Cipi Hostel Concepción de Ataco

... generally get reacquainted with living the simple life. Louis turned out to be a very welcoming host, and we went on walks to the local waterfalls, cooked meals on the open fires. It is always good to meet people on couch surfind, because you have a completely different experience out of the guide books, and you can get to know what life is really like in the country. It turned out there had been elections in El Salvador a week before we arrived, and a new leftist ...

... US. He knew more geography than we did! We are also seeing that many families are single moms and kids because dad's in the US or elsewhere making a living, or Dad was a victim of the civil war here.

We knocked off early today and made our way into the mountains where a waterpark had a hot spring pool. We did not hesitate to change out of our dusty, painted, hot, sweaty clothes and into swimsuits. That was a great stop. We loved every minute of it.
Santa Ana, Santa Ana, El Salvador thriventbuilds

... 2 pm so we could head to the Tazumal Mayan ruins. We tramped around in our work clothes and saw the Mayan ruins from centuries ago, some parts of the site calculated to be built as early as 300. Over a solid brick fence, we could see a cemetery filled with beautiful blue crosses of every hue. The grounds were bare dirt, no weeds, obviously well-cared for. It was a very pretty spot with lots of shade trees ...

... on the road, headed for a lake southeast of Santa Ana which was created by a volcano. The road to the place was rugged, but once we got there- WOW! Some of us said it reminded us of Hawaii. There's a restaurant that sits on stilts and overlooks the lake. It looks a little ridiculous, sort of like a multi-legged spider, and it swayed a bit under our weight. We had a great lunch and listened to a couple of marachi ...

... br>Sadly no samples as beans all exported for toasting & no-one here can afford to drink this brand of coffee!

For dinner Mama bought us in some pupusas, the ES staple fast food, which are stuffed wheat tortillas, in my case stuffed with queso con leroco, another local speciality (leroco is a flower used extensively to flavour cheese though the flavour is not strong it is definitely more interesting than the usual cheese!) Served with surtido, pickled veggies, and tomato sauce.

... dollar bill. There was a lip synch group with a little boy who hopped nonstop from foot to foot. And the highlight, a group of boys and girls who did the twist for us!

When it was over several of us called out we wanted to twist too! So we ran out and got partners and did the twist! FUN!!!! I coudn't post the video as it was too big.

Next we divided into groups and went into different classrooms to do ...

... zout. Alles werd gesneden en gewassen in het water.....en we hebben in een streepje zon op een droge steen zitten pummelen....heerlijk. Al zittend was ik de tijd aan het omrekenen en kwam tot de conclusie dat jullie boodschappen voor het weekend aan het halen waren bij AH.....Gaaf toch!!
Nadat we de honden de restjes hadden gevoerd gingen we verder met de tocht en heb ik geen tijd meer gehad om aan Holland te denken.....het was hard werken, oppassen waar je liep, glibberen en ...

... arrived, and the older colonial buildings are pretty much all gone. The newer ones, even those that try for the old style, just aren't the same, but are not unpleasant. I was hoping for some of the great examples of colonial architecture that are still found in Guatemala, Peru and Mexico. We stopped at a shop to get some crafts, but there is a lack of distinctive local style and we didn't find much of interest. The Beneficio Buena Vista, Juan's family coffee mill ...

... etc. There were mostly Europeans when I arrived, an Irish guy, Spanish guy, two Slovenians, German girl, etc, but the common language, luckily, was English. The world's funny like that. After an early night I had a slow morning and finally made it down to the famous weekend food fair. I tried some not so great paella, came back and rested. Later I ventured out again and tried some frog (rana). I sat down on a bench in the packed ...

... up old 4x4 for over an hour into the park, which wasn´t really lush jungle but dry scrub jungle with an incredible variety of trees. Pumas and other animals live there apparently but we didn´t see any, the scenery was great though. After going up and down rocky tracks I really wanted to take my bike down, we parked up then walked across a ridge from where we could see the Pacific many miles away, then down into the gorge through jungle. It was pretty ...