Antonio Blanco Rodriguez -Tony R.I.P. 1965-2009

My best friend and brother Antonio Blanco [Tony] got murdered in El Salvador last Friday 11th September 2009. I'm still in shock. He got shot seven times on the chest by 3 people when he was driving his motorbike on his way home.
El Salvador Police (PNC) is investigating. they said that the incident occurred in the village of San Antonio Abad of Los Indios, in the jurisdiction of Maple City-Ciudad Arce, 40 miles west of San Salvador.

He wasn’t only my friend, he was my brother.
I spoke with him the very same morning as he was visiting Spain for a few weeks and also coming to see me in Madrid this very Wednesday he did send me this photo. Probably the last photo of him

Antonio Blanco Rodriguez R.I.P. 1965-2009

Toni was a very special person, unique, one in a million and he also literally saved my life years ago. We lived loads of intense experiences together since our teenage days on the 80s.. So many memories.....
He was a single parent and leaves a 4 year old beautiful girl called 'Maya Blanco'.

But nobody dies if you keep his memory alive. And I will make sure this is gonna happen.

Love you mate and will never forget you, because to me you are not gone.

R.I.P. brother

We have created a group for Antonio Blanco Rodriguez [Tony] in Facebook [See link below]. This is an open group for everyone to share memories and keep his flame alive. If you have photos or you crossed paths with him in the past, please share your story with us all.
Thank you.

Antonio Blanco Facebook group

Hemos creado un grupo en Facebook [Link arriba] para que todas aquellas personas que tuvimos la suerte de conocer a Antonio Blanco Rodriguez [Tony] podamos compartir aniversarios, memorias, anecdotas o fotos y así de ahora en adelante mantener siempre su memoria viva.
Gracias

Here is a video I recorded with Tony in our skyjet trip in rio Dulce Guatemala on the way to Belize in August 2006.

Antonio Blanco Rodriguez&Pedro Vila in Izabal Lake [Rio Dulce]

Antonio Blanco Rodriguez&Pedro Vila in Izabal Lake [Rio Dulce]


If you want to read more about Toni click on the link on the right in Labels


link news english:

http://www.barcelonareporter.com/index.php?/news/comments/spanish_citizen_antonio_blanco_rodriguez_43_shot_dead_in_el_salvador/

Link Noticia en Español:

http://www.lavanguardia.es/sucesos/noticias/20090913/53784663627/asesinan-a-un-ciudadano-espanol-en-el-salvador.html

Honduras and Guatemala photos

Anonas , delicious but strange fruit






Honduras Bay Islands





Nadia



Jeremy


Triunfo De La Cruz Honduras

lol

This is The End...

I had such a great time.

The trip didn’t disappoint me a bit. It did have all the perfect ingredients for a holiday.

I am also very glad things are still the same with my friend, like they used to be.
Nothing has changed.
Next year hopefully we will go somewhere else, maybe Colombia, Nicaragua and Panama perhaps.

This time I really hope we dont have to wait another 10 years to see each other, brother.

Ace.

Now the Doors are open again.

.

Apologies for spelling mistakes and the language barrier. I did my best, believe me. And also thanks to my friend from Holland Yvo [Furry Happy Monster] for spell check assistance.

This blog about my trip is dedicated to all the people I' ve meet during this days, who have no Internet access, and probably will never see this site.

Pedro Vila

Some Photos

San Salvador City Center

I would chop my hand already







Pedro Vila

'La Colocha' Ranch-Zapotitan-El Salvador



Antonio Blanco Rodriguez [Tony] ranch 'La Colocha' near Ciudad Arce





Volcano





Yummie!

My friend needed a quick operation on his elbow, so I decided to wait for him in the nearest 'Mall' in San Salvador city center. It was funny because I never go to this sort of places here in Spain, but there you go. The place was huge, apparently they are the bigger ones in Central America.

While I was waiting for my friend in the Mall, while he was operated, I had a few nice Cocktails.

And Im not telling you about the woman in El Salvador!

Antonio Blanco Rodriguez [Tony] came about 6 pm. He was great and the operation went OK. We celebrated it with some more booze, and a huge cigar.

There was no Jeep anymore, but Tony had other vehicles.

This

and this


Cheeky Bugger

' La Colocha' Ranch near ciudad Arce. Tony's employees.

La Colocha Ciudad Arce Tony's Ranch

My friend Antonio Blanco Rodriguez [Tony] wanted to show me his ranch. Something he has put lots of effort and energy into.

Like everything he does really.

It’s called 'La Colocha' which means curly hair, like his girlfriend Ana has. It was located in a place called 'Zapotitan' in 'La Libertad' Department.

It was right in the middle of the jungle.

So we took the Mini and drove to my friend's ranch.
When the Mini couldn’t go further, we rang my mate’s employee Manuel and he picked up us with a Toyota 'pick up' and then he gave us a lift to the ranch.

On the way to the ranch. Locals

Tony's Dogs

My friend’s dogs are 'Golden Retrievers'. He has two. He bought them in Colombia. They got mad with the goose or ducks whatever it was. The dogs did have fun while we tried to stop them, I guess the ducks didn't.

Zapotitán El Salvador

I forgot my mosquito repellent [Remember, over here Repellent it does makes the difference!], so when the sun was gone they almost annihilated me!

Antonio Blanco Rodriguez [Tony] is working on his ranch, he planted Palm trees and all sorts of other tropical plants. One day it will be finished.

We went to the river near the ranch. There was some fishermen with nets trying to catch some fish. I was told the task could take a few minutes or perhaps all day. They wouldn’t stop until they got some fish. It was their food for the day.

River fisherman

We saw this woman doing the laundry in the river. Lots of people do that. Some people cant afford washing machines in El Salvador.

The water in 'Congo' river looked so clean!.

Sonsonate-Salinitas, El Salvador

Mayan Sculpture

Salinitas Beach-El Salvador

Wanna swap jobs?

Honduras an exciting trip with my best friend Antonio Blanco Rodriguez

My friend Antonio Blanco Rodriguez lives in El Salvador. I went to visit him in 2006. We traveled all over central America. We also visited Guatemala and Honduras.

Here are some of the photos I took

Kids repair the wholes on the road for some change

Avin' a Break

The poor fucker above was on sale. They do soups with Lizards over here. Apparently they are very good for you!

Mountains on the way to La Ceiba



On the way to la Ceiba we thought it was time of a break. My brother suggested some proper shower, good food&drinks and take a well deserved rest. I Didn't argue with him.

Antonio Blanco Rodriguez [Tony]

We booked a couple of nights in 'Quinta Real Hotel’ in La Ceiba.

Tony on full display of Mediterranean sex-appeal.


Honduras Bay Islands were waiting for us!

The Garifunas a little history

The last night I was in 'Triunfo de La Cruz' I chatted over few nice Coronas with this old Garifuna fella. He was a sort of Social Assistant worker.
He was employed by the government.

He was encharged of an education project for the Garifunas.

Triunfo Beach

I was interested in the Garifuna culture so I kept asking him questions.

He was telling me how concerned he was about the imminent loss of identity of the Garifuna community. The same old story.

The youngsters leave and go to the big cities abroad, in this case the USA, so they lose their own language and tradition. The local Garifuna youngsters don’t work anymore because they receive little amounts of giros from their relatives in the US. They dont have their traditional crafts or the delicious Yuca bread anymore.
The Garifuna were traditionally catholic but our old man was commenting about the increase of new churches in town, Jehová witnesses, baptists etc.... they were brought in from North America too.

My friend Antonio Blanco Rodriguez lives in El Salvador

Tony playing with the kids

There are plans already to build a big resort in the area. That will probably be the end of the Fisherman Garifuna Culture?

I really hope not...

Girls and Jeremy-Garifuna Kids

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garífuna

Triunfo de la Cruz. Honduras part 2

We stayed at 'Hotel Colon', some bungalows placed few yards from the sea, owned by an old Garifuna fella called 'Margarito'. [Or at least we call him like this] :-D

The bungalows were decent and clean. And it was extremely cheap, everything was cheap. You could even hear the waves at night. It was very relaxing.

Bahia local lager was excellent so was Port Royal!

There weren’t many people at the Margaritos bar on the beach. Just a Dutch girl who worked for a Theatre company and was relaxing few days, and a German hippie couple. Those were the only foreign people we could find in the whole area.The German guy was very angry at Iberia [Spanish airlines] because they had lost all their luggage. I spoke a bit with him and shared a couple of spliffs, he recommended me to go and visit some Honduras Islands, Roatan, Utila and Guanaja. We did that a couple of days later.

I spoke with a black guy who told me there was a live theatre comedy they were rehearsing that night in the social community center. Tony&me, the Dutch girl and the German couple we were all invited.

Antonio Blanco Rodriguez Tony finally enjoyed his Seadoo ride in Honduras too.

We went to the theatre rehearsal in the late afternoon. It was in the Garifuna language, so we didn’t understand a bloody thing.

But it was fun, they were doing African chants and dancing all the time. It looked to me like a love story between two guys and a young girl. There were about 30 or 40 kids and young teens around. They seemed to have a very good time laughing non stop. Soon I realized we were the only whiteys around.

I meet also Jeremy. I felt sorry about him as he had a kind of disease on his skin feet . But he didn’t seemed bothered. He wanted me to take pictures of him, so he could see them on the camera afterwards and have a good laugh.

Jeremy's friends were there too.

We stayed a couple of nights there, but there wasn’t much else to do than relax and relax, so we decided it was time to move.

The places the German guy told me about sounded very good.

I was looking for ' the beach' and I knew things could get even better.

My Garifuna friend turned up with his brother and his grandad.

He was the coal supplier in town.

I gave him my Pretzl head lamp I use normally when I climbed mountains. He was so pleased with it. He told me how useful it would be for him on dark nights when he had to supply the coal.

Although it had 3 small batteries and I was unsure if he would ever be able to affort to buy some.

Bit later, the kid asked me for a soda, so did his brother Genar which seemed 1 or 2 years older than him. At this time of the night, shouldn't be kids on bed? I thought, it was over midnight.

I think it was time for a crab hunt contest.

Erzun's Grandad

I offered the sodas [Refresco] and some crisps who brought the bigger crab. Them wee little fuckers normally come to the beach at night. It was full moon and just when they left to hunt the little creatures, it started to rain heavily again.
It was the rainy season [May to November], so you expect the odd heavy but brief rain.
There was thunder and lightning too.

I felt guilty about the kids, but 5 minutes later they turned up with the crabs! The lightning helped them.

I think we have two winners, innit?

Genar and Erzun wanted me to take a photo of them in the watercraft, but there was not enough light, so they asked me when we were leaving, and I told them early in the morning.

And guess what, next morning about 6 am....There were the kids!

We had to go. It was a fantastic time where I enjoyed a lot the place and also had the opportunity to meet and hear, for the first time, a new and very interesting culture for me.

It was a very poor place, there is no money in 'Triunfo de La Cruz' at all, but I felt so safe all the time and people were honest and extremly friendly.

I really hope they manage to survive in this strange times we have to live.

Goodbye Erzun, goodbye Genar..... goodbye Garifunas....