37 Best Places to Shop in Honduras

Local residents send travelers straight to Don Ángel's workshop for masterfully carved woodwork. He makes custom pieces with advance notice, and he sells bowls, canoes, and centerpieces at the central market. Ask your hotel to put you in touch.

The name means "our strength" in Garífuna. A hodgepodge of the coastal culture's woodcarvings, seashell and cocao earrings, maracas, drums, and oil paintings fill the small shop next to the Fortaleza de Santa Barbara visitor's office.

The lively Barrios Cristales neighborhood hosts the native Garífuna communities well known for their dances, food, and traditions. A broad selection of Garífuna artisan items and fun souvenirs is available at Artesma. While you’re in the area, stop by the beach to learn dances and maybe get your hair braided.

A group of local artisans sell their wares in the pink-and-purple building next to the Cocopando Hotel y Restaurante. The shop offers Lenca pottery, woven-bark purses, and bowls from the Pech, plus Garífuna instruments. Plastic bottles stuffed with plants and herbs are for sale; add rum or cold water, and you've got the Garífuna drink gifiti.

The Marriott hotel's gift shop, Bahía, keeps a terrific selection of Lencan pottery and leather handbags.

Intricate weavings, handmade leather goods, knickknacks, gourmet coffee, cigars, and even machetes make this well-stocked souvenir shop the best place for gifts. The large selection of artwork, jewelry, and trinkets is ample but not tacky.

Casa de Oro sells a nice selection of silver jewelry with Mayan designs.

Casa de Puros, with shops in Colonia Palmira and at the airport, has a fine cigar selection.

Near the American Embassy, Casa Havana sells cigars.

Souvenir vendors set up shop every day in the small plaza that fronts the Iglesia Los Dolores. Much of what's for sale here is standard kitschy tourist fare, but you'll find a few nice pieces of Lencan pottery and other artisan work for lower prices than in a store with four walls.

Spruce up your dining room table with placemats, table runners, and glassware from In Vitro.The works here come from cooperatives near Valle de Ángeles and in the Mosquitía.

Rosario Lobo started the women's sewing cooperative after Hurricane Mitch devastated her community in 1998. Today, the group sells colorful quilts and crafts all around La Ceiba. Lobo transports visitors to the workshop by pumping a basket down a cable cutting through the forest.

The 130-store Las Cascadas with theaters, food court, and upscale shops, is fast becoming a southside alternative to the long-established Multiplaza.

Librería Guaymuras is Tegucigalpa's best Spanish-language bookstore with a good selection of novels and nonfiction works on history and politics.

An offbeat little shop is Lorendiana You'll find a selection of Lenca handicrafts, as well as shelves of homemade preserves and hot sauces.

The capital's newest mall is Los Próceres; you could spend quite a while exploring its 91 stores.

This easy-to-spot purple and turquoise wooden house across from the airport means no one has to go home without gifts and souvenirs. Forget carved coconuts and low-budget T-shirts—this place stocks items created by some 80 local craftspeople who have tourists, but also beauty and quality, in mind. Tasteful coffee bean necklaces, beaded bags, handmade dolls, and sewn holiday cards are among the vast inventory. And if time gets away from you before your vacation ends, an online store allows ordering back home.

The two-story shopping plaza houses a supermarket, department store, pharmacies, clothing boutiques, a giant food court, and chain restaurants like Applebee's. The first floor has a row of heavily guarded ATMs.

The latest shopping center on the highway has a pharmacy, the main Honduran banks, some clothing stores, a few restaurants, and more. The air-conditioned Espresso Americano is a good place to stop for a coffee.

Two blocks east of Parque Central is the covered mercado, an enticing market that sells everything from shawls to saddles. There's not much to buy of tourist interest—the average resident shops here for day-to-day goods—but it makes for some interesting people-watching. It is also the place to go for a great breakfast; ask for atol chuco, a delicious mush of fermented corn served with a few beans, lime, and roasted squash seeds.

The huge downtown market, Mercado Central. is the biggest and most colorful in the country. Pickpockets like the crowds, so be on your guard.

The chaotic Mercado Ex-Cuartel seems to go on forever. Prices here are slightly higher than in the local villages (where most of the crafts come from), but it's a great place to stop for last-minute ceramics, textiles, hammocks, and more.

This traditional market has managed to accumulate a terrific selection of souvenirs from around Honduras and can be your destination for one-stop shopping if time is limited.

Just what you’d expect from a city market, with throngs of vendors hawking produce, various home goods, and other inventory. There’s plenty of lively conversation and examination to determine which is the ripest fruit or the best-priced meats, providing many photo opportunities of true local culture.

The rows of stalls at the Mercado Nacional de Artesanías are where you can find handicrafts from all over El Salvador (and some from Guatemala). This is one-stop shopping for ceramics, hammocks, and just about anything else you can imagine. It's open every day except Sunday from 8 to 5.

Only if you're feeling extremely intrepid, you can check out the capital's largest market, the enormous labyrinth of the Mercado San Isidro in the Comayagüela district across the river from downtown. The upside is everything—and we mean everything—is for sale here in quantities large and small. (This is the kind of place where you could buy just one safety pin.)

The big downside is that tales of pickpocketings and purse snatchings are legion, although they are less likely to happen in the market building itself than in the surrounding streets.

If you go—and consider carefully whether you want to—take a taxi to and from and take nothing of value with you.

If you're hell-bent on seeing a local market and are able to spend a half day outside the city, Valle de Ángeles's

is a much safer and calmer experience.

Stock up on English-language books, magazines, and newspapers at Metromedia, which has a main store in Colonia Palmira and a branch at Multiplaza.