(Sunday Dinner with Vice President and Mrs Santos)

May 8, 2007: Candles make your room hot.

You wouldn’t think that a few candles perceptibly increase the temperature of your room, especially when the “windows” have no glass (only screens), and there is a breeze. But sure enough, I come back to my room here in Copan and it’s definitely warmer.

There’s also the issue of the stray “bat” fluttering around in my room. I actually think he is an exceptionally large moth, but he’s so big that as I opened my computer a moment ago, I was worried that he would fly towards the light.

Anyway, I need to catch up. Although I have no internet, I’ll write a blog entry in Word and post it when I next have internet.

So the last I wrote covered Saturday and Roatan. On Sunday morning (May 6, 2007), as I woke up, I didn’t feel all that great. I actually woke up before the sun for bathroom purposes, and decided to stay up until sunrise for the photos. As I walked to our pier, the enormous dogs that guard the place came bounding across the lawn, mean-looking, and running full speed while barking. I thought for sure I was going to get attacked. I crouched down and talked softly… and thankfully, I think the biggest dog was as afraid of me as I was of him. He stopped about 30 feet away, and just barked. Finally, Corinne (resort owner) came out and dragged him away.

I went and sat out on the pier as the sun came up. Nothing spectacular, but a rare event for me, and beautiful just for what it was: a sunrise in paradise.

I went back to bed, and awoke after breakfast. I ate a little, then we jumped on the boat and headed back to civilization. We had a few drinks with our friend at the dock, and then jumped in the bus for our 45 minute ride to the very little airport.

From there the rest of the afternoon was a hell of flights. We flew first to La Ceiba – which was NOT on our itinerary, then over to San Pedro Sula. At each stop the air-conditioning on the plane did not work. It was hot as hell, only mitigated by the oversize tube they would stick in the door that blew cool air into the 2-propeller plane. Weird.

So from San Pedro Sula we finally flew to Tegucigalpa (or Tegus as it’s called.) Tegus is a big, dirty, bustling, gang-filled city. Not somewhere with a lot of redeeming qualities, to be honest. After landing (in the middle of an air show, oddly), we shot off to the Intercontinental, which is a very nice hotel. (It’s still Honduras, though, and check-in on the “special” floor of the best-of-the-best hotel still took an hour.)

Once checked in we zoomed off to our dinner with the Vice President, Mr Elvin Santos, and his wonderful wife Becky. The dinner was everything I could have asked for: very candid discussions of politics; historical discussions of the problems of Central America and how they are being addressed; discussions about Becky’s malnutrition recover center; and generally the most interesting political discussions I can remember … talking with someone who is in the position to know, to make a difference, to understand.

A few of the most disturbing points were hearing how much jeopardy his life would be if he chose to pursue the presidency, and also how the average Honduran mother begins motherhood at age 14. Wow… the -average- girl is pregnant at 14 years- of age. Astounding.

From there we headed back to the hotel, to drink the bar to the closing while a few guys smoked cigars indoors. Again, strange, but no big deal here. Outside the hotel, a downpour brought thunder and lightning to the city, while we comfortably chatted about everything.

So what’s the best thing to do on your second SCUBA dive? Of course, it’s to find a 6 foot shark, and pet him.

On our first full day in Honduras the non-certified divers (me, Stacie and Ed) awoke early for our “pool” course. Of course, our pool was the 80 degree plus Caribbean waters of a private island, complete with a pirate fort with gun housings still intact. So we got trained a bit on breathing underwater, and got down around 15 feet under. The water was murky, but it’s still cool to be weightless.

We returned to the resort (only a few minutes boat ride in little passageways between the dangerous coral reefs) and had french toast breakfast, the jumped back in the boat for our first official dive. Everyone was in the boat this time, and we moored to a little bouy at one of our divemaster’s favorite spots. For the first time, I rolled backwards off the edge of the boat (a bit unsettling, I have to admit), slowly sank down to 15 feet, and waited for everyone to gather. Then we just cruised around for the next 47 minutes, seeing a never ending coral reef filled with life. There’s no way to describe it Read the rest of this entry »

Wendy, Chris and I are sitting here in Roatan, and this is our view. I’d write more, but it’s time to go have another drink…

(Sat 6:21 pm)

This is the first time I’ve ever written a blog update via oil-lamp light. In fact, I don’t know if I ever even used an oil-lamp before, but out here, when the generator is off that’s all we’ve got.

E-Ticket Forum arrived around 8 pm at the fantastically beautiful Royal Playa Roatan. The journey was not so simple, though.

We started in LAX and made our way to El Salvador. From there it was 40 minutes by jet to San Pedro Sula, Honduras. And from there … lots of waiting … and finally getting on an earlier flight. I’ve slept maybe 3 or 4 hours since Wednesday.

The flight was small … maybe 30 people on a 2-prop plane (a Fairchild F-27, if you’re curious. I wonder how old this plane was? It looked vintage 1960’s). Our first glimpse of the island gave us a hint of the incredible diving I expect tomorrow, but also of how small this island is.

We successfully re-met with Stacie at the airport, and headed straight for ziplining. This was supposedly the largest zipline area in the Americas – which seems unlikely – but nevertheless it was a ton of fun. Jumping off a cliff and flying, hung only by a cable, hundreds of yards at a time way over the jungle… beauty and adrenaline, all at once. It was great… lots of hot-dogging and fun.

We also met Pancho. Pancho was an adorable (and very friendly – domesticated I think) spider monkey. He immediately climbed right on top of my head, and when people went to leave he hugged their legs as if to stop them from going.

From ziplining it was another 20-30 minute drive up to the “docks.” We ate at a restaurant bar (I use the term lightly) out over the water. The bathroom was literally a raised platform, with a large trough leading straight out to the water below. But the food and local rum were great, and the character of a man that runs the place was straight out of a book … no one could’ve written a better character.

Matt, the owner of our Resort, told us to put anything we didn’t want to get wet onto the first boat, which left immediately. After our late late lunch (yes, it was past sunset by the time we finished), we jumped on Matt’s other boat and headed to the resort. (It’s not reachable by car, but only be a 30 minute or so boat trip.) However, the wind had come up quite a bit, and the boat ride was more like a trip to Disneyland than your typical “ferry.” Up and down the swells we went, as Stacie and Meschi and I sat in the bow, looking straight down the boat as it went up up up, then not knowing how hard it would slam down, and getting constantly splashed in the process.

We arrived to a pirate’s cove, complete with an island where tons of buried gold was found in the 1950’s, where there are two 1600-era pirate forts that suffered battle damage … where there’s a palapa over the water where we can eat or have our drinks. Arrival was heaven, made all the more so by how much effort it took to get here. (While it was only 20 hours or so, it seemed like days.)

So I’ve just finished a great dinner of fish, and the group is still debating EO topics while I headed back to the room to download photos and get to sleep. I’m beat…

Tomorrow we awake around 6:30 for SCUBA intro lessons. Wish me luck with my ears; they’ve been the problem in the past.

— Post 1 of a weeklong series from the Entrepreneurs’ Organization Forum E-Ticket Annual Retreat —

We’ve arrived in Honduras from LAX via El Salvador. The final leg of our journey was delayed, so we’ve been waiting impatiently. After a breakfast of beer and pizza at 9 (2 flights after we started) … talking on skype … figuring out how to use iChat to video conference my office … texting the beautiful Erica in Hong Kong … and just general time-killing activities, it looks like we’ll be headed for Roatan shortly.

Of course, all this follows the unspeakable (and I mean that literally and figuratively) of the knife-edge decision of whether I was going to even make it on this trip. At one point, I was staying, and I pulled my luggage off of the baggage loader… only to have a change of direction, and to put my luggage ON the loader because I was going. (Of course, it was then 2 minutes past the cut-off, and they almost didn’t accept it, nearly sending me BACK to staying here …) But I’m here, I’ve made it, and I’m in good contact with those who needed me in contact. The world still spins.

The guys (in which I’m including Stacie) don’t know it yet, but we’re about to go ziplining in a few minutes… I don’t think I’ve ever done it “in the wild,” so I’m looking forward to it. More later tonight from our resort.

So … another year older. All of a sudden I’ve reached an age where I can’t even fake it… I’m just not young anymore.

It’s been a fun week, though. Mark & Mark took me to dinner on Friday at one of my favorite places, Christakis (Greek food). And Sunday was breakfast with Mom and Jack followed by kayaking Newport’s Back Bay. (Very easy to do, very affordable… I never knew that was there to do before … and there’s even kayak’s you basically peddle!) At our BBQ dinner that night I got to have my newphew Branson sleep on my chest for 30 or 40 minutes… what a great feeling.

So yesterday (my real bday, May 1) was lots of great phone calls and emails, and dinner out by my pool with 12 or so great friends. (I have to admit, though, there was a disappointing and notable DNA — did not acknowledge — list of people, including a close relative and a longtime “best friend”)

Today was consulting, and I was once very well cared for … great people …

And tomorrow… Honduras for a week. So … stay tuned for the “Jasontopia Honduras Travel Blog” … coming soon (Friday) to a screen near you.