Monday was a national holiday (El Salvador's Independence Day) and my office was closed; we decided to participate in a trip organized by some friends to the old Spanish colonial-era town of Suchitoto, which was a (the?) Pipil tribal capital during the Mayan Empire. Suchitoto in Nahuat means "Place of Birds and Flowers". (I would guess that Suchitoto is a Spanish bastardization of a name that was originally something more like "Xochitotl".) We headed east on the Pan-American Highway to San Martin, then north on a secondary road to Suchitoto; took us awhile to get there because every little town was holding an Independence Day parade, so we had to bushwhack our way around each village on muddy side roads.Suchitoto is very charming and quaint and tranquil, and is one of El Salvador's few remaining colonial-era
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