Frontera Corozal to Comitan – 15th Nov 2016 (Tuesday)

We began what can only really be described as an epic day of travelling. Epic is an overused word, and I use it here knowing that. But it really was a big day.

We started by getting up really early, knowing that we had a lot of miles to cover, but not really knowing how to cover the ground. We actually didn’t really know how to get our of the village. Oscar our taxi driver had been so efficient that it felt like we’d just arrived.

So we walked to the end of the town, the edge of Frontera Corozal, hoping to catch a combi (this is a type of minibus service between major towns).

Our final goal was to get to Corozal or San Cristobal.

The first mode of transport we managed to find, was a tuk-tuk. Basically a covered motorbike that is noisy, and slightly cosy for two with our bags. But it was all we can find, in the rain at before 8am in a dead end town.

Our other option according to the map and the locals was to walk 5km in the rain, before 8am.

It was probably the right choice, but we did give share a few concerned looks a few km in. I suppose it was fun, bit it was bumpy and a bit damp.

Also our driver seemed a bit stoned.

He dropped us at the highway, and then we waited in the shelter of a ‘corner’ shop in the rain for a few minutes until quite unexpectedly a combi turned up.

We hadn’t got a combi before, so we just asked for San Cristobal, they nodded and we jumped in. I didn’t quite know what to expect, but I don’t think that I expected to get kicked out at Benemerito, about 1 and a half hours after getting in. This first section of the road was long, straight and well maintained.

Turns out, each combi does a small section of the long border road, and then you wait a few minutes for the next one to turn up for the next ~2hour section. It makes sense and it works really well, well it did on this day. It’s also pretty reasonably priced, at less than £10 a section.

Benemerito is a true border town, lots of shops and lots of cars and people. We waited as instructed for next bus, and it arrived within minutes. We jumped busses and travelled further west and north towards our destination.

This bus was busy. Sebastian was our driver for this section and he spoke good English. The road began to deteriorate rapidly as we left Benemerito. As the bus emptied out along the road, we moved up to front of the combi to chat to him – he was very interesting and had worked as a chef in America.

We asked him about getting into America, and as Trump had just been voted into power we asked him about what he thought. He said that the Mexicans didn’t care. Wall?? Who cares. Not the Mexicans.

Sebastian dropped us at as a crossroads with a parrot/macaw sanctuary. We were tempted to visit, but since we had no idea how much further we had to go we decided that we should go on.

We had seen a few Macaw’s flying along the road, flying about, and we had also seen a lot of palm oil plantations, Sebastian had stopped so that we could take a look at some of the plants which were on the side of the road after harvest.

Sadly our time with Sebastian came to an end.

We wait for a few minutes and the van arrives for the next leg. The first van we get into was pretty empty, I guess pretty normal in the middle of nowhere.

We jumped in, with one other man. But only a few hundred meters along the road, the van stopped. He driver turned in his seat, and started asking us something. We couldn’t understand.

Luckily the man in the van with us translated, more or less. It became clear that that the van driver wanted to tell us how much the journey was going to be, and insisted that we showed him that we had enough money to pay that.

We did, but we were worried that he was trying to scope out if we had a lot of cash on us. We told the translator passenger that we had enough cash, and he told the driver. It seemed to keep him happy.

Our journey began again, but we had a bad feeling that this driver was a bit of an idiot.

We were right. As we headed into a very hilly area, the mountain roads became steep and windy. The views were incredible, the driving was terrifying.

We stuck with this guy for a while, but after checking the map and the road signs we decided to take a risk, and get out of the van. We were about 50km from our destination at the Laguna/Lagos Miramar.

We were both in a rather bad mood.

The Lagos was pretty, but nothing very special. There was a few shops in little huts, they were quiet though, and looked like they were closing up for the winter. They did have a toilet though, and Eddie made everyone laugh with her Spanish.

Hasta LewAgo.

We then got a final minibus (despite the idiot driver’s assertions that we’d not get one at this hour). This one took us into Comitan without any more issues, and it was much more relaxing.

We decided then that we had quite enough combi busses for the day, so we got into a collectivo (a big communal taxi) into town from the bus station.

These final few kilometers into the centre of Comitan were fantastic. Steep hills, colourful buildings and a beautiful evening light. We loved it so much that we forgot to get off. Oooops.

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We went back the other way to get back into the town centre. At 16 pesos (25p) each per trip it was definitely worth it.

We finally got off the bus at the town square and we found a hotel which had a room. It wasn’t very nice, off a central square and it smelt a bit bleachy.

To me that was okay, but Eddie has the nose of a bloodhound, and found it repulsive. I was very tired, having not eaten much to avoid any accidents on the journey, so I was wiped out.