Adventures in Tela , botanical garden

On the Sunday, I took a taxi to the Botanical Garden. This is situated down a 2 km track from the main road about 4km out of Tela. This was a research centre into Bananas established in the 1920s for looking at new varieties and avoiding disease. The founder of the site also had the vision to establish other plants so there are many species of trees from all over the tropics. I had a guide Anna and it was a chance to practice my Spanish.


We had a very pleasant conversation walking around the grounds. There are many highly toxic trees there. There is one tree whose fruit contains cyanide when it is closed but is safe to eat and apparently popular in Jamaica when open (or the other way round as my spanish is not that good). Anyway the wife of the founder, ate a fruit and sadly died. She is buried in the grounds. A sobering thought that even the experts are not always right. I think I will pass on the next fungus foray!

After my tour, I then spent a pleasant time wandering around the grounds. I finished at 10.30 in plenty of time to get back to my hotel to check out and then to get a taxi to the bus station for 12.00.

By 10.50, no taxi had turned up, indeed there had not been any other visitor. I recalled that I had only seen two other groups while walking the grounds. Very peacful but clearly not the most popular place. So I went up the office and asked for the telephone number of a taxi firm as I was getting concerned. I was told to wait, there would be a taxi. I was not sure if they made a call. At about 11.10 I heard a car coming and as it came round the corner I could see that it was white which is the colour of taxis in Tela. But as it drove past, I could see that it was not a taxi. I waited a little longer and was about to set off walking when a 4x4 came by coming from within the grounds. I tentatively stuck out a thumb. It stopped. I said A Tela?. He said 20 Lempiras. I said Si. With great relief I got into the back seat which had a broken window that had been covered with brown plastic.

We set out along the track. I was doing the sums for the times in my head and thought that it would be alright. Suddenly an animal slightly larger than the size of a badger scuttled across the road. The guys in the front looked excited and produced a pistol and aimed at the animal. They stopped where it had ran across the road hoping to see it with pistol aimed.

At this point I realised that I was sitting in the back of a car and there were pistols being brandished in the front. I also remembered in the risk assessment that Charlotte gave when I arrived that hitchhiking was a definite no-no. Ooops I thought. Maybe not so OK. But all was alright. The car moved on and breathed a sigh of relief when we reached the main road.

Charlotte gave me a severe look when I got back to Copan.


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