EL SALVADOR…PRICELESS
I know this is old school, but I think you will enjoy it anyway!
Although I will be touching on some stories of our trip to El Salvador in this post, some are worthy of more detail which I will share with you in my next post.
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Bus ride from San Pedro Sula to Santa Rosa de Copan…… 80 Lempiras ($4.00)
Getting the scariest bus “losing-it’s-steering-on-mountain-roads-death-defying-praying-to-all gods-for-our-lives-literally-crying-roller-coaster-like-ride” experience…Priceless!
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BY THE WAY – PRICING IS PER PERSON!
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Taxi to the bus terminal in La Ceiba…20 Lempiras ($1.00)
Bus to San Pedro Sula…90 Lempiras ($4.50)
Bus to Santa Rosa de Copan…80 Lempiras ($4.00)
Hotel and Food in Santa Rosa de Copan…($22.50)
Bus to El Salvador Boarder…70 L ($3.50)
Bus to La Palma, El Salvador…$1.50
Total….$46.00
Eating a pupusa ($0.35) for the first time IN El Salvador (where they are from)…Priceless!
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| First El Salva Pupusa |
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El Salvador using the American dollar as their money…not interesting at all.
Change actually being worth something again…Priceless!
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Hotel in La Palma…$10.00
Dinner in La Palma…$1.70 (2 pupusas with a beer)
Breakfast in La Palma…$3.70
Seeing one of the most colorful towns in all of Central America…Priceless!
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| The Colors of La Palma |
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Having a 3 hour bus trip turn into 4.5 hours because we took the local bus instead of the the “directo”…1.5 extra hours of our time.
Seeing so many teeny tiny villages and passing out gum to the school kids on the bus…Priceless!
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| La Palma – Suchitoto Bus Ride |
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Having beers at El Necio in Suchitoto…Around $5.00
Meeting Mario a local mason and ex-guerilla (and his boxer dog, Tasha) and hearing his stories of days gone by…Some sad, but definitely Priceless.
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| From 2009_10_24 – Suchitoto – Juayua |
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On a bus from Apopa to Santa Ana seeing a young guy with make-up concealing his poor quality gang face tattoos “selling” Chiclets….Sad.
Finally realizing he wasn’t an ex-Marada like I thought, but a current one extorting the bus worker near where we were sitting…Scary as All Hell.
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Eight hours of bus rides to the Route of Flowers…4 bus changes and around $3.75.
Not seeing many flowers on the Route of Flowers but beautiful country none the less….“What the…?” kind of Priceless!
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Following a local “guide” into the jungle…Worrisome.
Seeing 4 wonderful waterfalls and a group baptism, and swimming in the fresh cold water…Outdoorsy Priceless!
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| Juayua Waterfall |
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Meal in Juayua…a whopping $10.00!
Eating a whole grilled frog, a small string of sausages shaped like balls and experiencing Juayua’s Weekend Food Fest….Very much so Priceless!
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| Juayua Food Fest! |
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Bus along the coast to small Beach town of El Tunco…50 Cents.
Jim pushing me and our bags off the back of the bus all of sudden when the bus stopped because there was a gang of 8 guys hanging about us…Exciting, but Not Priceless.
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| Emergency Bus Stop to El Tunco |
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Getting a cheaper room in a nice hotel’s annex across the street in El Tunco…$20.00 (for both of us)
Having a beer while we cool off in the fancy pool at the nice hotel…Priceless.
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Going to a pacific coast beach…3 bus rides, surrounded by gang members and around $3.00
Seeing black sand and more rocks than anything else at the beach…Photo Opp Priceless for Dawn!
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| El Tunco |
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Trying to find a small art museum on foot in a city where houses are locked down like prisons for safety…a bit disconcerting and $3.00 when we did find it.
Discovering Sorpresas…Priceless!
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| Sorpresas – San Salvador |
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Having to hit 3 hotels to find one that has NOT raised their rates…a bit of a pain in the butt.
Looking through the collection of social welfare, leftist political and feminista books of the older owners…Priceless!
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Going a bit out of our way to see the little mountain coffee town of Santiago de Maria…1 hour.
Seeing a town that my brother in-law’s mother was from and actually meeting someone that knew her…Priceless!
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| Santiago de Maria |
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Being told by a hotel owner to leave Alegria, the highest very cute town in El Salvador, because all the hotels were full…very annoying!
Having a drunk, but amiable, local guy find a cheap room for us right on the parque central and with a great garden and view…In Your Face Other Hotel Guy Priceless!
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| Alegria’s View |
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Jim getting sick in the middle of lunch and sleeping the rest of the day and night in Alegria
…a bummer.
Dawn meeting a Australian couple to talk to while out having her fix of pupusas for dinner…Priceless, in a “Keeping Dawn from Going Stir Crazy in the Hotel Room and Bugging Jim” kind of way.
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Waking in the early, early morning to live bands belting out tunes and hustle and bustle noises around the hotelito…a Bit Put Off.
Finding out the production crew of El Salvador’s version of Good Morning America (Viva La Manana! – Long Live the Morning!) was staying in our hotelito, and that they were shooting the whole show in central park vive (Uh…LIVE)…Priceless in a Silly Star Struck (okay, Jim was not that impressed) Way!
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| Vive en la Manana! |
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Looking forward to going to the small town, Perquin, that was the Headquarters of the FMLN during the Civil War…3 hot buses, our packs on our laps for 4 hours, and around $3.50.
Getting to the only not clean and kept up town we have seen in El Salvador and not being able to do a hike with an ex-guerilla guide because of thieves on the trails…Kind of Sad.
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Finding a event a decent place to sleep in Perquin…impossible.
Sharing a huge beer to help us sleep…Priceless!
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| From 2009_10_30 – Alegria – Perquin |
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Wishing I could take a shower, but it was very cold and foggy outside where the cold water shower was located and there was a big spider in the shower room… too bad so sad.
Convincing Jim that there was hot water in the shower and then seeing his goose bump body when he came back from the shower… Priceless.
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Weezing and taking puffs of my inhaler throughout the night and finally deciding to get up at 4:22am because I couldn’t handle breathing any more mold in the room…not fun.
Deciding to take the 6am bus back to Honduras instead of the 1:30pm…more not fun.
Waiting for 3 hours for the 6:30am bus to arrive then hearing that it won’t be coming so we have to wait for the afternoon bus…triple not fun.
Coordinating with our fellow stranded bus passengers and arranging a ride in the back of an old hoopty pick-up with 9 other people and all their luggage on very rutted mountain dirt roads across the border that El Salvador still doesn’t recognize…Doing it Local Style Priceless!
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| From 2009_10_31 – Perquin – Marcala |
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Lugging our beloved but huge and bulky Hondo super umbrellas all over El Salvador and not needing them once…awkward and inconvenient!
Getting caught in the rain, minutes after crossing the border back into Honduras, in the back of an old hoopty pick-up with 7 other people and all their luggage on very rutted mountain dirt roads with our huge and bulky Hondo super umbrellas…So Worth It Priceless…for everyone!
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| From 2009_10_31 – Perquin – Marcala |
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| From 2009_10_31 – Perquin – Marcala |
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Arriving to Marcala, Honduras drenched and muddy, looking life refugees (okay the umbrellas were not made to be used while in a moving vehicle)…funny.
Taking a hot shower…Priceless!
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Dawn getting what sickness Jim had the other day…bummer!
Jim going out and about to not bug Dawn and go stir crazy….Priceless!
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Long bus travel day…10 hours.
Sleeping in our own bed…Priceless!
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That’s it in a Priceless-like nutshell. Read the next blog for elaborations on some of our adventures mentioned above.
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.WE.ARE.GNOMADS. 
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