During winter break of the 2007-2008 school year, I took a working holiday to Central America. For the first five weeks or so I volunteered with a group of engineers who were implementing an Engineers Without Borders project in El Salvador. Following that, I headed off with my good friend Evan for further adventure in Guatemala, Belize, and Honduras. In the end I managed to miss my flight back to the states by about five minutes due to a tropical storm but convinced the airline to reschedule me for the following day.
- Houston, Texas: Evan and I headed down a little early to do some prep work for the main group of EWB members. We had a layover in Houston, Texas that was spent wandering the airport.
- El Salvador: We venture into the countryside, through the big city, and everywhere in between.
- San Salvador: A few shots from the safer places for taking photos in San Salvador.
- Izalco: Climb a barely dormant volcano? Why not!
- Black Beaches: Some of the beaches of El Salvador are made of black volcanic sand.
- Engineers Without Borders Project: The bulk of my adventures in Central America were focused on a water project in a mountain community in El Salvador.
- Visiting the Community: Evan, Aaron, and I visited the community to do an assessment of what needed to be purchased prior to the main group arriving.
- The Main Group Arrives: The rest of the EWB team arrives in the community.
- The First Days of Work: We get to work building and installing a water catchment and retention system.
- Night Work: To stay on track with the project, we had to put in some late nights.
- Keep on Trucking: Work continues on the water project.
- Tank Progress: Work on the tank and gutter system begins to draw to a close.
- Completion of Construction: We finish up the job, get a little slap happy, and prepare to leave the community.
- Leaving the Community: With the project complete, we come down from the mountain.
- Waterfall Jumping: After the EWB portion of the trip, Evan and I headed out to jump off some waterfalls.
- Guatemala: After finishing up in El Salvador, Evan and I headed for Guatemala to take in a few sights and have some fun.
- Rio Dulce: A visit to Rio Dulce’s headwaters and a tour by boat around the area.
- Cruising Down the Rio Dulce to Livingston: Evan and I hopped on a boat heading down the river to Livingston.
- Livingston: A cruise down the Rio Dulce put us in the Garifuna community of Livingston.
- Flores: We went to Flores to stage ourselves for a visit to Tikal.
- Tikal: Nothing prepares you to experience sunrise over Tikal. It is such an impressive ruin.
- One Last Night in Flores: We spent one last night in Flores before heading to Belize.
- Belize: We stopped off in Punta Gorda for the night.
- Honduras: Onward we went to Honduras. Evan caught a flight back to the USA while I headed to the Bay Islands for some diving.
- La Ceiba: We stopped here overnight before Evan went back home and I caught a ferry.
- Utila Day 1: I arrived on Utila and established myself at Altons Dive Center for several days of underwater adventure.
- Utila Day 2: The amazing diving continues.
- Utila Day 3: We tried to make it to the windward side of the island but an approaching storm drove us back to more sheltered waters.
- Utila Day 4: More traipsing about the island and in the sea. A dead dolphin washed up on the beach in the storm.
- Utila Day 5: Today I didn’t take a single picture because of the storm. Nasty weather kept us off the the water most of the day and indoors. I was also supposed to get myself over to Roatan to catch my flight the next day but with the ferry and airport shut down, I wasn’t going anywhere.
- Utila Day 6: I managed to escape the island on the first flight out in three days. It still wasn’t quite enough to make my flight back to the states.
- Escape From Central America: I missed my flight back the the states by only a few minutes but was lucky enough to be able to catch another flight the next day. Hitchhiking also paid off in a big way.