Going To Copán?
Going to Copán? (You
should... it's one of the best sites.) There are two ways to get there. The more popular
route is to fly into San Pedro Sula in the Honduras, and rent a car or take a bus to
Copán (which is almost right on the border with Guatemala). The other way (which few
people do) is to fly to Guatemala City and rent a car, and drive halfway across Guatemala
on Highways CA9 and CA10, crossing the border into Honduras at El Florido. We choose the
second method (mainly because the flights into San Pedro Sula did not fit into our
schedule). On the day we crossed the border we were the only Americans to do so, and when
we returned two days later, our paperwork was still on the top of the stack pinned to the
Customs wall.
It was quite an experience to rent a car in a foreign country, drive
halfway across that country, and cross the border into a different country. Looking back
on it, it was a lot more audacious a stunt than I would normally have attempted, though at
the time it seemed perfectly reasonable. Luckily, we encountered no problems. I was
thankful, however, that we paid the extra money to upgrade the rent-a-car to a big Chevy
Suburban. The vehicle's size and expense helped us bully our way through the traffic in
Guatemala City, and garnered us respect from the locals that we met in the roads and
towns. The ruggedness of the Suburban also made it easier to travel the unpaved 50
kilometers of road near the border crossing, especially when it came to fording the half
dozen streams that the road crosses on it's way. (We crossed during the height of the dry
season, which meant that the streams weren't too deep.)