Guides to La Paz

Two days is enough to see the departmental capital properly and still get one full day in the coffee mountains. Here is the hour-by-hour version, with rooms from about $22 a night.

Seven days is the right length for this department: three bases, four day trips, and two full days that need no plan at all. Expect to spend $45 to $70 a day for two people, rooms included.

Three days in La Paz department on $30 to $40 a day per person, rooms included. It is not deprivation travel here; it is simply what things cost.

Same three days, roughly $90 to $120 a day per person. The room still lands under $50; the upgrade is a private driver, a proper coffee farm day, and never queuing for a minibus.

Two and a half hours of switchbacks buys you Honduras at 1,300 metres and the country's most famous coffee town. Buses are $3 to $4 each way; beans are $5 to $8 a pound at source.

Honduras former capital sits 20 minutes from your La Paz hotel, and the minibus costs under a dollar. Budget $8 for the whole day, or $30 with a guide and a long lunch.

One of the most important archaeological sites in the Americas sits above a valley three hours from your hotel, and almost nobody visits. Here is how to actually get there, for $60 to $130 with a driver.

The biggest natural lake in Honduras is two to two and a half hours north of La Paz on the CA-5. Fried tilapia costs $8 to $10, waterfall entry is a few dollars, and the bird list runs past 400 species.

Two hours of climbing takes you from valley heat to a Lenca town near 2,000 metres with cloud forest above it. Bring a jacket, cash and a driver, because buses run once a day if at all.

La Paz department gives you three realistic bases and almost nothing over $50 a night. Here is how to pick between the departmental capital, coffee-country Marcala, and colonial Comayagua next door.

The dry months from November to April are the safe bet, and coffee harvest overlaps them from late November to February. Here is what each season actually costs you in rain, heat and hotel prices under $50.

Mototaxis cost under $1, the bus to Comayagua is about $0.75, and Marcala is two and a half hours away by highland road. A practical guide to moving around La Paz department without a rental car.

A day in La Paz department costs a careful traveller about $30 to $45 all in, including a room under $50. Here is what things really cost, where to get cash, and when to tip.

La Paz department is one of the calmer corners of Honduras, and most trouble here is traffic, water and bad timing rather than crime. Nine practical habits, plus what a $0.60 mototaxi ride buys you after dark.

Eleven dishes worth ordering in La Paz department, from a $1 baleada to Lenca ticucos and a plato típico that lands at $4. What each one is, when it appears, and what it should cost.

Four markets worth your morning across La Paz department, where $5 buys a bag of produce and $10 buys a pound of Marcala coffee. Go before 9am, bring small notes.

In La Paz department $10 is not a budget, it is two people eating well. Here is how to fill a whole day on $8, from a $1 baleada breakfast to a $4 comedor lunch.

You can fill three full days in and around La Paz department without paying an entry fee once — here are 14 free things worth your time, from the cathedral steps in La Paz town to the coffee mills of Marcala.

La Paz is a mountain department town of roughly 20,000 people, not a party city — expect three or four decent options, a 10pm dinner cutoff, and beers at $1.50. Here is an honest map of what is worth your evening.

At 14 degrees north the sun drops fast — you get about 25 usable minutes. Here are seven places in and around La Paz to spend them, from a free hillside road above town to the coffee ridges above Marcala.