Migrants from the caravan to the United States: a look at their trip

Few of them have money. Some would have been hungry for a long time without the generous Mexicans and municipalities who offered them tamales and pineapple juice along the way.

Many wear flip-flops, rubber shoes or sneakers that fall apart.

Like others, Gomez had to deal with grueling heat and torrential rains. At night, members of the group slept on the sidewalks before getting up each morning to leave for their daily marathon.

Despite his precarious health, Gomez, an unemployed farm man from Honduras, said he had no other choice. He has left eight children in his country and the only way to earn enough money to feed them, he said, is to continue to progress and reach the United States.

"There is more work, the government has taken our land," he said.

President Donald Trump has stood up against the caravan and described it as an effort by obscure forces to bring in criminals and possibly terrorists to the United States.

However, after a week of traveling with the group, CNN had little or no organization.

People joined and left at will. Exhausted by the effort, many decided to go home.

Last month, the Mexican government said that the caravan had grown from more than 7,000 migrants to about 3,600. But the organizers said the numbers were increasing.

Oscar Rodriguez, a 22-year-old migrant, said he wants a better life for his 2-year-old son. He challenged Trump's claims that many migrants are criminals.

"He's trying to find an excuse in us," said Rodriguez. "We are not aggressive, aggressive are those who shoot in a theater and kill dozens, not us."

They escape hatred and persecution

Many migrants said they joined the caravan at the last moment, after seeing a social media message or a local report in Honduras that had inspired them to leave a homeland where they had given up a future.

The rainbow flag on a road full of migrants carrying Honduras blue and white flags that chantal Alejo and his friend Stefani Rodriguez wear is distinguished.

Alejo comes from Honduras and Rodriguez from El Salvador. Both are 27 years old and are identified as transgender, making it a part of a community facing high rates of violence and persecution in many Latin American countries.

Alejo said that a publication on Facebook had made him immediately make a bag.

"There is a lot of persecution and no work," she said of her country. She and Rodriguez hope to be able to travel to Dallas, where they have heard of trans women like those who receive hormonal treatments.

They were separated from their families in the United States.

Many migrants in the caravan learned everything they knew about the United States through movies and TV shows. But not Bryan Colindres.

Colindres was six years old when he and his mother emigrated from Honduras to the United States after the murder of his father. Colindres said that he had never been able to get citizenship, but that he had grown up more American than Honduran.

Nearly 20 years later, Colindres' American life is interrupted by an immigration raid on the construction site where he works. When he was deported, he left his wife and a 3-year-old daughter, an American citizen.

Upon his arrival in Honduras, Colindres headed north, eager to find his daughter.

"It is she who needs me the most, and I do not want her to go without me," he said. "I know what it's like to have no father."

Colindres joined the group in Guatemala and, when Mexican police blocked the bridge that connects the two countries, he and other migrants spent about $ 1.25 to be rafted through the Suchiate River.

He has since gone. Colindres took a bus to Guadalajara, where his perfect English helped him find a job in a call center offering customer service to the country he considered home.

Colindres said he hoped to earn enough money to eventually join his family in the United States.

They travel with children

Resting on a shady spot on the road to Arriaga, Mexico, Iris and her group were hoping that a car would stop to accompany them.

Iris's younger brother, Freddy, seemed to have fallen asleep in the sweltering heat, using his backpack as a pillow. Her nieces and nephews played with dirty stuffed animals by the side of the road.

"The trip was hot and walking under the sun is the hardest thing," said Iris, who did not want to give her last name.

The 21-year-old said she was confident that they would be fine if they went to New Jersey.

"I will do everything that will be offered, I will take the first available job," she said.

When asked if she knew how many miles they still had to travel, Iris sighed tiredly.

"Muchos (a lot)."