Central America – 6 Countries in 6 Weeks
Why We Chose Central America
For the past two summers, I have been apart of a medical mission in Honduras. This amazing country has become apart of me and I always wanted to explore it and Central America more. Around Christmas time last year, Brett and I were discussing going on a big backpacking trip. With the summer being the only time off school, it would have to be then. Since I was already going to Honduras in June 2018, we thought why not fly into Panama and travel north to Honduras! This way we would get to experience the several countries on route and save money on flights since I would already be flying to Honduras anyways. And with this started a time limited backpacking trip through six different countries:
Panama – Costa Rica – Nicaragua – El Salvador – Guatemala – Honduras
6 Countries in 6 Weeks??
On May 5, 2018, Brett and I landed in Panama City both prepared and unprepared for a crazy backpacking adventure through Central America. We had a tight schedule, as we needed to be in San Pedro Sula, Honduras by June 16th for Brett to fly home and me to start my medical mission.
Over our travels, we ran into hundreds of other backpackers. As usual, details about each other’s trips were always the main conversation topic. When Brett and I would tell people how far we are travelling in just 6 short weeks everyone always reacted the same way – surprised and filled with questions. “Can you see everything in that short of time?” or “Don’t you feel rushed?”
The answer was always the same – No, we are passing by a lot of places we’d like to explore and yes, we feel very rushed. Being students, our summer is short but it is also the only time to travel and explore. Having a crazy travel bug, both of us wanted to see as much of the world as possible in a short amount of time. This meant budgeting our time and only spending about one week in each country.
We did quite well staying on schedule but both of us knew that if we wanted to stay a few days longer somewhere, it would not be difficult to hop on an overnight bus and get to where we needed to be on time.
Brief Overview
Though we budgeted our time for about one week in each country, we stayed less in some and more in others. Here is the amount of time we ended up spending in each country:
- Panama: May 5th – May 12th (8 days)
- Costa Rica: May 13th – May 18th (6 days)
- Nicaragua: May 19th – May 26th (8 days)
- El Salvador: May 27th – May 31st (5 days)
- Guatemala: June 1st – June 10th (10 days)
- Honduras: June 11th – June 16th (5 days)
Overall…
Looking back at our trip, 6 weeks to backpack through 6 countries is manageable and can definitely be done. If you are short on time but still want to see as much as possible, you can! Just be sure to have a detailed plan! Though plans can (AND SHOULD) be changed along the way, it is good to have some sort of idea about where you are going and how much time you have less. For example, if we stayed somewhere an extra day or two, it meant less time somewhere else.
On the other hand, if you have extra time, I would encourage everyone to spend MUCH longer in each country. There were certain cities we stayed 3 nights in but could have easily stayed there for 3 months!
Though this type of travelling is not for everyone, we had a blast! We only had a certain amount of time but now we have a list of “Must Return To” places for future travels. I am grateful to have been able to travel with my best friend and experience the less developed world the best way someone can – by being completely immersed in it.
