Honduras Travels

One morning, after our tortillas and beans, José stood, removed his straw cowboy hat and looked out of the doorway of his earth-floor hut towards the hills.

“I saw the haruca in the forest last night,” he said. I glanced across at his wife, Maria, but she wasn’t smiling. She stayed near to the wood fire on the hearth, rigid and silent. “Walking through the trees,” he added.

Atlántida has one main highway that is the primary transportation and economic corridor along the north coast; this highway runs from east to west and transects the entire length of the department. South of the highway, after the piñeras (pineapple plantations) and African palm plantations, the land climbs up into the mountains that run like a spine along the north coast of the country.