More Travel Pictures

I think I have things under control now, but who knows? 

Anyway, after we saw all the ruins, the next day was spent looking at volcanos and seeing the cloud forest.  It was pretty overcast and misty, but we saw some amazing stuff.

This is a cloud forest - it was all jungle and forest as we climbed up the volcano.  Climbed isd prob ably too strong a word, we actually hiked.  Or walked, Or strolled.  which ever works. 

El Salvador grows a lot of coffee.

Yes, I suppose I am a bit obsessed with foood.

Here is our driver and friend, Ernesto at the waterfall.

 A couple of kids playing - see the next picture as well.

                                   


Here I am enjoying the falls.

Here is Mike doing the same thing.

Another waterfall shot.

San Salvador from the top of a volcano.

Here is a volcano as seen from our hotel room in San Salvador.

 So all and all it was a wonderful trip.  I can hardly wait to go backand see more.

We have also talked about going into Zacatecaluca for shopping - taking the bus and all.  It is also where we go to pick up mail.  So here are some pictures of that process. 

Here is where we walk to change buses - you just hop off and hike up this hill.

Here is the crowded bus,  Sometimes people bring their chickens, but not this time. Mike does not mind the crowds!

Here is Zacatecoluca.

And again.  I think this was the trip we got rained on - see the storm brewing? 

And this must be the best way to travel that I have seen yet- setting up a hammack in the back of a pickup truck.

 So that is it for now.  I hope tbhis sort of shows where we are and what we are doing.  I just love it here.

"The best day of your life is the one on which you decide your life is your own. No apologies or excuses. No one to lean on, rely on, or blame. The gift is yours - it is an amazing journey - and you alone are responsible for the quality of it. This is the day your life really begins."  (Bob Moawad)

More Adventures in the Tropics

Sorry about opening with an unidentified picture,  Another technological problem I can't solve.  Anyway, these are the pictures we took while touring San Salvador and the surronding area.  The picture on top is of a Mayan ruin.  This one was particularly interesting because it was covered in volcanic ash, and therefore survived quite well.  The other ruins we have seen were mainly palaces and seats of government and temples and the like.  This one is an example of how regular people lived.  Without being  preserved in volcanic ash, these mud and wattle dwellings would not survive.

This is Ernesto, our driver and good friend.


One really fabulous lunch!  I love eating fish this way - it is guttted, and then the whole thing is fried.  The tortillas are thick and roasty flavored, and you get more veggies than you do in Mexico.

A really beautiful lake.  We had lunch overlooking it.  I would not mind living on these shores!

And now, I have sadly discovered the rest of the pictures of the trip are stored on the other computer - sigh - so this is all I have for now.  I am currently hating computers - I wanted to post pictures of our jungle trip yesterday but I cna't make it work as they are saved wrong.  I really don't understand why this all has to be so complicated!  So anyway, I am going to end this sad little post and see what I can do to get more pictures up.

“Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.” 
(Oscar Wilde)

 

La Comida y Mas

I have been putting off writing because I wanted to add pictures.  But due to a variety of technological reasons, I haven't been able to do that.  So I decided to just go ahead and make a post anyway.  Plus I have just been lazy.

There is a publication called Latitude 38 that you can find online.  It is a sailing magazine out of the SF bay area, but in their June issue there is an article about our El Salvador rally.  There are pictures of some of our friends and even a glimpse of me.  Anyway, you can find it if you google Latitude 38, find the June 2012 issue, and then find the San Salvador rally story.

Since I last posted, we went to San Salvador for four days.  The trip was really amazing - we saw Mayan ruins, volcanos, a big lake viewed from a volcano, a waterfall we got to swim in, a wonderful market, and what I think is the Cabo of El Salvador, the surf town of La Libertad.  Best of all, we had dinner at the home of our driver and friend, Ernesto.   I am going to postpone describing the trip until I have the pictures.

But what I will talk about is Salvadoran food.  I really love it, especially the breakfasts.   I know I already sang the praises of pupusas.  I could go on and on because those lovely thick tortillas stuffed with beans and meat (and cheese for everyone except me) are absolutely to die for.  And depending on what you stuff them with, they are not bad for you.  They are not fried, and I make mine with soy chorizo and beans, neither of which are high fat.  The dough is made from corn and does not have fat in it.  Now what is fattening is the fried plantains. Absolutely delicious and I will give up pancakes and waffles for them.  (Oh I forgot to mention regarding pupusas - they are served with curtido, which is made from cabbage and is like a cross between sauerkraut and kimchee.)  Now if one is not in the mood for pupusas, there are Salvadoran tamales.  In El Salvador, they eat tamales as a breakfast item rather than for lunch and dinner, although you do see them at other times.  The only real difference is that tamales here are steamed in banana leaves rather than in corn husks.  Then there are these other things that are just like tamales, except that they are thinner, not filled with anything, are just slightly sweet, and after they are steamed, are fried or at least cooked again on a grill.  I forgot what their name is.  And finally, there is casamiento, which I made this morning, along with our fried eggs and plantains.  Casamiento is like a Salvadoran version of red beans and rice, except that the beans used are refried beans.  And these beans are not the same refried beans you get in Mexico.  There you either get pinto beans or black beans, depending on what part of the country you are in.  The beans here are red beans, sort of like kidney beans.  They are very good. 

Salvadorans also like chicken.  Besides having live ones running around all over the place (some of the largest, fattest chickens I have ever seen), they have several different chicken fast food chains, at least one of which is very good.  They also have KFC, and they seem to love American fast food places and have them all - Burger King, Wendy's. McDonalds, Pizza Hut, and so on.  There is somthing called Gallina India (Gallina means chicken,  so does pollo) that I haven't tried yet and am not sure what exactly it is.  But it is heavily advertised at the little roadside comedors - diners - that one passes as one drives between here and San Salvador.  They are not what we think of as real restaurants - just shacks or even awnings along the side of the road with wood stoves to cook on.  They also advertise their chicken soup, and I haven't had that yet, either.  I did try atole, which is a hot drink made from corn.  It tasted just like cream corn out of the can, but better.  Mike had some that had pineapple in it.  I thought mine was better.  I had wanted to go to this restaurant in San Salvador that I read about that specialized in exotic stuff like lizard and goat, but unfortuately it was not there anymore.  So no lizard for me!  Actually I would only try the lizard as an appetizer, not am entree.  I would have had the goat.

Here on the estuary where the boat is anchored, the emphasis, of course, is fish and shellfish.  The most popular way to eat fish is to fry the whole thing, head and all, except for the innards.  It is delicious - the fish just falls off the bones and all that is left on your plate is a skeleton with a head.  It is usually served with a salad and those wonderful thick tortillas.  (They eat more vegetables here than in Mexico - you almost always get some steamed veggies of some sort when you order a plate of food.)       

Speaking of fish, we went to a great fish market out on a pier while we were in La Libertad and bought some filets that Mike cooked last night - marinated in something like Italian salad dressing and then cooked in olive oil with garlic. It was wonderful!  We also had brown rice (the leftovers went into this morning's casamiento) and cucumber salad.  Then we even shared the dish-doing - which I was grateful for, since I usually do them myself. 

So if you notice when I next post pictures that I am a bit on the portly side - well, that is because I am eating very, very well.  Too well.  Waay too well.

Otherwise, until I report on my trip, there is not a lot of news.  A new boat come in yesterday.  The people on three other boats are away on roadtrips.  It is pretty quiet around here, although we still meet with the other boats everyday for pool time and drinks.  We did experience having to deal with customs when we needed to pay a duty on something we had sent to us, but although there was a fair amount of sitting around and waiting (next time I will bring a book), the process was actually quite smooth, the officials were pleasent to deal with, and the payment was reasonable.  I had two dresses and two blouses made for me, and there is another dress waiting to be picked up.  These are sundresses and the like, made by a woman who lives on the island that is directly across the estuary from the hotel.  (We are anchored between the hotel side and the island.)  She makes everything on an old foot pedal machine because there is no electricity on the island.  She does have a fan attached to a couple of car batteries for use when it gets too hot to sew without it.  I also have plans for a pair of light, drawstring pants as well.  Her prices are extremely reasonable, and fabric down here is cheap and plentiful.  I will have a new wardrobe custom made for me, and how amazing is that?  We are really enjoying life here in this tropical paradise.  Stay tuned, there really is more to come.

"All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds, wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act on their dreams with open eyes, to make them possible."  (T.E. Lawrence)




              

Lazy Days

That is exactly the way to describe my life these days.  I get up, have breakfast, do some minor chores, read, sit in the pool and visit, eat some more, and that is about it.  Sounds boring, but it isn't.

Yesterday we took two girls who were guests at the hotel on a dinghy ride through the mangroves.  It was great - cattle egrets, four eyed fish, different kinds of crabs, some yellow bird I have yet to identify, and a lizard swimming his way across the estuary.  Mike told me that when he and another friend went on a mangrove trip with our Salvadorian friend Rogelio, Rogelio netted a lizard and threatened to eat it.  They do eat lizard down here - it is called Garrabo and there are restaurants in San Salvador that have it on the menu.  I just might try some if I get my courage up.

The four eyed fish have two sets of eyes - one set is on top of the water and the other is below the water.  They sort of swim on the surface.  I had never heard of such a thing, but there they are.  I heard that there are caymen (alligator type things) around the estuary but I don't believe it - maybe at one time, but they would all be eaten by now.  Mike and his friend and Rogelio often take the dinghy and spend an afternoon in the mangroves, catching fish and fixing it over an open fire.  They use whatever they can find on the beach to make the fire, which means using trash that has washed up to get the fire going if the wood is wet, which it often is because it rains all the time.  They have a great time doing this, and because Rogelio speaks little to no English, Mike is getting better at understanding Spanish.

We went into the town of Zacatecaluca the other day because we though there was mail for us at the post office.  Here, even though the mail is addressed to us at the hotel, it only goes as far as the PO.  This is because mail for the hotel is brought in by a motorcycle courier, who can only carry letter sized things.  So any packages have to be picked up at the  PO, which is an hour and forty-five minute bus ride from here.  When we got there, we found out we did not have a package, rather, the last time we were there (about four days prior) the PO employee did not full out the paperwork correctly and needed us to come back and give some information.  Apparently he was in trouble with his boss for doing it wrong, and because we were so prompt in answering his summons, we are now very popular with the staff at the PO.  Truthfully, if we had known what is was about we would likely have just waited until we needed to go to town again, rather than make a special trip.  But all in all it was a good decision, because now they know us and they will take special care with our mail.  Here is what they say about Salvadorian buses:  How many people can you fit on a Salvadorian bus? One more!

I will leave you with a quote from Che Guevara - a very big hero throughout Latin America, there are pictures of him everywhere.  I did some research, saw The Motorcyle Diaries, and have decided he was a complicated figure in many ways, defying any particular label. 

"Man truly achieves his full human condition when he produces without being compelled by the physical necessity of selling himself as a commodity."  Ernesto "Che" Guevara

Pictures

This post is dedicated to posting pictures.   These were taken on our beach trip as well as when we took our dinghies down the estuary to a restaurant.  Here are some of the things we are seeing here on a daily basis.  I have been terribly lazy about this blog, and I hope to start doing better. 


This is me standing in front of a bathroomat a estuary restaurant.  It wa jsut a structure built around a hole leading into the estuary.

 When you go to the market to buy crabs, this is how they come - tied together in a bundle.

Here are our friends pulling up to the estuary restaurant in their dinghy.

 This is an estuary restaurant.  They pretty much only serve fried fish and shrimp, but it is great. 

Here are our friends coming through a clearing in the mangroves.

This is a harbor for fishing boats.  There are all different kinds and sizes.

 Here is dinner at an estuary restaurant - friend fish, shrimps, rice, and pico de gallo.

This is our friends and Mike eating dinner at the beach house we all stayed at last week.

Here we are at the estuary restaurant after our dinghy trip through the jungle mangroves.  Our friend Santos led the way.

Here is a gecko.  They are every where,  I would not mind one on the boat, we would never have a bug problem.

IF you want coconuts, you must pay someone a dollar to climb up and get some.

Here are  kids playing checkers on the streets here in El Salvador.  Things got pretty heated, one kid was chased away.  Who knew checkers could be so cut throat!

Here are two of the local canoes - one is a dugout.  They are both in use.

Here is a woman canoeing her way down the estuary.  We see her almost daily, delivering laundry.

Here are locals on their way down the estuary.  People here are very friendly.

Mangroves. 

This is our anchorage.  Magda Jean is the first boat on the right.

Here is where Mike and I slept at the beach house.  The beds had mosquito netting over them.

Enruique, our chef at the beach house.  Here he was referred to as the "cook boy."  He was an excellent chef.

An oxcart in the middle of the road.  A new kind of traffic jam. 

Fishing pangas at rest.

A road side restaurant on our way to the beach house.  Our driver, Ernesto, took us here,  The food was wonderful, the beer was cold.  They did all the cooing over wood fires.

Road cows!

A panga at sunset - I took this off my boat.

Here is an estuary structure with people waving to us as we went by.

Ok, that is it for today.  Our plan for today is to deliver one of our old solar panels to a family living on an island near here - a place with no electricity or running water.  Earlier we had a fund raiser (when all the cruisers were still here) and bought and installed water purifiers for each family on the island.  I am also dropping off some material to have a couple of dresses made for me at a grand total of ten dollars per.  The fabric was also extremely inexpensive.  I am looking forward to looking good!

Most everyone has gone from here, leaving only about four boats.  Some of the people have sailed south to Costa Rica and Panama, or back to Mexico, and others have left their boats here and are back in the US or Canada for the summer.  We plan to be here for another couple of months.  It is a good place to base some further exploration of Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Honduras, as well as Belize.  It was hard to see some people leave - this is the first place I felt like I really got to know some of these people and I hope we meet up somewhere later.  A number of them plan to go through the canal to the Caribbean - our plan of course is to turn right at the canal and head off to the Marquesas and the south pacific.  It was a great group of people while it lastetd.  Now we are down to about four boats, luckily we like them all.  I suppose people will be coming and going throughout the summer.  We will spend the fall and  winter in Costa Rica and Panama.  But all these plans could change at any moment. 

Our new rain catching system works well.  We just have to remember to keep things really clean, or we could be drinking bird poop!

  "Any damn fool can navigate the world sober.  It takes a really good sailor to do it drunk."  (Sir Francis Chichester)

Catch-Up

I realize that I have gotten behind in my entries here - but our internet access has been limited.  We have also been busy with this and that - it is a great place to be.  This post was written about a week ago, but the internet connection went down before I could publish it.  Here it is verbatim.

We have had rain twice since the big storm.  The first time, about three days ago, the wind came up and it rained hard for a short perid of time, just like the last time except the wind only got up to about 30 knots.  One cruiser said they clocked the wind at 50 knots, but I don't think it was anyhere near that.  It did not last very long, but we were ready for any problems.  There was a lot of thunder and lightening (lightning?  Never have been sure about it).  A day or so late, we had a nice, long soaking rain with no high winds or thunder or lightning (I am going to go with this spelling until otheriwse informed).  I sat out in the cockpit under the bimini and just enjoyed the sound, smell, and the look of the rain.  I will never get over enjoying rain in almost any circumstance, and when there is nothing to have to monitor or worry about, it is even better to be on the boat in the rain.

That is all that was saved before I lost the connection.  A lot has happened since then.

It rains almost every niht now, but without any problems.  Just some wind, and then comes the rain.  It reminds me of Camelot - "The rain may never fall til after sundown".   We took the ceiling down and added insulation, so it should stay cooler in the cabin.  We made a raincatcher to augment our drinking water supply, but it has not rained enough yet to be able to tell how it is working.  We also discovered that it is possible to have drinking water brought to the boat and the tanks filled for about $25.00, which is pretty good. 

I should note that this computer lost most of its keyboard functions one day when I accidentally left a window not battened down tight enough when I washed the boat down, and water came in, wetting the keyboard.  So we bought a new keyboard, which works except that it is in Spanish, and arranged differently than what I am used to.  So there will be more typos than ever, sorry about that!  I have never been good at editing my own work.

A couple of days ago we took a three day trip to the coast just south (east, actually) of where we are now.  We went with two other couples, and stayed at a beach house.  We swam in the ocean (very warm water), relaxed in their pool, ate well with the assistance of the "cook boy" provided gratis by the owners of the beach house (all very "Night of the Iguana"-ish but in a good way), slept under mosquito netting, and listened to the surf all night long.  It was also the first time I heard rain on a palapa roof.  A wonderful sound, and very conducive to sleep.  I learned to play a domino game callled Mexican Train - it was fun, easy, not any complicated math, no teams, and I really enjoyed it despite the fact I usually don't like games.  We are planning to get our own set of dominos to play it the next time we take a shopping trip to San Salvador. 

I promise to provide some pictures with the next posting, but I wanted to get this one off as it had been some time since I posted.  Anyway - tbings are fine, we are fine, and still loving El Salvador!

"After all,  the best part of a holiday is perhaps not so much to be resting yourself, as to see all the other fellows busy working."  (Kenneth Graham)