El Salvador & Nicaragua Part 1

Bus Travel in Central America: It should have started at 10 AM, but it actually began at 10:45 AM, about 1 ½ hours heading toward Santa Ana. Then our driver received a call and shook his head. His boss had forgotten to tell him that he needed to pick up one more person; he was asked to please turn around and collect the waiting person. I thought to myself, frustrating, but what can I do? The other passengers did not take it so calmly. A Guatemalan woman talked to the boss and repeatedly told him that we would not return. A couple from New Zealand reiterated the same in English. After 10 minutes, the driver returned and said he had to go back; we could wait at the rest stop. Again, both wanted to talk to the boss. Another 10 minutes later, our driver was now afraid of losing his job; he had to go back! Once again, both wanted to speak to the boss. This whole situation went on for about an hour until everyone agreed to meet in the middle. The end of the story was that we were almost back at the starting point, and if we had gone back directly without discussion, we would have surely been faster; well, it is what it is, I have time. In the end, the journey (195 km), which I had planned for generously 5 hours, took 8 ½ hours.
I need to slowly get out of my comfort zone; I cannot complain that everything is so expensive and at the same time only travel with the most expensive buses and shuttles. So, I did it, and of course, right away in El Salvador.

I thought I had seen a lot already, but (thank God) I was surprised once again!

The bus station is something entirely different, a crazy market around the bus station that is already falling apart.

As soon as I sat in the camioneta to Juayua, the market came into the bus; it felt like the entire market genuinely entered the bus. Of course, I have experienced a lot being sold on buses before, but not with 8 people at the same time trying to outshout each other, and the variety is also unique. Pain relief medication, scissors, charging cables, chips, tomatoes, eye drops, fries, salad, fruits, phone cases, candies, ropes, breakfast boards, plates, salt, sugar, nail clippers, leather belts, juice, and hot dogs in bags (I had to take notes simultaneously, so everything is mixed up) and much more. The ride was already promising; winding roads led into the mountains, and the climate became increasingly pleasant.

Upon arriving in Juayua, I first went to explore the area, a lovely little town along the Ruta de las Flores. Together with Conny from Vienna, I rented a scooter. First, we went along the Ruta de las Flores before we turned off to a small crater lake. The roads immediately became dusty trails, and our scooter's off-road capability was put to the test.

The lake was not spectacular, but still lovely to see. Back in civilization, we naturally ran out of fuel (the gauge was inaccurate), but since it was downhill and the next gas station was already in sight, we didn't have to push even a meter :)

Then we continued to the next town, Concepción de Ataco, where we fortified ourselves for the next kilometers at the market before heading to a 37°C warm river, complete with a waterfall; here too, the roads were disastrous, but it was still fun. At the end of the day, we had to ride the last kilometers of our almost 100 km tour in the dark through a thunderstorm and got completely soaked. The ride was genuinely exhausting; the oncoming cars blinded us, there was no street lighting, but the lightning was so bright and frequent that it just looked beautiful and terrifying at the same time.

The next day, we went on foot through the jungle to 10 different waterfalls. A great, short hike where we had to climb through the waterfalls at some points. To wrap up, we could swim in a waterfall with a pool and swim through a small cave.

We continued on with the camionetas toward the Pacific, specifically to Taquillo, which has only one hostel and a few houses. The hostel was magnificent; in between, I walked the hostel dog, Pitufo, and spent the rest of the day at the pool, as the waves were quite high.

We then moved on to La Libertad, which was recommended to me as a hostel but was not nearly as good as the last one. Well, sometimes that's how it goes, and surfers are also a unique species. Many have been stranded in some places for years, some have a quirky view of life, some are very self-assured, and most have a real problem with T-shirts and shoes, as these items are often missing, even in buses, towns, shops, or restaurants.The day trips to El Zonte (Bitcoin Beach) and El Tunco confirmed for me that I would rather stay elsewhere. One cannot really speak of beaches here; they mostly consist of stones and trash, and the accommodations are quite run down for the price. El Tunco is probably nice for partying, but I skipped that :)

So, we moved on to La Unión, again 6 hours in an old American school bus, including a transfer in San Salvador, but it cost me only 9€ instead of 30€; somewhere one must save when one only has 60€ a day.

La Unión is quite dirty, and there isn't much to see. I wanted to go to La Unión to camp on the Conchagua volcano and then travel on to Nicaragua. Option A: Walk 5 to 6 km toward the summit with my small backpack in over 30-degree heat.

Option B: Pay 5€ to ride up with a truck. Given the temperatures, Option B was definitely the better choice. Since it was the weekend, I was by no means alone and easily outnumbered 50 people on the small area. At first, I was somewhat skeptical due to the large number of people, but that quickly changed; after all, I was the only Western tourist, and it didn’t take long before I found the first conversation partners. You could immediately tell that the people who can afford to vacation here are somewhat more educated, as most spoke excellent English. Later in the evening, I was offered steak, chorizo, bread, rum, whiskey, marshmallows, and much more; of course, I tried everything extensively. The security in the country has improved considerably, yet many still want to leave the country. There is still a great deal of corruption, and the economic situation has recently become rather worse than better. I actually wanted to watch the stars a bit since that night, one could even see the Milky Way without a full moon and without light around. However, if I had stayed out longer, I would surely have woken up with a hangover tomorrow morning, so I quickly went to bed. The night was not good; everything was damp, and the people from the neighboring tents continued to drink, so the snoring background was quite notable. I didn't want to walk into the spider that had made itself comfortable somewhere in my tent in the middle of the night, so I tried to sleep without earplugs. The sunrise was very beautiful, especially when you can watch it comfortably from the tent.

I actually wanted to go directly to Nicaragua, but since neither a bus nor a boat was going there, I spent another night in La Unión before heading to the immigration office at 7 AM the next morning. There was no exit stamp, well, if no one gets it, it must be fine. Instead of a stamp, the entire crew of the boat were allowed to pose for a photo; unfortunately, they didn’t want to send us the photo, which is a pity.
Then after about an hour of waiting, we finally boarded the boat, the journey took less than two hours. The first immigration office was an old table where everyone filled out the usual paperwork. Two soldiers searched all the luggage more or less thoroughly before we proceeded over an idyllic horse pasture to the second office. Here we waited another two hours, as the officials had to take a long break after the first new arrivals. Then we were charged 18$ for entry. Nobody could tell us why it was 18$. The people in front of us had to pay 13$, others 10$, and two people nothing. Well, maybe they still had to pay for lunch. After we finally had our entry stamp in our passports, we headed to the bus. Since I didn’t want to travel by shuttle buses anymore, we had to wait over an hour for the