic, which is really no fault of the company. Again, no sweat, because even at 7 hours I would have a comfortable 45 minute cushion to buy my next ticket and hop on a new bus. We crossed the border, where the money changers tried to screw me with the exchange rate. Officially you should get 1.53 pesos to the quetzal, but they wanted to give me 1.40. No way. I decided I would rather risk not being able to change over $100 worth of Guatemalan quetzales than to get played by the sleazy border dwellers. After realizing they weren't going to rob me that easily, one guy finally offered me 1.50, which I knew I wouldn't get any better than, and had already set as the point at which I would agree to change my money. We worked out how much I had and what it translated into pesos, and made the swap. I made sure to count my money, and sure enough, I had been short-changed 100 pesos (just under $10). Apparently they figured that they could win by giving me a better rate but not giving me all the money they owed me... He played dumb when I told him I was missing 100 pesos, and so he took it back and counted it again. This time, he recounted and got to the right number, but I was onto his tricks, and kept my eyes on him as he slyly pulled a quick change and pulled out another bill from my stack. I called him out on it, and this time he made the mistake of passing me his calculator - I now had a bargaining chip. I counted it out real slow to him, as if he were the idiot that I was being taken for, and he finally handed me another 100 peso bill in exchange for his calculator. Another changer had lent a woman with a baby from my bus some change to pay the exit fee, and she only had American dollars, so she asked if I could pay him in pesos and she would change money with me (because she knew I had the right rates). I paid the guy and later realized that he screwed her on the exchange rate (and subsequently me since I paid him), but I nonetheless felt more vindicated than normal with my border crossing experience. I hate borders.

After the border it was a short 10 minute bus ride into Tapachula, and we pulled into the station at about 10:10pm. I found the ticket counter and asked for the 10:45pm bus, to which the lady said something about 11:10pm. OK, so the bus just changed departure by about 30 minutes, no biggie. Then she said that there was another bus the next day at 10:45pm. I was a bit confused, and asked her if I could leave on tonight's bus, to which she replied it had already left. Obviously seeing my confusion this time, she pointed to the clock and said ¨11:10pm¨. I had not taken the time zone change into effect when planning my elaborate host of bus connections. Perfect... Tired and wanting a shower and tv, I found a hotel that wasn't a dump for 200 pesos, and called it a night after some dinner and flipping back and forth between Fast & Furious in english and The Departed in spanish.

I woke up late, had breakfast, bought my ticket and checked my backpack, and headed to the town center. There, I met a crazy english-speaking local guy that went from mean-looking to really friendly (although in an eccentric crackhead way) when I told him I was Canadian and not American. After a nice little chat where I tried to stay talking while also figuring out if this was a scheme where one of his friends was trying to pickpocket me, I shook him in a very friendly manner, and walked around the market for awhile. There I walked through the butcher section, with every imaginable animal part lying around. While I normally don't consider myself a squeemish person, but when I saw a set of two whole skinned cows' heads looking at me, I decided it was time to get out of there before I lost my lunch...

I visited the archaeology museum, spent some time updating the blog, bought some supplies for the 10 hour night bus ride, and then walked back to the bus station where I am now across the street killing time. My only consolation is that at this time tomorrow I will be sipping on an ice-cold Corona, watching the surf crash down onto the beach of Mazunte. Life is tough.