Back roads of El Salvador

Estero Jaltepeque, El Salvador

This week we enjoyed some travels with our friends Bill and Jean into some less travelled areas of El Salvador (not necessarily intentionally).

Our three-day mini-vacation started with a routine drive to the town of La Palma, in northern El Salvador, not far from the Honduras border.  Bill and Jean had been there before so it was somewhat of a surprise when we found ourselves on the wrong road, heading for the town of Suchitoto instead.  After asking for directions in Suchitoto, we found a slow, winding shortcut to take us back to the main road to La Palma where we arrived a little later than we had originally planned.

After checking into our 2nd choice for hotels for the night (the first being surprisingly busy), we drove a few kilometers outside of town to a fancy resort where we were treated to a great meal.  There did not appear to be anyone staying at the resort and we had the restaurant completely to ourselves, although they assured us that the next day they would be extremely busy.

The next morning, we explored a bit of the town of La Palma (basically two main roads) which is famous for many unique arts and crafts.  Bill and Jean bought several items to help decorate their new home back in the estuary, including an interesting folding table.  We bought one tiny picture for the boat.  After grabbing some cappuccinos to go, we motored south-east toward the town of Suchitoto.

Jean thought it would be a great idea to take a less-travelled route that would include a ferry-ride across Lake Suchitan to Suchitoto.  After only a few wrong turns, we found where the ferry should have been, only to discover that it does not run on Tuesdays and Wednesdays (this was on a Wednesday of course).  We could almost see Suchitoto some 5 kms across the lake but there was no easy way to get there.  We later found out that the ferry had not been running at all for some time, so it probably did not matter what day we had arrived.

Rather than backtrack the way we had come, we persevered onward to find a supposed alternate route across the lake (across a hydroelectric dam as it turns out).  The roads in this area of the country do not seem to be very accurately portrayed on the only maps we have been able to find, so there was a lot of guesswork involved - asking directions was often a futile effort as the locals often did not seem to know how to get to the next town, let alone where we wanted to go.  The roads themselves were not much more than trails at times and the rental car we had was not really the right choice for this type of off-road exercise.  We were constantly bottoming out on rocks and at one point we managed to shred one of the tires.  This was an "economy" rental car so we should not have been too surprised that it had two bald tires and a bald space-saver spare.  To give it its due, it did get us through.



Guard Chickens

Guard Pig

Eventually we found a route to the town of Suchitoto, turning what should have been a 2 or 3 hour drive into an 8-hour marathon.  We arrived as night was falling but it did not stop us from hitting the pool as soon as we were settled into the hotel.  We had a great meal at the hotel's restaurant, then retired to our beds for some much-needed R & R..

Suchitoto is a great little town, sort of the cultural capital of the country, well worth a visit if you ever find yourself in El Salvador.  A colorful colonial town with some real quality art galleries, specializing in "indigo" dyes as well.  Our hotel (we stayed for free as we had won a night's lodging at one of the rally events last spring) was the Los Almendros de San Lorenzo, arguably the most elegant hotel in El Salvador.  It is owned by the former French ambassador, who is a very gracious host and friend of Bill and Jean.  A lot of European charm, with a glass-encased restaurant and a stone swimming pool.

We were only able to stay one night at the Los Almedros hotel as they were fully booked, so we moved to another, not quite so spectacular, hotel around the corner.  We spent a pleasant day walking around the town, shopping for more goodies for Bill and Jean's home, and taking a drive down to the lake (where the ferry would have taken us had it been running) to enjoy a lunch along the waterfront.

 On our last day, we motored the short distance into the city of San Salvador, bought a few hardware and grocery items and proceeded back to the estuary.

Yesterday (Saturday), Jean took us to the town of La Libertad, north-west along the coast, where we immersed ourselves in the daily fish-market at the dock.  If it is fish you want, this is the place to be.  We also visited a sort of thrift-shop where I was able to buy a dozen shirts for a dollar a piece - my wardrobe was in bad need of updating.

Now, back on the boat, I am attempting to resuscitate my ailing batteries.  Using the Honda generator to get them up to a full charge, then letting the solar controller try and equalize them.  I sure hope this works as otherwise I will probably have to invest in a whole new set of batteries for the house bank.  Pictured here are the 6V golf cart batteries that I can get in Sal Salvador - they look like they would work OK, but I would be giving up some capacity compared to my Trojans and I don't know the quality of these batteries.  For now I will just have to wait and see.

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{GMST}13|29.208|N|89|19.1635|W|La Libertad, El Salvador|La Libertad, El Salvador{GEND}
{GMST}13|56.202|N|89|01.5655|W|Suchitoto, El Salvador|Suchitoto, El Salvador{GEND}
{GMST}14|18.93|N|89|10.1076|W|La Palma, El Salvador|La Palma, El Salvador{GEND}

Busy week in the Estuary

Estero Jaltepeque, El Salvador

Yes, it has been a busy week for us here in the Estuary.  Some good, some bad - mostly good...

 

Last Thursday thru Saturday was the big fishing tournament at Bahia del Sol.  We understand that the entries were down from last year, but there were still some 34 boats registered, with at least 4 or 5 people per vessel - we have never seen the marina looking so busy.  There were some pretty big prizes as well (those cars parked around the pool were just some of them).  The best part, for us cruisers, was the bottomless free Rum from the Flor de Cana sponsor.  There were separate competitions for Marlin, Sailfish and "Fun" fish.  The fun fish were primarily Dorado (Mahi Mahi) with a few Tuna thrown in for good luck.

The fishing was good.  The leading boat in the sailfish category landed some 45 fish over the 3 days (These are done on a catch and release basis).  The fun fish are NOT thrown back but are certainly not wasted - some go to the local families in the estuary and others are just cooked up for supper.

A couple of days ago, we were treated to a bit of an adventure on the estuary.  Our new-found friends Lou and Lynn, who have a lovely home along the estuary, took us and our other friends Bill and Jean on a cruise in their powerboat.  We were able to experience the entrance bar in a boat that could actually go in and out at any time - it looked pretty rough out there to us, but Bill assures us that it is virtually flat.  Oh boy, we can hardly wait until we have to tackle that to get out of here.

 

Restaurant prices - 6 beers for $5.95

We cruised up some of the little channels between the estuary and the Rio Lempa, just soaking in the sun and watching daily life along the shores.  We stopped for lunch at a new palapa restaurant along the shore, then cruised back to Lou and Lynn's home for a relaxing swim in their pool in the afternoon.  All in all, it was a great way to spend a day.

Susanne has suddenly decided that we need to get our upholstery recovered while we are here in El Salvador, while we have access to inexpensive material and labour.  With this in mind, we took another trip into the city of San Salvador yesterday, courtesy of our taxi driver Jose, where we visited a big fabric shop and a few other places.  We came back with our best-guess as to what we need to do this job and are going to try and get a local seamstress to do the actual work.  What this really means is that we will have to hang around here for a bit longer yet if we want to see this project though to its completion.  Ezabel, the lady we hope will do the work, is a friend of Bill and Jean, and lives on the same island - just down the block so to speak.

 

Testing the load handling ability of our dinghy

 

Meanwhile, the latest boat issue is with our batteries.  Everything seemed to be going fine until two days ago, when I noticed that our voltage is not holding up very well overnight, even though it appears that we are getting plenty of power from the solar panels during the day.  I started up the trusty Honda generator for a few hours and monitored the battery levels while getting a thorough charge - it seems as if we have one dead cell in one of our batteries, and it is pulling everything else down with it.  I have removed one of the three pairs of batteries, to eliminate the offending unit from the house bank altogether - it is much better now, but our capacity has gone down from 720Ahrs to 480Ahrs as a result.  I fear we may have to look at replacing these batteries while we are here, as they are apparently available locally - something that might not be the case as we venture further south.  I will attempt to rehabilitate the batteries first, but I am not sure I hold out much hope. But that will have to wait for a few days because...

Today, Bill and Jean have arranged for a rental car and we are all going to take a few days to see some more of El Salvador.  Sounds like another adventure.

Bill, the proud land owner!

Boats on moorings in the estuary

A place in the sun

Estero Jaltepeque, El Salvador

Well, we made it safely back down the estuary to our current location, here on a mooring in Bill and Jean's new mooring field, not far from Bahia del Sol.  After a few moments of panic, the short 3-mile trip was uneventful - we went at high-tide this time and never saw a depth less than 9 feet.  The problem of the day this time was a slipping belt on the alternator.  Even though I had run the engine up to speed as a test shortly after we arrived back in the marina, this problem did not decide to appear until we were ready to leave the dock.  Fortunately I am getting really experienced at the contortions required to loosen and adjust the alternator - a direct result of our previous alternator failure back in Z-town on the way down from Mexico last winter.  In a matter of minutes, I had the belts tightened and we were on our way.  An hour later, we were safely tied up to a lovely, new, very substantial looking, mooring.

This is a great location for us, far enough from the busy resort to be nice and quiet, yet close enough to make it a short dinghy ride if we want to join in the party.  So far, we have been pretty busy since the move.  The day we arrived, we spent the afternoon and evening at an impromptu gathering at the resort, with about a dozen other cruisers - it was interesting to hear about everyone's experiences in getting here and their plans for where they are going when they leave.

The only problem with this location is that we cannot pick up any free Wifi Internet here, so I was forced to find out how to enable our Claro Internet stick instead.  After finding out the secret code (email 4777 with a text message of "30"), we are online from the boat again.  Note: We do have the option of taking the dinghy to the resort to use their Internet if necessary and we have done so, usually in conjunction with having lunch at the restaurant, but this is much more convenient.

 On Saturday, Susanne joined a couple of other ladies for a trip into the nearby town of La Herradura, to visit the cemetery where the "Day of the Dead" celebrations were underway.  Lots of painting of tombstones, complete with a local band for entertainment.

On Sunday, our hosts Bill and Jean took us on a trip up the estuary, past our former home at Paradise marina, to meet a very nice American couple who have made their home here, in a very nice, upscale home on the peninsula side of the estuary.  They have a really nice pool, in which we lazed away the afternoon - I can see how you could get used to life here.

Bill and Jean also live here now.  Their home is on the island side of the estuary and is a little more primitive (there are no public utilities on the island), although their lifestyle does not to seem to suffer any as a result.  Since we left here last June, they have completed a lot of the work on their home, and added the mooring field (currently has 6 moorings) where we now reside.  Bill has lots of plans for further expansion in the future.

Studying charts and entering waypoints

Studying Spanish

Right now, we are trying to decide how much longer we should stay here.  The weather does seem to be moderating some - we have had no rain now for over two days.  Temperatures at night are getting down as low as 25 degrees and it does not seem quite as hot and humid during the day as before.  Could this mean that the rainy (and lightning and thunder) season is coming to an end?  One of the other sailboats left yesterday and another is leaving today, both heading in the same direction we will be going.  It will be interesting to see what they encounter as they head south.  They will be keeping in touch via the Pan-Pacific radio net in the mornings.  At present we are still hoping to see a bit more of El Salvador before we leave, and there is really no reason to hurry as far as I can see.  We are hoping that later this week we can rent a car and have Bill and Jean show us some of their favorite places.  This week is a big deal at the resort - a major fishing derby is underway so there is lots of activity with sport fishing boats coming and going and some serious partying in the evenings; or so we have been told - we have been keeping a low profile, staying mostly on the boat during the day, working on the endless list of boat-maintenance items.

Today, I am running our Honda generator for a while, partly to top up our batteries after a couple of partially cloudy days limiting our solar input, but mostly just to use up the old gas that was in it, to try and avoid the same kind of issues we had with the outboard.  So far, it has been running for over an hour and a half on what I thought was about a thimble-full of gas - these things are really efficient on fuel - a much better solution for charging batteries than running our fuel-guzzling diesel engine.


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