We camped out on the beach and did not a see a soul for most of the next day.
Later in the afternoon, 2 young guys came riding up on horses. We started talking and it turns out that one guy was from Belize (and spoke english) and the other dude was Garifun from the village just up the road. We shared some beers and became instant friends.
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We had seen the movie “The Mosquito Coast” with Harrison Ford a few years ago that described this very remote undeveloped area of the northern Honduran coastline. We forgot all about it until we saw the name again in our Honduras guidebook. The Moskito Coastis described as the least developed area in all of Central America. With minimal roads, no services, and no tourist infrastructure. It sounded right up our alley.
We heard about a 4×4 trail that hugs the coastline out to a small Miskito village named “Pueblo Nuevo”. They said it was rough going, lots of beach/sand driving, river crossings, and no support out their if something was to go wrong. SOLD!
Winding through the hills towards the coastline
ATM disaster dodged, Corrupt cops deflected. What else could go wrong!?
We are climbing through the mountain passes of Honduras and I can tell the 4Runner is losing power. Not exactly sure what is going on I do what any proud Toyota owner would do and simply ignore it. Hell… She still runs don’t she?
Eventually we are coming through a construction zone near the top of a pass and I lose all momentum/power. The truck basically cuts out. The accelerator pedal pins flat to the floor and doesn’t come back up.
We are smackdab in the middle of the construction zone. Huge dumptrucks and bulldozers battle it out with the mountainside all around us. It is at least 95F, hot, dusty, and LOUD.
We are stuck blocking the 1-lane of the passable highway with gigantic buses and semi-trucks all honking and trying to squeeze around us.
I jump out of the truck and pop the hood. Chaos everywhere. Tons of dust, huge loud tractors, people honking like crazy at us. I check the throttle cable and its all screwed up, sagging from the throttle body like a limp noodle.
I try to jerry rig it quickly. No go, It wont retract. Something is jamming. I pull out my tools and take it apart in the middle of the highway with people passing everywhere.
No wonder it wont retract… Line is frayed and jamming inside the throttle cable housing.
Stocked up, fueled up, and ready for adventure! We hit the road to the Moskito coast.
The directions we had were shaky at best and we ended up taking a wrong turn into a small sketchy neighborhood. Before I got a chance to turn around we found ourselves smack in the middle of a police-checkpoint in this barrio.
The checkpoint was manned by 6 young fellas. They see us coming and pull me over. Young guy asks me the usual paperwork questions and then says he needs to search my truck… OK. We haven’t been asked to search our truck yet in Honduras so I thought it a bit odd.
Then he asks me to get out of the truck. Again odd, I haven’t been asked to get out in quite some time either.
So I get out and he puts me up against the truck and gives me a crappy cursory pat-down. The first pat-down I have received since leaving the U.S. Obviously he wasn’t looking very hard since he doesn’t notice I have a damn buck knife in my pocket. He starts asking me if I have drugs, where we are from, did we come here to buy drugs. We are conversing in spanish, I am telling him… No we are just lost, we are tourists bla bla blah.
He continues to search the truck, I roll down the rear-window, he opens the cooler and comes back around to the front of the truck. He then tells me “Having a cooler full of beer during Semana Santa is illegal…”
I say… Por Que? (Why?) and he says because the police say so…
So from this point on we know this guy is trying to take us for a bribe and we mentally shift gears.
As sick as it sounds… We have been preparing for this moment now for so long we are almost excited to get a chance to have a go at some corrupt cops. The game is a-foot!
He rechecks all of our papers and tells us our vehicle import papers are only good for Guatemala (which is bullshit. Why would Honduran immigration give me an vehicle import document for Guatemala?) so I call him out on that in spanish. Surprised by our confidence. He moves on.
Then he says I need a front plate. I explain to him you do not need one in the United States and they do not issue you a front Honduran plate at the border, in spanish. He moves on again.
He starts saying I have drugs in the car, since I am from California and Californias love drugs! (I see our reputation precedes us…) I tell him we do not have any in spanish. He moves on.
The cop just keeps coming up random crap hoping we cave and just offer him cash. I keep calling him on his B.S. in spanish. He is almost smiling at this point, unable to keep the con alive and remain serious.
Eventually he just straight up starts asking for a bribe/regalo (gift). That is when we start playing the fool and immediately forget all the spanish we know….
Everything he asks now is met with a “no entiendo” (I dont understand)
He asks Lauren something, she replies “No entiendo”
We go back and forth for 10 more minutes with him asking me for a regalo and me saying “no entiendo” and talking to him about random nonsense in rapid fire english which really confuses him.
He keeps saying in frustration “You don’t understand my language!?”. Guess he forgot about the 1st half of our conversation that took place entirely in spanish…
Eventually he calls his buddy over who just tells him to knock it off. Young Cop #2 takes our paperwork from Young Cop #1 hands it to me and tells us to get going.
Home on the Highway-1 Honduran Corrupt Cop-0
While every case dealing with the police is different…we have found, as have most others, if you play along with the cop long enough, waste their time, or just downright confuse them. You can get out of most bribery incidents without paying a nickel.
NOTE: This was our first bribe attempt in over 5 months of travel and 20,000+ miles covered. The majority of police/military we have encountered have been friendly and helpful.
PS: He never did ask about our reflective triangles, fire extinguisher, or reflective tape!!!
We packed up our stuff from the “Omega Tours” in Pico Bonito and headed to town to stock up on supplies, gas, and cash. We were planning to drive out to the remote “Miskito Coast” and needed to be prepared for anything. Visit Richardsons Smoke House for the best food and drinks. Foodie wants different foods with tasty recipes.
We load up the grocery cart with tons of food, water, beer etc. Hit the register and try to pay with our debit card. Lady tells me its not working for some reason… OK, try this one? Still not working… Great. OK Let me go pull some cash from the ATM.
