'Funnest Day Ever!'

 First of all, yes, I know that funnest is not grammatically correct.  I, however, do not pretend that my child is smarter than he really is on my blog.  Caden has been begging for a month to ride a horse.  As we were leaving the ruins our guide said there was a man at the entrance who would let him ride his horse.  Well, he apparently was not there that day so Tom started talking to a taxi driver about finding another arrangement (Caden was beyond excited at this point) .  It is important to note that sometimes my husband has conversations in Spanish that I do not understand and he does not translate for me.  I walked away to buy some souvenirs (Connor apparently followed me without my knowledge and a few minutes later a woman brought him to me-close call) and as soon as I was done Tom was putting the boys into one of these small taxis. The taxi driver was taking us to someone with horses.  We get to a small field with horses, they bring one out for Caden to ride (her name is Princesa) and as far as I am concerned this is turning out lovely.  Conversations continue in Spanish and the next thing I know Tom says we are going to walk behind the horse to some cemetery.  Ok, I am not going to let some random stranger take my 4-year-old on a horse through a small town in a third world country.  So we start walking.  One problem: it is Connor's nap time and he is already exhausted from walking around the ruins (plus we will find out in a few hours that he is sick) so he has to be carried.  Who is generally his choice to carry him? Mom.  We keep walking and walking through the run-down residential areas of Copan.  Have I mentioned that it is at least 90 degrees outside? 



We kind of got ripped off and paid a lot of money for this impromptu horseback ride but I would have been content with ten minutes in that little field.  Oh no, we are apparently going to get our money's worth.  We finally arrive at the blessed cemetery (there is a picture below).  I thought the taxi was going to pick us up here.  Nope, now we have to walk back!  Added bonus: our guide takes us through what can only be described as the 'red light district' of Copan.  Our children are now completely dehydrated, hungry, and tired (except Caden who was been comfortably riding atop Princesa).  I am exhausted! (Have I mentioned that Tom and I have been doing 'Insanity' for the past few weeks-my muscles just hurt).  The good news:  Caden had the time of his life and called this the 'funnest day ever!'  Do you know how ridiculous we must have looked?  I cannot begin to imagine what all of these Hondurans were thinking when they looked out their humble dwellings and saw a horse with a kid on it and his American parents walking behind it while sweating profusely.

 "Why do my parents do this to me?"  -Poor Connor

It was a very colorful cemetery. 

 This was our fun little taxi.  Caden had such a hard time understanding why it did not have doors.  Our driver took us to a restaurant after our fun walk.  It was a pretty good restaurant but we were all dehydrated so we did not eat much.  There were some little boys selling us little dolls (I bought three)  so we offered them our leftover food.  As we drove away and I watched those little boys devouring that food I committed myself to someday fight for hungry children.  Malnutrition is such a big problem in this country and it literally breaks my heart. 

We went back to the hotel and finished our day with some much needed cooling off in the pool.  There is a really cool bird sanctuary in Copan that we wanted to see and were hoping to go to the following day but Connor developed a fever that night and I got very anxious to get him home.  As we were driving home we got stopped because a semi-truck rolled and blocked the entire road (there is only one road) so we were forced to sit and wait for 2 1/2 hours.  Luckily, they don't really enforce traffic laws here so I held Connor on my lap for the entire trip.  It was definitely a trip to remember!