El Salvador!!

The crossing at Alvarado was time consuming a bit nerve racking and a bit of a hassle, like most. But it was free! Not a dime spent, and speaking of dimes, El Salvador uses American currency; how fun!!
This is the smallest of Central American countries, and before we knew it, we were at the beach and there were waves, We stopped at a few before finding what we wanted at El zonte; cheap camping
right on the point.

The surf wasn't perfect, but good enough for us; just happy to be out there. We stayed here at Raul's for two nights and have headed south to check any number of beaches around the town of La Libertad, where I am typing from right now. We just dropped off four boards at the surf shop for repair and are heading back up north to camp and surf for a few more days. Full of groceries and diesel!
Hotter than Haydes near the coast... but everyone here (except for a hairy weirdo outside) seems nice and we both have good feelings about El Salvador.
Til next time,
GB

Montericco Guatemala

Driving south from Sipicate, we tried to hit two spots, Puerto San Jose and Istapa, but had a hard time finding a place to stay and both places looked rather dodgy, so we kept on, towards Montericco, where we heard there was surf. We showed up to nil save for a small beach break, which was a bummer. We floundered about in the water for a while sans boards and stayed in a little bungalow for the night. We were eaten by mosquitos but slept well so we could get up and drive south!
Just out of Montericco there's a ferry that takes about 50 miles of slow road driving out of the picture.

125Q ($14)

This seems to be it for Guatemalan surf, so we set out for El Salvador..
GB

OCEAN!!!!!!

Sipicate is said to have good surf, so we drove a few hours that way. While a bit tough to find a place to camp, it is great to see the Pacific again. We found a place to stay next to a swimming pool FULL of Guatemalan kids and immediately dug the surfboards out and got in the water (the ocean!).

Time didn't make me any better at surfing and our bodies are sore from using different muscles, but words can't say how nice it is to be back on the coast; where we'll try to stay from here on out.

GB

To the big lake!

The drive to Lago de Atitlan was uneventful (save for a fatal big rig accident) and only took a few hours. We stopped a bit to check the views.

We camped in Panajachel and decided to take boats to see the other spots as the roads around the lake are slow going and steep. Also, the road to the coast leaves from Pana. We heard this was a great fun town to see but it wasn't as great as we expected. We stayed two nights, hitting the same restaurant for Plato tipical each night. We did manage to meet a bonafide shiteater, seen here feasting on diapers:

By day we took the boats around the lake to different towns...


Camper did not like the boats rides.
San Marcos was said to have all the rocks to jump off of, and they did.

Alex flipped:

Camp swam:

We stayed at a liitle spot on the lake for an unreasonable 100Q per night, which might have been reasonable if we were skaters
We decided that while the lake was beautiful, we were looking for salt water, where there are waves. Off to the coast....
GB

Coban to Antigua Guatemala

We finally got out of Coban, with brakes!
Good thing, too as Guatemala is one hilly place. We'd be in trouble. Brakes or not, I ran over a dog; his fault. He ran alongside the truck for awhile thinking about it, faked us a few times, then jumped right out in front and right under the truck. We felt him bouncing about the running gear and saw him scrambling to get out of the way of the truck behind us, he lived!
The drive through Guatemala city was hectic

and we got turned around a bit before finally finding our way down the LONG steep hill into Antigua..

Antigua is surrounded by three volcanoes and full of tourists. There is good coffee and fun things to do about town for a bit before you've seen everything. Unfortunately, Alex ate a questionable falafel and was down with some sort of stomach parasite the whole time we we there. After a visit to the doctor, a bunch of pills and a week's time, he was okay. He read 5 books; one a day. I explored the place at night by myself and met a ton of great people; had an absolutely wonderful time. Always nice to hang with Californians. During the day Alex and I got out and saw a few movies with subtitles in espanol, exchanged and bought books, and drank good coffee.

Luckily, we camped for free the whole time in a big lot where the police park their vehicles and where some live.

Aside from a work crew burning a bit of it one day, it was an awesome spot to stay in the middle of the city.

We were planning on hiking the nearby and active Pacaya Volcano, but by the time Alex was feeling better, we were both ready to get out of there; it had been a week without a swim or any exercise save walking around.
GB