My name is Levison Wood.
Woo!
'In 2014, I walked the Nile.'
Take care.
'And in 2015, I walked the Himalayas.
'Now I'm about to trek between two continents on what could be
'my toughest journey yet.'
You don't get that if you rub sticks together.
My plan is to walk from the point where Europeans first made landfall
in Mexico all the way to Colombia,
along the length of Central America.
My route will take me through eight countries, across volcanic planes,
drug-smuggling routes and cloud forests - but before I can cross into
South America, I'll have to make it through one of the last
great wildernesses on Earth -
the lawless jungle of the Darien Gap.
'I'll take four million steps over remote, unpredictable...'
I've never seen anything quite like this before.
'..and beautiful landscapes.'
I can see everything.
This is absolutely incredible.
Whoa!
'I'll see Central America through the eyes of the people that live here.'
Bullet holes.
Dangerous business, being a pastor around these parts, isn't it?
'So far, I've witnessed an ancient civilisation...'
It's unbelievable.
'..and walked into narco territory.'
On alert at the moment.
'Now I'm crossing tropical shores...'
Absolutely stunning.
'..into the deadliest city in Central America...'
I can see the bullet holes.
'..to try and reach...'
I'm coming.
'..the halfway point in our journey.'
I'm walking the Americas with my Mexican friend and guide, Alberto.
After four weeks, we've covered 500 miles and made it through
El Peten, one of the wildest regions in Guatemala.
But we're not safe yet.
What's been going on there?
Looks like somebody has been practising their accuracy.
You see these holes are huge.
They must be big bullets.
Sounds like a very safe place, eh?
Looks like!
So much people carrying guns everywhere.
It's like the Wild West.
'We arrive in Rio Dulce.
'Once known as Las Fronteras,
'it still feels like a frontier town today.'
Literally, one of the first shops we've come across is a gun shop.
You can find anything here, eh.
It's a busy place, isn't it?
It's a love hotel.
The auto hotel
is a very particular place.
You pay per hour.
The first hour is one price and the second hour is less and less and
less, depends how much time you spend in this little rooms.
You've never been in one of those?
No, I haven't.
I definitely haven't. What, erm...
You seem to know a lot about these!
No!
'Today, we're leaving Wild West territory behind
'to enter a very different Guatemala.'
Down there is Rio Dulce, the "sweet river".
From here, we're following this river
back towards the Caribbean.
Over the next 400 miles,
we'll enjoy Guatemala's Afro-Caribbean culture
before reaching country number four, Honduras.
We must then cross a mountain range to reach the infamous San Pedro Sula,
the most dangerous city in Central America,
before stepping into lush landscapes that lead to country number five,
Nicaragua, and the halfway point in our journey.
A day on from Rio Dulce and we're in Livingstone.
This laid-back town is home to 5,000 Garifuna people,
descendants of African slaves,
shipwrecked in the Caribbean 400 years ago.
What's up, guys? Hi, there. How are doing? You all right?
Chilling, man. Good. Are you well?
Good, man. Welcome to Livingstone. Thank you.
Everything cool. Nice to meet you.
What's your name? My name is Lev.
My name is Aston. And you guys?
'They have their own religion, music and even language.'
How do I say "hello" in Garifuna?
Ida bina? Ida bina? Ida bina, numada?
Are you sure? Yeah, I'm sure, man. Those ladies are laughing.
Yeah, man! That's what it is!
I'm not sure I believe you.
You could tell me anything. Yeah, man.
HE SINGS IN GARIFUNA
Follow me, man.
'Aston says that even on a Sunday night, there's a party in town.'
Amazing. Well done. Yeah, man.
'A few hours later, we hit a local bar.'
Hello.
'The last time I saw something even close to this
'was when I was walking the Nile.'
Incredible.
I thought it was a horn, but it's actually a conch shell.
And the other guy over there is playing the turtle shells.
I feel as though I've been transported out of Central America
right back into Africa.
'This is a Garifuna birthday party
'and they've kindly invited us to stay.'
How are you doing?
Divan? Good to meet you, Divan.
My name is Lev.
This is Alberto.
How old are you?
ALBERTO ASKS HIM IN SPANISH
15. Huh? 15?
Happy birthday.
It's a tradition, every time you are 15 years old,
like a big celebration.
In Mexico we do the same, but just with women.
'For Garifuna boys like Divan, turning 15 means becoming a man.'
And now birthday boy is sat in the middle of the dance floor
and all the girls are giving him a private dance.
He seems transfixed.
As you would be.
This definitely did not happen at my 15th birthday!
'This traditional Garifuna dance is called the "punta".'
'It's said to liberate the mind and the soul.'
'And get the party started.'
I'm not sure I could twerk.
Yeah, you can do it. No.
I haven't got the rhythm.
'The next day, we're the first to hit the beach.'
Wow, look at that boat.
Wow!
It's not one, it's two.
'Exotic coastlines like this are what draw millions of tourists
'to the Caribbean.
'But there's a dark side to this part of Guatemala.'
Just two days ago, a massive shipment of cocaine was discovered
on a luxury yacht.
This is where a lot of the drugs get dropped off,
either in private aeroplanes
or speedboats, and then picked up and that's how drugs get imported from
Latin America all the way up to the USA and beyond.
So, it's in these little sort of pirate coves
that the international drugs business is conducted.
And this is the route we're taking right now.
Buenas tardes.
DOG WHINES
'A day later and we're five miles from Honduras,
'the most dangerous country on our journey.
The closer we get to Honduras, the more stories we hear about violence.
You know, all the bad stuff that you hear about Central America.
I don't know, I still feel a little bit nervous about it.
'Honduras is Central America's poorest country.
'Five coups in the last 60 years have weakened the government.
'Even at this major border crossing,
'there's little sign of the authorities.'
What do you think of the place?
It's like a ghost border.
This is the border. It's one of the quietest borders I've ever seen.
There's just nobody around.
Everything's overgrown.
But, welcome to Honduras.
'Despite its bad reputation,
'our first experience of Honduras is of stunning beauty.'
It's quite nice to just get off into the villages
and actually into the hills.
There is some pretty epic hills up ahead.
'Rising to 2,500 metres, these are the Merendon mountains.'
We've got about 20 miles of some quite thick jungle to get to
one of Honduras' biggest cities, San Pedro Sula.
There is a trail that goes through it. It's quite difficult to know
where the trail is, so we've enlisted some help.
Got these two young, local lads.
We've got Jose and we've got Darling. That's his name.
Hello, Jose.
Hola. Hola.
And Darling. Hola.
That is a great name, isn't it?
'Darling and Jose are brothers.
'When they're not acting mountain guides, they earn a buck or two
'by fishing and waiting in restaurants.'
MUSIC BLARING FROM RADIO
That was a little off-road tuk-tuk.
'Honduras' tropical climate and steep fertile hills are perfect for
'growing bananas and sugar cane - but a nightmare for walking.'
It's quite nice being able to get a nice view like this,
but when you finally get a view, what that means is you can actually see
how far we've still got left to go.
And, as you can see from here, there is another one, two, three,
maybe four ridges we've got to get over.
'It's already taken us five hours to crest the first peak,
'but these hills are full of surprises.'
Wow! This is a super cool river!
'Our little oasis is clearly a popular watering hole.'
Can I see?
Carrying a pistol around on a horse.
It's pretty Wild West around here.
ALBERTO ASKS IN SPANISH
They're off to a party apparently,
and, obviously, he's packing his Smith & Wesson pistol just in case.
I mean, it goes to show, it all looks very peaceful, but in this part of
the world, it seems pretty normal to walk around with a gun.
'After four hours' hard trekking, we're miles up in the hills.
'We could hardly be more remote,
'when we stumble into someone's back yard.'
Buenas tardes, senora.
Buenas tardes.
Do you sell anything? Do you have a shop here? La tienda? No?
She is offering some bananas.
Yeah, that'd be great.
Passion fruit?
Gracias.
What's your name?
Wow!
She's the mum of the guys on the horses. Oh, yeah, we saw them.
Do you ever a go that way, to San Pedro Sula?
Are you scared when your family and your sons go over there?
Gracias.
Adios.
Gracias.
'Maria's fears about San Pedro Sula are well founded.
'It's one of the most violent cities in the world,
'but Alberto and I are heading straight for it.'
I'm walking the length of Central America with my friend, Alberto.
We've crossed the Merendon mountains and are now entering the most
dangerous city on our journey.
So, we've arrived in San Pedro Sula, we're just on the outskirts now.
And despite all of the scare stories that I've heard,
it seems all right.
But within this city are pockets of extreme violence, where two gangs,
MS-13 and Barrio 18,
do battle over the multibillion-dollar drugs trade.
Citizens must pay them extortion money, called war tax,
or else face death.
In the last five years,
over 5,000 people have been murdered in this city alone.
Every property has, like, their own extreme protection,
you know? Electric fences, these sharp wires around the walls.
It's like a lot of little jails.
It's 5:30, it's going to be dark in the next half an hour or so.
I think the first thing we need to do, before we...
get into the centre of this place, is just to find somewhere to stay.
Getting into town is the easy bit.
Tomorrow, we'll face a much tougher challenge.
San Pedro Sula's crimewave dates back to the '90s,
when the US began deporting Honduran criminals back here.
They brought a brutal gang culture with them
and now control large areas of the city known as barrios.
The most notorious, Rivera Hernandez,
is directly on our route.
This is where a lot of the killings, the murders happen.
Some real horror stories come out of this place.
I'll be honest, I've got no idea what to expect.
Rivera Hernandez is home to the savage MS-13 and Barrio 18 gangs.
To make it through, we need the help of a local.
We're going to go and meet a guy called Daniel,
who's a local pastor. He's a community leader.
So he knows the gangs, he knows the police,
he's kind of an intermediary. If anyone can keep us safe, he can.
Daniel says the safest place to meet him is outside the barrio,
at a kids' playground.
It's the only child's park I've seen under full armed guard.
He turns up right on time.
Nice to meet you, how are you doing? All right?
Daniel grew up in Rivera Hernandez.
He has now dedicated his life to turning its fortunes around.
It's earned him the respect of the gangs here.
He's in contact with the gang leaders who are in prison.
He's just on the phone now,
organising a safe passage so we can get through.
I'm a bit nervous, because I don't think I've ever walked through
a proper gangland before.
I've been to some pretty dodgy places in the past,
but if you look at the statistics, this is definitely up there.
MS-13 graffiti marks the entrance to the barrio.
We are now in gangland territory.
It's safe for locals to be on the streets.
But we have to watch our every step.
Who is, like, checking that nobody is crossing this area?
Now we are crossing the sort of invisible frontier to Barrio 18,
which is another gang.
They are fighting, they are killing each other.
There is no border, it is just one neighbourhood into the next.
This is the border, here? Si.
Who are these guys that are stopped in a car, just behind you?
Are they, like, watching us, or what?
Right, that's a relief.
Just 100 metres divides these two warring gangs.
Three lookouts guard Barrio 18's border.
Thankfully, Daniel knows them.
Is it dangerous to be this close to the frontier?
You're not allowed to go on that side, you have to stay here?
The law on the street is simple -
step on enemy turf and you'll be killed.
What would happen if we walked into this neighbourhood without you?
If we just walked in on our own?
Pleasant(!)
Half a block down the road, we come across a casa loca.
You can see the bullet holes.
There has obviously been a shoot-out or maybe even a murder.
And inside, it is full of the "18", which is the name of the gang,
all over the walls.
This is actually one of the places that people are tortured and killed.
The place is completely trashed, as you can see.
So...God knows what's happened in here before.
The BLEEP?
That is BLEEP.
For some unbeknown reason, there's a dog that's been hung
on a piece of string.
Maybe...
just a warning, I guess.
Who knows? It's...it's sick.
This is a scary place.
It's getting dark. We should probably start
thinking about moving out, shouldn't we?
If we keep going this way, in just under a mile,
we should be able to get out of the barrio.
We've got to kind of take it slowly, say hello to everyone.
This is where Daniel lives, so he's got to be very careful.
The little kid?
How are you doing?
Hello. What's your name?
Jose?
Are we OK to walk through here?
Do you see any bad people around here? What do you have to do?
Mmm.
Let's keep on moving, I think.
Gracias. Mucho gusto.
Adios.
It takes us three hours to get out of the barrio.
Daniel's got us through unscathed,
but even he is not immune to the dangers round here.
A bullet hole.
It's his car. It's Daniel's car.
He's been shot. Who shot you?
He doesn't know.
Hmm. Dangerous business,
being a pastor around these parts, isn't it?!
THEY LAUGH
It's not like your average, you know, Surrey vicar job, is it?
Well, thanks for everything, Daniel. Muchas gracias. You've kept us safe.
Si, gracias. Thank you very much.
Good luck with your work, as well.
The next day, Alberto and I are back on the road at first light.
We've left San Pedro Sula behind and we're out beyond the suburbs.
Some nice, rolling hills.
Life seems to be back to normal.
Hola!
"We walk this every day."
And they come back from school,
and they are already exhausted!
I would be a very bad student if I was living here.
I would never go to school!
There is a bit of a crowd forming and some yellow police tape.
So I'm not sure what's going on.
It looks like...
Well, I thought we'd left the horror of the city behind,
but it looks like there's literally a dead body just there.
The body's covered by a jacket.
We've walked into a murder scene.
And the mother of the deceased is already here.
I'm very sorry for your loss.
What is your name?
So, this is your son?
And what happened, do you know?
What was his name?
Do you know who killed him?
So, this is one of the most brutal and horrific things I've ever seen.
Looking around, there are kids...
ladies, people are just taking photos.
This is part of everyday life here in Honduras.
Yeah. I'm pretty speechless, to be honest.
It's tough, huh?
It's super-tough.
Not just to see the body there,
just to hear the story of the mother.
Must be very sad for her.
I think I've seen enough.
Time to move on.
I'm walking the length of Central America.
1,800 miles.
Across eight countries.
Under the car.
OK.
'I'm with my friend Alberto in the highlands of central Honduras.'
We've come slightly off the beaten track.
It's like a little haven of beauty.
Over the next 200 miles,
we will climb up to the volcanic fields surrounding the magnificent
Lake Yojoa, and stepthrough Honduras' lush agricultural heartland
before reaching country number five, Nicaragua.
And the halfway point in our journey.
We're 700 metres up in Santa Barbara National Park.
This mountain range was formed
by volcanic eruptions 120 million years ago.
And the jewel in its crown is Lake Yojoa.
It teems with tilapia fish and the area's rich soils are near-perfect
for growing coffee and fruit.
What's your name, my friend?
Guato. Enrique Jose. You've got very good English.
Yeah. Have you spent time in the States?
Ah, very nice. When was that? How long have you been back for?
You got deported? How did you get there? You went over the wall?
They catched me and then they gave me deportation in 2000 and I go back
in the same year, 2000.
Did the Coyotes take you?
Yeah. Was it expensive?
Right now, yeah. How much does it cost?
How much did it take? 10,000 bucks.
$10,000? $10,000.
My wife, she lives in Dakota.
Rapid City, you know. Yeah. Rapid City, South Dakota.
She's a Native American.
A Native American?
So you can't go back? I have to wait ten years.
Ten years? So you're not going to see your wife?
How are you going to...? What are you going to do? No choice.
I don't want to go back over there illegal again.
What would you say to the people who want to leave?
Don't go in there.
Don't go, because you need to pay for everything in there.
Right here you we've got guayabas, we can eat guayabas in here!
Over there you need to pay for one guayaba.
Enrique is one of 20,000 Hondurans deported from the USA every year.
Many find work as campesinos,
farm hands who make up nearly half of this country's workforce.
They sell their goods anywhere they can.
And where does it come from? In the jungle?
Have you? A weird fruit.
It smells like an orange.
That's a nice colour, eh?
Sincuyas can help cure fevers.
Whilst the local fruit is good for you,
the same can't be said of these roads.
I'm not surprised. It's bloody noisy.
ALBERTO SINGS
Hopefully.
THEY SPEAK SPANISH
We are now heading into the least populated region of Honduras.
It's so peaceful and quiet.
There's just these pristine pine forests.
There's nobody else around apart from a few cows over there.
I've never seen a cow like that before.
They have eyes like...
They have skin like tigers.
Can you see?
It looks like a cow had sex with a tiger and that was the result.
I never saw a cow like that before in my life.
Alberto, he's been absolutely brilliant.
I know that if I wake up in a foul mood,
Alberto will always be there to cheer me up.
How are you doing, Alberto?
Every muscle on my legs are sore.
He's just got a sense of humour that makes life on the road that much more
pleasant and tolerable.
The only way to kill the pain is... walking.
Keep walking.
I mean, I wouldn't be able to do this journey without Alberto.
So, faced with a bit of a problem.
We've come across this dam and we're trying to get over it because it
seems that there
is no other way to get across this river.
Down there there's a steep gorge,
vertical cliffs on both sides.
There is a security guard on the other side.
Alberto, can you shout the guy?
Hey!
This is in fact El Coyolar dam.
It's the only one in the region and we are pretty much trespassing.
OK, these guy are letting us through.
There is no key.
I hope this doesn't come loose.
Are you learning the army?
Whoof! I have to say,
I'm glad that I'm not having to go down into that river
cos there's no way we would get across that.
Despite the downfall,
we have no choice but to spend our last night out here in the wild.
So, it's ten to five and we have about an hour left of light and we need
to find somewhere to stay so I think we're going to try and just camp
somewhere at the side of the road.
'We find a riverside clearing to pitch our hammocks.'
One between here and there.
Like a dream holiday home(!)
'Next step, start a fire.
'But the ground is damp and nothing will catch.'
I can't believe we didn't bring any papers to burn.
Stupid.
'Years of Army training should help me out here,
'but nothing seems to be working.'
Put it down there then and burn it.
Yes, well done.
All right.
Alberto wins again.
'I'm walking the length of Central America with my friend Alberto.
'We're in southern Honduras,
'approaching the border with our fifth country, Nicaragua.'
This is it.
This is the last town before we get to Nicaragua.
And I've had a mixed feelings about Honduras, I guess.
Seen some horrendous stuff but at the same time seen absolute beauty
and incredible hospitality along the way,
so I think I'm going to leave with very fond memories.
So, this is it. We're leaving Honduras now.
Nicaragua, here we come.
Look, almost three kilometres
of trailers parked and just waiting to cross.
This lorry tailback doesn't bode well.
The Nicaraguan government has long taken a close interest
in foreigners entering the country.
So we've just crossed over the border into Nicaragua.
They basically confiscated our cameras
and went through all the bags, searched everything
and it's taken almost three hours to get through that.
Nicaragua has had a very brutal civil war and I suppose the legacy
of that lives on in the paranoia
and suspicion of any foreigners in particular.
It's strange to think that until 1990
this stunning country was in the midst of a violent revolution.
Left-wing rebels called Sandinistas fought a brutal dictatorship.
In some places the scars of war still show.
This is Esteli town centre.
It's absolutely incredible to think that what is now
a buzzing, vibrant market town was, you know,
35 years ago the scene of some absolutely horrendous fighting.
The Sandinistas fought the bloodiest battles
of the revolution in Esteli.
Just a handful of them still live here
and I've come to meet one of them, Pedro Pablo.
That's you, is it? So, why...
why did you decide to join the Sandinistas?
'At the start of the revolution,
'Pedro was one of just 38 insurgents here.
'Soon, other guerrillas joined them
'and Esteli became a rebel stronghold.'
So, was all this area destroyed during fighting?
'The Army bombed Esteli more than any other town in Nicaragua
'but never defeated it.
'The Sandinistas' vicious resistance
'helped them win the war and come to power.'
Do you feel proud to have fought the revolution?
Pedro, thank you for sharing your experiences.
It has been fascinating.
I feel incredibly humbled to have listened
to Pedro Pablo's story.
He feels proud to have served with the Sandinistas and to have won
and to have contributed to the revolution.
From Esteli, our route takes us high into the mountains.
So far,
my first impressions of Nicaragua are that it's got friendly people,
beautiful landscapes, incredible views
and some absolutely bastard hills.
We've been told about a very special place
and this steep path should lead us there.
I wasn't expecting to find elephants
in Central America but here's one.
Very weird, isn't it? It's like the petroglyphs and carvings
you find in pre-Hispanic civilisations
but this is actually all new.
Legend has it an artist came here to mend a broken heart.
Over 40 years he's carved more than 300 images into this rock face
with little more than a stone hammer and a chisel.
Here we go. There's a camel here.
So in 1,000 years' time when the world has been destroyed
and humans recolonise the Americas they are going to find elephants,
they're going to find camels.
And a chopper. Helicopter. They'll find a helicopter. Helicopter.
They really won't know what happened here.
There's going to be a lot of very confused anthropologists.
We pick up the pace
as we're heading for a major milestone in our journey.
And the closer we get the more dramatic the Americas become.
You can see just how volcanic the landscape's becoming.
We've got these enormous hills just rising out of the plane.
It's like being in the Shire.
Next time they want to film Lord of the Rings, forget New Zealand.
Come to Nicaragua.
Hola, Senor.
So, you can't actually see it yet
but just on the far side of the lake,
down there at the bottom of the valley
is the capital Managua and this,
standing right here at the top of this mountain,
I'm at exactly the halfway point.
How does that make you feel, Alberto?
Half-point? This is the halfway point.
You didn't tell me that.
We've done 900 miles.
That's like 1,500 kilometres.
What? Wow!
Three more countries left to go.
High five.
Let's go.
'Next time...'
Whoa! That was close!
'..Nicaragua goes wild...'
The monkey whisperer, that's what they call me.
'..volcanoes...'
Check this out!
I hope it doesn't go off right now.
'..Central America's migrant crisis...'
Honestly, I... Now you're stuck here. ..stay here to die.
It's truly harrowing.
'..and the highest peak on our journey.'
Come on, Alberto.
Whoo! That is spectacular.
Subtitles by Ericsson