Blogs from Juayúa, Western, El Salvador, Central America Caribbean - page 2

Saturday we finally got a late start which I was grateful for. I was desperate for some sleep. Our tour guide, Caesar, picked us up for a “ruins and volcanoes tour” around noon. Caesar claims to have vast knowledge of the rich history of the Salvadoran people and Mayan culture; I also suspect that during the 1980’s he stole cars in the U.S. and sold them in El Salvador, but I'll address that in another blog. Our first stop was a visit to the Pompeii-style Mayan ruins of “Joya de Ceren”, which was buried under lava and ash after a volcanic eruption in 595 A.D. Exploring the ruins was a unique experience, but is accurately described by Christina’s tour book as “underwhelming to the novice”. Every ruin looked similar to me; it was difficult to distinguish ... read more

Casa Frolaz is the name of the place we are staying in Santa Ana, dropped our things in the dorm room and left for metro center mall to internet eat and chill, then we headed to town center so the boys can check out travel agencies to book their tickets. Coming back to the hostel we had some red wine and just chill, it was quite windy and gusting quite strong. Then all of a sudden the owner Javier came in the room and said something like check your belongings as there was a suspicious dude who checked in earlier claiming to be Calixto from Cuba and that he showered in our room, he might have stolen things as he looked dodgy from the get go, I quickly checked my money belt and to my horror ... read more

As well as being the most "off-the-beaten-track" destination in Central America (95% less backpackers here than in Guatemala, for example) El Salvador also has to go down as quite possibly the friendliest country I've ever visited. Almost from the moment I arrived (when I asked the bus driver where a certain hotel was, and he told me to stay on the bus and he´d drive the bus there for me once the other passengers had gotten off), I´ve been treated more like I´ve been a visitor in someone else´s home rather than just a traveller passing through. Sure, most people in Mexico, Belize and Guatemala were pretty nice too, but me and some of the folks I've been travelling with all agree - there´s a genunine-ness and amicableness about the way Salvadorenos treat us and interact ... read more

Whoo-hoo for Semana Santa! Blair and I have been traveling since Saturday morning. We left Copan at 11am and had been in three countries by the end of the day (Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador). We stayed in San Salvador for a couple days, met two of his friends that came down to visit. Yesterday we made our way to the Pacific Ocean!! LOVE THE BEACH!!! Spent an amazing day and a half there, and then arrived in Juayua this afternoon. The coast was HOT (getting a bit tanner), but we're in the cool mountains now and it even sprinkled a bit today. Feels fresh...and our hostel has HOT water, and internet! Living it up! Will post photos and sweet stories later on (hopefully!!!) I was ready to leave San Salvador. Big, noisy...ugh. But the coast ... read more

It is really funny how so many buses terminate at markets. It takes ages for the big beasts to negotiate their way through the crowded market and they spew huge amounts of black exhaust fumes contaminating the fresh produce and choking pedestrians. We encountered this in Ahuachapan, on our way to Juayua. Juayua is on the Ruta de las Flores (Route of the Flowers) and it was quite beautiful getting there. Not so many flowers but probably a little too early in the dry season for those. Lots of coffee plantations. We had a lovely view of Juayua from the main road before we turned off to the town. Juayua had a lovely feeling and when we looked lost a boy on a bike asked if he could help. We were walking in the wrong direction ... read more