**NOTE: Although El Salvador is the smallest country in Central America, we had such a strong experience here that we have to try to include as much as we can of the short time we were here because it has affected us so powerfully... So get ready, this is a long post!**
From the moment we crossed into El Salvador from Guatemala our biking experience changed yet again for the better. Gone was all the trash, the clouds of black car exhaust stopped coming out of the tailpipes of all motorized vehicles, the food (pupusas = tortillas filled with beans and cheese... ) has been great and interesting, and the landscapes - from volcanoes and mountains to beaches famous for great surfing to the capital city to the lakes - have been remarkably beautiful. And to top it all, the people are so friendly, educated, open and nice, helpful and pleasant.
From the moment we crossed into El Salvador from Guatemala our biking experience changed yet again for the better. Gone was all the trash, the clouds of black car exhaust stopped coming out of the tailpipes of all motorized vehicles, the food (pupusas = tortillas filled with beans and cheese... ) has been great and interesting, and the landscapes - from volcanoes and mountains to beaches famous for great surfing to the capital city to the lakes - have been remarkably beautiful. And to top it all, the people are so friendly, educated, open and nice, helpful and pleasant.
We crossed into El Salvador and entered into a region called the Ruta de las Flores riding through several beautiful small vilages along picturesque roads along rolling hills. The area is famous for coffee plantations, viviendas (greenhouses growing all sorts of plants and trees for sale) that you can stroll through, quaint coffee shops and plazas with cobblestone roads. We entered one of the villages just in time for the weekend food fairs, where everything from paella to grilled frog and rabbit were served from dozens of food stalls. The cooks were all wearing professional chef hats, nice aprons or uniforms and there was a much higher standard of cleanliness than we had become accustomed to.
Next we made our way around beautiful Coatepeque lake, in the crater of an old volcano - one of many in the region. We camped a night near Cerro Verde National Park where we took a 4 hour hike up and down barren, steamy, sulfury smoking volcano Izalco, not even in existance in the 17th century but now 1930m (5700ft) high. It's a perfect cone barren of any vegetation, and`standing on top of this lava rock mount that is still smoking, surrounded by more than a handful of other, green volcanos was superb. We had to be accompanied by a guide and 2 ¨tourist police¨ that all national parks now have for tourist protection. About 10 years ago the parks were notorious for tourist robberies, and since the government set up this service 8 years ago there have been no problems, so we never felt unsafe or worried. In general only just over 15 years after the civil war in El Salvador the country seems very advanced and developed, clean, well educated and relaxed. But probably we don't see all that is going on behind the scenes, as crime and gangs are still thriving.
From the volcanes we rolled down to the ocean again. Getting to the big beaches was a really nice quick ride on a gentle, slight downhill with a nice backwind to get us farther than expected in one day. Once reaching the small town we chose to spend the night, it was harder than we thought to find an adequate place to camp. We rode up and down a few dirt roads in a sort of creepy neighborhood, people staring at us and large groups of men hanging around looking mischevious. Kat didn't feel comfortable. We asked someone in the most clean, secure looking house if we could camp in their garden, but the man watering the plants said he was just the caretaker and the owner wouldn't be home for a few hours. We were getting desperate. Then out of nowhere a woman came riding her bike looking for us - she heard we needed a place to stay and said to follow her. She took us to her friends house - an old couple greeted us at the gate, invited us in, showed us our room (!) and told us dinner would be ready shortly. The abuela (grandma) and her daughter in law prepared a dinner of sweet, hot tamales with sweet cream on top, roasted corn, and orange soda. We stayed up for a while later talking about the US, El Salvador, farming, politics and travelling with the abuelo (grandfather). In the morning the daughter in law showed us how to make the delicious pupusas, which we ate with tomato sauce and had strawberry flavored atole (thick, sweet corn milk) before heading out on the road again.
The road then followed a gorgeous steep coast offering great views of little bays, and pristine beaches - unfortunately some private as about 20% of El Salvadorians now live and work in the US, and like to have a little resort apartment lodge with A/C on the beach when they visit home... We rode to a nice little village with a campsite/hostel right on the rocky beach, with perfect views of the surfers from the patio hammocks. There we met a great couple traveling in their camper from the US with their 2 children - working at home for a couple of months then loading up the van and heading out. They shared some wine with us, we had more great, stimulating conversations on absolutely everything - long travels, which routes to take and which to avoid, traveling tips, surfing, US and Californian politics and the reasons behind the many problems in the world and how we all could change things.... very cool, inspiring couple.
It was hard to leave this idyllic spot; we probably wouldn't have left if we hadn't already told our host in San Salvador that we'd be there the next day. So goodbye again to the lovely Pacific Ocean! San Salvador was an experience unlike any others we had spent in a capital city before. An hour after arriving, our host - an extremely interesting former english teacher - took us to a free concert put on by the El Salvador National Symphonic Orchestra at the Museum of Modern Art. It was an unforgettable, quite surreal 2 hour preformance honoring the 500th anniversary of Galileo's use of the telescope to look into the heavens, complete with a short astronomical lecture and identification of visible constellations, and projections onto the wall of telescope images of the planets, moons and stars. Many people were there, most dressed very well, many young people. The next few days were spent walking around the city and its neverending busy markets, doing some shopping (we have a frying pan now!! makes cooking lots more fun), visiting a few museums on the country's interesting history and having long conversations with our host.
The last stop in El Salvador was then Suchitoto, aplace all Salvadorians OOOH about as it seems it represents the country the way it was before the civil war: lots of arts galleries, nice little cafes, a fountain in the plaza, a lake nearby to look at (swimming unfortunately not recommended due to poor water quality), a theater, etc... Our host there took us to an Opera performance the first night - a peruvian soprano singer with an impressive voice, filling the whole theater hall without any microphone, accompanied by a piano. The peruvian embassy had set up waiters in chic white suits serving free hors-d'oeuvre and Pizco Sours afterwards. As the waiters wouldn't stop serving and got a liking to us, we stayed a while and got to know lots of locals and all the expatriates of the small town while getting more and more tipsy. It was great fun, and we ended the night with all our new friends from Suchitoto in a bar with live Garifuna (black african-carribean) drumming, singing and dancing. The next day, our host took us to a sugar cane mill where we learned how the typical lumps of cane sugar (pinella) sold in the markets are made.
Figuring out our routes was a challenge - unfortunally we couldn't visit the east of the country, so that'll have to be for another trip! Finally we headed out of El Salvador a few days ago to Honduras, from where you will be able to read more soon!
Greetings to all of you from Swen and Kat.....
Next we made our way around beautiful Coatepeque lake, in the crater of an old volcano - one of many in the region. We camped a night near Cerro Verde National Park where we took a 4 hour hike up and down barren, steamy, sulfury smoking volcano Izalco, not even in existance in the 17th century but now 1930m (5700ft) high. It's a perfect cone barren of any vegetation, and`standing on top of this lava rock mount that is still smoking, surrounded by more than a handful of other, green volcanos was superb. We had to be accompanied by a guide and 2 ¨tourist police¨ that all national parks now have for tourist protection. About 10 years ago the parks were notorious for tourist robberies, and since the government set up this service 8 years ago there have been no problems, so we never felt unsafe or worried. In general only just over 15 years after the civil war in El Salvador the country seems very advanced and developed, clean, well educated and relaxed. But probably we don't see all that is going on behind the scenes, as crime and gangs are still thriving.
From the volcanes we rolled down to the ocean again. Getting to the big beaches was a really nice quick ride on a gentle, slight downhill with a nice backwind to get us farther than expected in one day. Once reaching the small town we chose to spend the night, it was harder than we thought to find an adequate place to camp. We rode up and down a few dirt roads in a sort of creepy neighborhood, people staring at us and large groups of men hanging around looking mischevious. Kat didn't feel comfortable. We asked someone in the most clean, secure looking house if we could camp in their garden, but the man watering the plants said he was just the caretaker and the owner wouldn't be home for a few hours. We were getting desperate. Then out of nowhere a woman came riding her bike looking for us - she heard we needed a place to stay and said to follow her. She took us to her friends house - an old couple greeted us at the gate, invited us in, showed us our room (!) and told us dinner would be ready shortly. The abuela (grandma) and her daughter in law prepared a dinner of sweet, hot tamales with sweet cream on top, roasted corn, and orange soda. We stayed up for a while later talking about the US, El Salvador, farming, politics and travelling with the abuelo (grandfather). In the morning the daughter in law showed us how to make the delicious pupusas, which we ate with tomato sauce and had strawberry flavored atole (thick, sweet corn milk) before heading out on the road again.
The road then followed a gorgeous steep coast offering great views of little bays, and pristine beaches - unfortunately some private as about 20% of El Salvadorians now live and work in the US, and like to have a little resort apartment lodge with A/C on the beach when they visit home... We rode to a nice little village with a campsite/hostel right on the rocky beach, with perfect views of the surfers from the patio hammocks. There we met a great couple traveling in their camper from the US with their 2 children - working at home for a couple of months then loading up the van and heading out. They shared some wine with us, we had more great, stimulating conversations on absolutely everything - long travels, which routes to take and which to avoid, traveling tips, surfing, US and Californian politics and the reasons behind the many problems in the world and how we all could change things.... very cool, inspiring couple.
It was hard to leave this idyllic spot; we probably wouldn't have left if we hadn't already told our host in San Salvador that we'd be there the next day. So goodbye again to the lovely Pacific Ocean! San Salvador was an experience unlike any others we had spent in a capital city before. An hour after arriving, our host - an extremely interesting former english teacher - took us to a free concert put on by the El Salvador National Symphonic Orchestra at the Museum of Modern Art. It was an unforgettable, quite surreal 2 hour preformance honoring the 500th anniversary of Galileo's use of the telescope to look into the heavens, complete with a short astronomical lecture and identification of visible constellations, and projections onto the wall of telescope images of the planets, moons and stars. Many people were there, most dressed very well, many young people. The next few days were spent walking around the city and its neverending busy markets, doing some shopping (we have a frying pan now!! makes cooking lots more fun), visiting a few museums on the country's interesting history and having long conversations with our host.
The last stop in El Salvador was then Suchitoto, aplace all Salvadorians OOOH about as it seems it represents the country the way it was before the civil war: lots of arts galleries, nice little cafes, a fountain in the plaza, a lake nearby to look at (swimming unfortunately not recommended due to poor water quality), a theater, etc... Our host there took us to an Opera performance the first night - a peruvian soprano singer with an impressive voice, filling the whole theater hall without any microphone, accompanied by a piano. The peruvian embassy had set up waiters in chic white suits serving free hors-d'oeuvre and Pizco Sours afterwards. As the waiters wouldn't stop serving and got a liking to us, we stayed a while and got to know lots of locals and all the expatriates of the small town while getting more and more tipsy. It was great fun, and we ended the night with all our new friends from Suchitoto in a bar with live Garifuna (black african-carribean) drumming, singing and dancing. The next day, our host took us to a sugar cane mill where we learned how the typical lumps of cane sugar (pinella) sold in the markets are made.
Figuring out our routes was a challenge - unfortunally we couldn't visit the east of the country, so that'll have to be for another trip! Finally we headed out of El Salvador a few days ago to Honduras, from where you will be able to read more soon!
Greetings to all of you from Swen and Kat.....
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