Day 18 Friday 12th October: Living ‘La Vida Loca’

John writes: our day started with a beautiful balcony view down river towards the Pacific surfers paradise.

A quality breakfast was marred by loud gringos so we escaped for a day to go local amongst the El Salvadorians. Retracing last night’s steps, we walked along the coast seeing huge rollers crashing onto very black beaches covered in pebbles and rocks. We took some time out to watch some pretty impressive surfing but weren’t tempted to join in!

Having walked through El Tunco’s 2 streets we realised it wasn’t much different in the daylight so headed a couple of miles down the coast to Playa San Blas which felt more like a lunar landscape than beach.

Our only access was through the Blas Hotel, where we parked the Porsche under armed guard and walked along the largely deserted beach with huge waves but unsuitable for surfing. A number of run down resorts added to the bleakness but a passing butterfly

appeared all the more beautiful against this austere background and Mike performed gallantly dancing through the boulders for this shot!

The price for guarding the car was to spend $12/head at the hotel which we bravely attempted with some beers and water. However it was a great opportunity to watch real life in the opposite favela style fishing village.

Highlight was a small boy who had collected water from the river in a plastic container, was pouring the water into small holes in the sand and then trying to catch the crabs as they bolted out and across the beach.

On returning through the hotel we found our brave guard had, in true El Salvadorian entrepreneurial fashion, turned his skills to cleaning the pool but not letting go of his pump action shot gun!

We lunched at Beto’s Restaurant in La Liberdad up on a cliff overlooking the Pacific Ocean – a routine stop for the Porsche Club of Guatemala on their road trips to El Salvador. Stunning location, beautiful views and extensive menu full of local produce and especially seafood.

Our appetisers were plantain chips topped with ceviche and warm avocados with prawns – absolutely delicious although the Albarino wasn’t so good! Main courses of different styles of fish soup followed were as good as the starters but the Pinot Grigio was an improvement!

As we finished our lunch a full Salvadorian family arrived for a full gourmet lunch – grand parents, parents and numerous grand children with grand father very much the Don Francis of that family. We returned to a car park full of Porsche’s highlighting the dramatic differences of the lunch time haves and fishing village have nots of ‘La Vida Loca’ of El Salvador.

Tomorrow we fly to Panama and Panama City – our fifth country and we are sure another very different place.