El Salvador

9^th February 2011

We made it out of Panajachel. And out of Guatemala into El Salvador.
Sitting in a restaurant, that’s closed in the daytime but serves nice beer nevertheless we are hopeful the internet may work again soon. El Salvador is the most developed of the Central American countries we visited so far, though Internet is by far the hardest to find. Strange. Paul really needs it to work on the rafting business but it is hard to come by, and kinda super frustrating.
To be honest, the trip has not been very easy at all. It is a lot harder to travel by vehicle through all these countries than by plane and local buses, for sure. Suddenly you have all those belongings, your house on wheels, oh and the dog to think about. It has been nice to be stationary for a while, here in El Sunzal, at Antonio’s ‘Surfers Inn’, a very basic Guesthouse with a nice El Salvadorian family. I was asking about Laundromats the other day, so Antonio volunteered that his wife will wash my clothes. I obviously did not want this, but there was no arguing. The next day I get my clothes back, all hand washed, dried and folded. Antonio’s wife proudly exclaimed that they were way cleaner than a machine could do it, the river, rocks and sun are far superior than Laundromats. Sorry earth, I have just contributed some more to your demise. Again, it is hard to tell people here that their way of life, burning trash, using the rivers like they do etc etc is not sustainable. They haven’t reached our welfare level to even consider it. What makes me more angry are the big-ish hotels lining the beachfront. The one right on the point is being done up all fancy, with earthy colours an modern arty white stones on threads off the walls. It looks good, I have to say. But with all the costly modifications they still cannot stop dumping their waste water into a gutter next to their big compound wall, to run off directly into the wave. It is those that really annoy me, the ones that know about environmental measures but just ignore them.

but at least we have some waves again. El sunzal has a great right hand point break, right at the end of our track.. Paul is enjoying it a little more than me, as my rib has decided to play up again.. but it is nice to be here anyway..

travel day

Drama drama

29^th January 2011

So here we are. Back to square one. Hoping that a mechanic can fix our van. Except this time we are in a little town in Guatemala (yes they let us in, pretty easily) surrounded by big volcanoes and very steep roads out, with not a lot of access to parts or mechanical tools and oh yeah we don’t really speak much Spanish. I am tested to the max. My language and dictionary-look-up skills; my patience and my hope and positivity. We are hopeful it is ‘just’ a vent on the transmission box, which is broken, and making our ATF poor out faster than we can fill it. It may need a whole new transmission tho. Which they can only do in Guatemala City. A VERY long old tow up a steep steep curvy mountain road away. Not even sure we can find a tow truck who could do that, as we are very heavy, and tall. We were extremely lucky to find a tow into Panajachel, as tow-truck numero uno couldn’t lift us up. Tow-truck numero dos managed to drag-tow us down the steep steep mountain road, and drop us at the mechanic, where we are still.

Drama drama

29^th January 2011

So here we are. Back to square one. Hoping that a mechanic can fix our van. Except this time we are in a little town in Guatemala (yes they let us in, pretty easily) surrounded by big volcanoes and very steep roads out, with not a lot of access to parts or mechanical tools and oh yeah we don’t really speak much Spanish. I am tested to the max. My language and dictionary-look-up skills; my patience and my hope and positivity. We are hopeful it is ‘just’ a vent on the transmission box, which is broken, and making our ATF poor out faster than we can fill it. It may need a whole new transmission tho. Which they can only do in Guatemala City. A VERY long old tow up a steep steep curvy mountain road away. Not even sure we can find a tow truck who could do that, as we are very heavy, and tall. We were extremely lucky to find a tow into Panajachel, as tow-truck numero uno couldn’t lift us up. Tow-truck numero dos managed to drag-tow us down the steep steep mountain road, and drop us at the mechanic, where we are still.
We managed to convince Mario’s Hospedaje* (guesthouse) to accept the dog and that’s where we slept last night. Paul slept. I did not, too worried about break-ins to the van, as people are so very poor here, it is so tempting as we have so much STUFF. Although we are parked in the mechanic’s yard, who have a ‘guard’ dog and the Voluntary ‘Bomberos’ as neighbours I just couldn’t stop worrying. So tonight it is back to sleeping in the van. Gustavo, our mechanic is shopping for parts in Guatemala City today
which is quite a day-trip really. We hope he can find the right size vent-plug and filter. And then we hope that our fluid stays in and the transmission works. Then the next challenge will be trying to very slowly make it up those steep mountain roads…
I am starting to think about how easy it was to just fly in as a traveller, and not having to worry about a vehicle (and a dog!) and all that STUFF. What was I thinking?? This has so far not really been an easy adventure at all. But what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, right? I am ready for some easy times now tho. Bring it on, please.