El Salvador..The Mainland

#8
On day 36 of my year of travelling I entered El Salvador, the fifth country on my trip.

The first stop in El Salvador was Santa Ana. It is the second largest city in El Salvador and is in the north of the country. The hostel we stayed in here was definitely the best so far and will be difficult to top! Casa Verde is like a self contained little fortress in Santa Ana. It is run by Carlos who is from Santa Ana but was a backpacker himself and decided to turn the family home he grew up in into the ultimate hostel. His friends and family are always around chilling out and the place just feels like a home. It has everything: bikes, small swimming pool, roof terrace overlooking Santa Ana, two well equipped kitchens, BBQ, hammocks, film room, private and dorm rooms, book exchange and a soundproof room and it spotlessly clean. It also works on an 'honesty' policy for alcohol so if you take one of the beers or really nice bottles of wine available you just jot it down on the whiteboard and settle up on check out. You don't even need to leave the hostel and it was the first time I really got into cooking since being away (I promise I'm not working for Casa verde)! I also met some really great people here and we had a few days discovering Santa Ana, mostly where we were the only backpackers/'gringos' around.

Courtyard in Casa Verde

The afternoon we arrived in Santa Ana, we went for a wander around to the parque central. It was buzzing with street vendors selling mostly chips, hamburgers, hot dogs and ice cream. There were two beautiful buildings in particular that got my attention. The first being a massive gothic church towering over the park called the 'Catedral de Santa Ana' and the second the 'Teatro Nacional'. What struck me about Santa Ana was the lack of other backpackers around.

Catedral Santa Ana

Teatro Nacional

Papusas and curtido

I had heard a bit about the El Salvordian delicacy called 'papusas', corn dough tortillas stuffed with delights like cheese, beans and pork and topped with pickled vegetables called 'curtido'. They cost about $0.50 and lived up to my expectations. I also tried some sweet corn pancakes called 'riguas'. Three cost $1. They were very sweet and quite dry....nothing some Nutella wouldn't sort out.

The next day we had planned to hike the famous volcán Santa Ana in the Parque Nacional los volcanos.  It turned  out that three couples from our hostel were also doing it. The chicken bus was due to leave at 7.30am, the eight of us were standing at the side of the road where we thought the bus would stop at. By 7.40am we were beginning to think we might have been in the wrong place. Sure enough a local lady came up to us and asked us if we were looking to go to the volcano (we must have had that look about us..maybe the hiking boots and bewildered looks gave us away). The lady marched us into the bus terminal a few minutes away and told us the bus would leave from there and to buy tickets there. Thankfully the bus hadn't left yet and we just made it. The bus cost $0.90 and took just less than two hours. It was a very windy road all the way up but we got great views of the Lago de Coatepeque. We paid a total of $10 for the hike ($3 park entry, $1 for the tour guide and $6 for security). Apparently there have been quite a few muggings on the hikes and now it's advised that you pay for a tour guide and security guard. The eight of us were the only backpackers in the group, the rest seemed to be mainly from the capital San Salvador. The hike was easy enough, especially when comparing it to the overnight volcano hike in Guatemala. It took about two hours up of steady incline and clear trails. When we got to the top of the crater the vivid turquoise lagoon below was mesmerising and surpassed my expectations from the photographs I had seen beforehand. The guide told us the water below was about 90 degrees Celsius and had  last erupted in 2005.

Blue lagoon of Volcán Santa Ana

That evening six of us decided to cook together, Mira and Gerke from Germany made a potato, cheese and vegetable gratin, Angela and Samuel from Switzerland made a Swiss carbonara and fried plantains. I made a lime and coconut Dahl....a very random mix of food but all tasted great! Antonio, Carlos' brother also joined us for dinner.

Casa Verde family dinner 

The next day Angela, Samuel, Rex and I decided to visit natural swimming pools called 'Sapuapa'. Thy also had the little fish that nibble away on your feet so we knew a free pedicure was in store! We decided to walk there from town which looked like it would take about twenty minutes. We asked a few of the locals and a delivery man for one of the restaurants kindly drew us a map on the back of
a napkin. After getting slightly lost and asking numerous people on the way we finally found it, in the corner tucked away behind a dirt track. The sign for the pool was barely legible after years of wear on the white wall. There was a make shift barrier with two teenagers and an elderly man standing at the gate. We asked hesitantly it it was the swimming pool, they nodded and charged us $1 each. When we paid they actually presented us with a pretty formal looking ticket. We walked down the dirt track and saw on the right a huge natural pool with some people swimming, a make sift 'slide' and lots of people sitting in the shade drinking huuuugeeee bottles of vodka. The minute the four of us walked down it felt like the majority of people stopped to look around. It didn't feel intimidating though and when a table of about 8 older people called us over to ask us our names we realised we were the first western tourists that had been here in a while. They were keen to ask us our names and where we were from which was swiftly followed by offerings of vodka (straight).  Angela, Rex and I quickly jumped in the water...it was so cool and refreshing after walking around in the thirty degree heat.  We spent the afternoon getting our feet nibbled by little fishes, playing with some of the local kids, getting fed crab soup (caught that day in the swimming pool), having some drinks and chatting to the locals. Everyone was very friendly all day but when we thought about leaving we were warned to be careful leaving the pool as it was a rough neighbourhood and we could have been mugged, we didn't really have anything on us to take though and walked back to town with no problems. We also got fresh coconuts on the side of the road for $1 each...perfect post swim hydration!

Natural swimming pool at Sapuapa

Next Stop: Haven't decided yet
Food: Pupusas - Salvadorian delicacy!
Drink: Nice wine and cheap beers in the hostel
Bars/restaurants: 'Simmer down' as recommended to me, specialising in pizzas but found it a bit expensive compared to other places.
Stayed: Casa Verde - $9 for a dorm. Really recommend it!
Lesson 9: there are great second hand clothes shops in Santa Ana, we spent a dew hours wandering around them and getting a few bargains!

Ruta De Las Flores, El Salvador
The next day we decided to go to another part of mainland El Salvador. We took a chicken bus to Juayua in Ruta De Las Flores. Juayua is famous for its food market which happens every weekend attracting a lot of locals and Salvadorians visiting for the day or the weekend. It is also in the area known as Ruta De Las Flores due to all the wild and white coffee flowers that grow everywhere. It is also known for it's local art, coffee shops, restaurants and friendly locals. Seeing as it was Saturday we decided to go there for our next stop. The bus cost $0.90 and took about an hour and a half from Santa Ana. We arrived in a small town on a busy morning and found our way to a hostel that Carlos in Casa verde had recommended. It was very homely and quiet. We headed straight for the famous food market to see what was on offer. There was a great buzz around the parque central with lots of food stands, Spanish singers, craft stalls and the general daily food market. What struck me is that again, we seemed to be the only backpackers there. I had read that the market attracts a lot of San Salvadorians leaving the city for the weekend or for the day. The main dishes being prepared consisted of pork/seafood skewers/giant prawns. The seafood looked good so I got a king prawn dish with tortillas, rice, vegetables and spicy pickled cabbage. All the dishes cost $5-6, by no means expensive for what you get but compared to general meals in El Salvadorian markets it is quite pricey. It was however worth it.

Later that day I took a chicken bus to a nearby town called Ataco which is known to have detailed street murals and lots of local artists and crafts. The town was lovely with nice coffee shops and of course beautiful murals on the walls and a nice place to wander around. The buses ran regularly from Juayua and cost $0.50.

Street art in Juayua 

We also did a 'seven waterfall' hike while we were in Juayua with a couple Chelsea and Aaron who we bumped into in the hostel that had also been staying In Casa verde in Santa Ana. We had a great day with our tour guide Carlos and a couple of the dogs from the hostel walking through coffee plantations, repelling down a waterfall , exploring all the waterfalls in the jungle and swimming. We booked the tour through the hostel and it cost $17 each for four with lunch included.

The seventh waterfall and swimming spot 

What has really surprised me about El Salvador is how genuinely friendly the locals are. I know I also said this about Guatemala but it feels slightly different here. I have found that wherever you go, people want to talk to you and find out where you are from and what you think of El Salvador, a lot of them having lived in America or having family in America, they really want to practice their English. They also really want tourism to pick up and I would urge people to go to El Salvador. The violent past seems mostly in the past and where there is still gang presence and violence they are not bothered with tourists. Lots of backpackers and tourists tend to head straight to the Pacific beaches in El Salvador for the surfing but there is so much to see around El Salvador with cheap food, accommodation and really friendly people.

Next stop: The Pacific beaches (of course)
Food: The seafood at the food market in Juayua
Drink: A piña colada in a whole pineapple with rum for $3 after the waterfall hike
Bars/restaurants: none, just the food fair and cooked in the hostel
Stayed: Hostel Casa Mazete - $9 a night in the 6 bedded dorm. Small hostel and homely but the dogs are a bit mental.
Lesson 10: Papusas are life

Jess