When the time came to continue our trip through Central America onwards from El Salvador to Honduras, rather than crossing the main border at El Amatillo, we decided to go via the El Poy Border to western Honduras. That proved a fairly quick and straightforward procedure.
Several chicken buses (bus #112) depart daily from the Terminal de Oriental (coordinates: 13.7023, -89.1731) in San Salvador and go directly to El Poy Border. As we started from El Tunco Beach and had to take two additional buses and a taxi to get there, we only made it to the station quite late in the morning.
The bus was about to depart. The ticket cost us $2.50 per person, which may have included a luggage fee. The trip lasted a bit less than three hours and featured a few close heart attacks upon marginal overtakes. Vendors hopped aboard at every opportunity, selling a great variety of edible and potable stuff, and often jumped back down while the bus was again in motion at speeds I would personally rather avoid attempting.
It dropped us off at a little lot some 500 meters from the border. The crossing was also fast and easy. On the Honduran side was the first time they asked us for a Covid vaccination certificate in the region, although they made do with only seeing the QR code on the screen without actually scanning it.
Only a couple of money changers hung around; fewer than on most border crossings in Central America. We got quite a decent rate from one of them, but only after some bargaining.
Normally, there should be a local bus commuting between the border and the closest town of Ocotepeque. But eventually, after having waited for perhaps a whole hour, we figured out that that wasn’t the case on Sundays. So we had to take a taxi for 80 lempiras, which we couldn’t even share with other passengers as nobody was crossing without their own vehicle.
From Ocotepeque, buses go directly to San Pedro Sula or Santa Rosa on the way, whence you can catch a bus to Gracias or the Copan Ruins. But in our case, as it was already quite late, we stayed for the night.
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Accommodation and Activities in Honduras
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