copan was pleasant but there was not a hell of a lot to see in a 6k person town so we just relaxed in our pretty cool hostel and recovered from our sardine shuttle.
off to the ruins the next day which were pretty cool and had some awesome carvings and hieroglyphs but at double the price of tikal they just dont quite compare
took a couple of local buses down to santa rosa de copan in the arvo, a random little town we stopped in to break up the journey down to el salvador. this was also the start of about a week off the gringo trail when we did not see another tourist the entire time.
our hotel was dingy but doable, and i was pleased to eventually discover the powerpoint above the shower was not the only one in the room.
grabbed a bus down to the border the next day, smooth border crossing and very quick transit only a local bus down to la palma; this little guy ran up and grabbed my pack which wasnt far off the size of him, and ran over to the bus and chucked it on and we boarded as it drove out the gate.
la palma was a cool little mountain town famous for its art so there were heaps of murals on all the walls and tons of shops where you could check out the locals doing their stuff. mum would have loved it. our hotel was pretty nice with hammocks, murals all through the room and pool out the back. i had to use my middle eastern toilet fixing magic but aparts from that it was great.
went off to hike to the top of el salvador - el pital at 2730m the next morning. turned out to be a fairly simple operation really. just had to wait half an hour for the bus i knew would come sometime and take me to this random little town called san ignacio then wait another hour or so for the bus that would take me up suicide road number 743 into the mountains. if ezza was worried about getting a few inquisitive perusals in la palma it was lucky she opted to stay in bed cos i did get a few looks waiting in san ignacio and even more on the bus up to my stop at rio chiquito. tiny little village from which the road not trail to the top of el salvador starts. exchanged greetings with a few more surprised faces as i walked up to the summit. didnt take too long and wasnt too hard. my beautiful views will be waiting for me next time i guess cos they were not to be seen this time. there is a beautiful little campsite up on top and i can imagine it would be magical on a clear day.
then went off to check out this big rock along from the summit which is accessed by a slippery log bridge with a wire to hold onto which does help but twists here and there forcing you to go under or over it a couple times in the middle of your crossing when you are probably a good 20m up. am sure the view from here is good too, just not today. only when i had successfully navigated back across the bridge that i noticed there was another log bridge which of course looked a hell of a lot easier than my tightrope routine. was a lot of cool looking trails around there which i would have liked to explore but didnt. there was no view and all of them looked very similar and all seemed to say ´pick me, ill get you proper lost i will´
not many buses a day up that way so had time to fill and went off walking down miramundo way. would translate to something like ´look at the world´ and from what i saw the world is white and fluffy. did clear a little when i was walking down some other random road and seeing the dense green highlands spread out beneath you is pretty nice. got semi attacked by some rabid dogs on the way back but kung fu master me fended all three of them off successfully until their owner came out and yelled at them.
had lunch in a cool little restaurant; ´restaurante normy´ which did sound a little funny to me but the food was good. bus got me back down successfully and found ezza in the hammock listening to redneck jokes on my ipod, which she apparently had been doing most of the day.
was a cool day which i am guessing not many people bother to do, pretty easy; just would have been an issue if something had happened i.e broken leg cos i was a long way from help.
but all good.
beautiful day the next day of course, views would have been awesome-probably could have see 3 countries from up there but we were off to santa ana. were gonna take a shortcut but the moron on the bus with no teeth who i couldnt understand cos he was undoubtedly simple didnt know how to help so we ended having to go through san salvador which is just another big city.
dont recall alot about santa ana as i had the squirts, got v dehydrated and spent most of my time lying in bed watching cable. suffice to say i dont really recommend visiting santa ana!
down to lago coatepeque the next day when the worst of my discomfort had passed. had great connections again jumping on bus 220 'el lago' as it was driving out of the terminal. arrived in a torrential downpour to our hostel which seemed to have a few drainage issues but we managed to secure a room above the water line and basically had the place to ourselves. is a beautiful lake in an old volcano crater that could have done with some more exploring if i had more energy.
was gonna go volcano climbing but thought i would rest up for the ones in nicaragua so we headed over to san miguel for our last night in el salvador. another el salvadorian city which was neither good nor bad just another city
it was cool to go to el salvador and check out what a lot of people dont bother with. we basically had the country to ourselves and didnt hear any english at all really which stretched my ol survival spanish a bit. it has a nice places but nothing spectacular that you cant find in one of the more touristy neighbouring countries, so i can understand why visitors are few.
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