Adventures in Central America: Cascadas Tamanique, El Salvador

Surfing and yoga seem to be what most El Tunco tourists do, and since I am not into either, I decided today--my last in Central America--to try to visit the popular waterfalls, Cascadas Tamanique, which are further inland from the coast.

But first I had a huge breakfast on a balcony overlooking the ocean.

There are cheaper ways of getting to the waterfalls, but I opted for easy, and hired a guide--Edwin--and his SUV for $30.

We drove up to the town of Tamanique.

We parked by the square there, and walked out of the town, past a farmer's field or two, and then cut off the road and onto a trail.

At one point yesterday I wondered if I could get to the waterfalls by myself, but I would never have identified the trail without the guide, as it began literally at a break in a fence.

The trail began descending into this valley almost immediately.

You can tell that we ascended quite a ways from the ocean.  The pictures also give a sense for how dry it is right now--Central America's wet season will begin in May.

The hike down is probably half an hour or so, and it is actually quite rough.  Edwin was wearing flip-flops, which was madness if you ask me.  

These sections of the trail are two of the best, so you get a sense for how rough other sections are.

Eventually we reached the first of the set of waterfalls.

There was a family at this set, obviously having a picnic.  They looked like they were set up to be there all afternoon.  Other than them, Edwin and I had the falls to ourselves.

This spot here is probably the loveliest of the falls, and I think it is the third one.

We jumped in here, "showering" under the falls, and swimming.  The water was tremendously refreshing.  There was not much sun today, but it was still very hot, and after our hike (even downhill) we had gotten really hot.

In the dry season the water was probably no deeper than two metres in this pool, but Edwin showed me on the cliff how high the water can get in the wet season, and it is significantly higher--must be more like six metres deep at the deepest.  Edwin also pointed out where people jump from, and even with the water at its highest the jump must be ten metres at least.

While there was no way jumping that was a good idea this time of year, there was a spot Edwin showed me I could jump from in the second pool.  Even here--maybe five metres high--I was far too scared, and it didn't help when Edwin said he had hurt his arm jumping last time and wouldn't jump today.  I knew I would regret not jumping, however, so I simply climbed further down until I got to a point I thought was reasonable:

If I'm generous to myself I could say it was probably about three metres, but it might have been even as little as two.  I was still terrified, but Edwin counted to three and I leapt.  It was exhilarating and wonderful.  I did it two or three more times, but always from the same spot.  Thankfully there were no little Salvadorean children there to make fun of my cowardice.

I suppose in total we were at the waterfalls for an hour.  That was plenty for me, but I'm sure if you brought a picnic you could stay much longer, because just sitting beside the waterfalls was as nice as jumping into them (albeit less of an adrenaline rush).

Of course, climbing out of the valley was a lot more work than descending, and I am not exaggerating when I say this is a pretty serious hike, even if it is only half an hour.

Back in Tamanique Edwin and I bought $1 beers at the corner store and drank them on the drive back.  I had a postcard I wanted to mail, and Edwin told me the only post office was in La Libertad, about ten minutes down the highway from El Tunco.  I asked him if he would drive me there for another $5, and he agreed, so we did that and then he dropped me off by my hotel around 14:00 or so.

I was lazy most of the rest of the afternoon, but I did get into the ocean again for a bit.  I was also lucky to run into a Canadian couple from Winnipeg who I had actually met in Antigua.  It turned out that they're heading home tomorrow too, on the same flight, so we agreed to share a cab to the airport bright and early tomorrow morning.  

Before dinner I enjoyed the El Tunco sunset once again.  Even with some cloud cover it was still spectacular.

Adventures in Central America: El Tunco, El Salvador

Another early day; this time, I was outside the hostel in Copan before 5:00, and picked up around a quarter after.  Thankfully I had slept much better than Saturday night, and this shuttle was especially comfortable, and there were only three of us, so that meant lots of room.  I got to lay across three seats and nap.

Although it is not intuitive, the fastest way from Copan, Honduras to El Salvador is through Guatemala.  So we began our morning at the border crossing I had crossed two days ago.  Once again it went really smoothly, and there were no taxes from either country.

We drove in Guatemala for about 90 minutes, I think (I was dozing, so not quite sure) before we reached the border with El Salvador.  Here we got out passports stamped, but my Guatemalan stamp clearly indicates "entrada" rather than "salida" (so I now have three "entrada" stamps and one "salida" stamp), so I think the woman might not have realized what direction we were traveling.  Then in El Salvador the guards simply came to the van and talked to us.  They seemed confused, and we had lots of difficulty communicating but eventually they waved us through without stamping our passports.  Apparently this is normal--I guess I will see how it goes over at the airport on Thursday when I leave El Salvador.  In any case, for now I am somewhat pleased because, as much as I love passport stamps, I realized that two years into my ten year passport I have already filled it halfway!  It would be a shame to have to renew it before it is much closer to expiry.

We stopped in El Salvador in a town called Metapan at a chicken fast food place for breakfast.  It was a bustling place.  Here was my view sitting by the shuttle waiting for the driver:

I got a coffee and a muffin at the chicken place, then walked down the street to get a banana.  They use US dollars in El Salvador, which is kind of nice because it is familiar.

I stayed awake the rest of the way, watching the El Salvadorian countryside and cities of Santa Ana and Santa Tecla (a suburb of San Salvador) go by.

We could see the Pacific Ocean by 10:30, and arrived in El Tunco by 11:00.  I could not check in at my hotel until noon, so I sat at a cafe and ordered a banana smoothie and chicken quesadilla.

The smoothies in Central America have been wonderful, and by Canadian standards really cheap (usually +/- $2).  

I was pretty lazy for the rest of the afternoon, just relaxing in the shade, mostly, and enjoying the ocean view.  

Around 16:00, with the sun a little less intense, I donned my swim trunks and went on in.  The beach is actually quite rocky at first and not very pleasant, but after that there is lovely sand, and the water is a perfect temperature. 

After swimming I showered and changed and got up onto a patio of a bar to watch El Tunco's famous sunset.

Adventures in Central America: Copan Ruinas, Honduras

Today was my first day this trip without some sort of travel--unless you call a horseback ride into the hills a sort of travel!

I began my day with breakfast in my hostel's backyard again, then arranged a horseback ride with the hostel owner.  Shortly after 9:00 a man more or less my age arrived at the door and led me around the block to where he had tied up the horses.

He indicated which one I was to mount, and the two of us headed off out of Copan.  My guide's name was Wilson, and he was friendly despite the fact that our language barrier was among the steepest I faced in communicating with tourism workers in Central America.  We forded the Copan River on our way out of town, which was something I had never done on horseback before.  Splashing through the cool water was lovely because it was already a warm morning.

Once on the other side we rode along the river for awhile.  We saw a bird that I believe my guide told me was a relative of the famous quetzal (after which Guatemala has named its currency).  It had an incredible tail, far longer than its body, and did not seem all that perturbed by our presence, it simply watched us ride by.

At some point we began ascending towards a village called Los Sapos.

It was about 10:30 when arrived in the village, and my guide had us dismount to let the horses rest and go for water.

He then led me down a path for a ways and to where there were some Mayan ruins, including toad statues, which is how the village gets its name, because toad in Spanish is sapo.

From there we returned to the village, and while the guide went off to find the horses, I joined a couple local boys playing soccer on their "field."

We descended into Copan the same way we had come up, and we got back just after noon.  My guide dropped me off and I went for lunch.  I spent most of the rest of my afternoon around the central square, reading my novel and relaxing.

Adventures in Central America: Copan Ruinas, Honduras

My day started probably earlier than any day of my life has, at 3:40.  I do not want to ever do this again, but, given the terrible time, my 4:00 shuttle from Antigua to Copan Ruinas, Honduras, went superbly.  I was the first passenger picked up, so got to sit in the front, which meant both greater comfort and superior view; the trip was two hours less than I feared it would be; and the border procedures went super smoothly!

I have seen a lot of confusion online about Guatemala and Honduras entry/exit taxes, so I may as well add my two bits: Guatemala had no exit tax (may have had an entry tax, but it would have been included in my flight cost); Honduras has a fee for what I thought was a tourist visa (but actually seems more like a receipt when you read it, except that it was inserted loosely into my passport), that clearly indicates $3.00.

Interestingly though, I was told I had to pay in either quetzales or lempiras.  This was no problem for me (in fact I wanted to get rid of some quetzales), but it was still odd; also, I was charged 30 quetzales, which is more like $4 USD.  Something else that was interesting was both Guatemalan and Honduran officials made certain I was going "only to Copan," so for some reason that mattered to them.

I should also comment on money changing, because I know I find these types of observations helpful.  First, I was pleasantly surprised at the rate these somewhat sketchy looking people (including two women) were giving as they sat on plastic chairs outside of the passport control office.  As I check the rate online now, I see they were maybe taking as much as a 5% cut, so obviously they do alright for themselves.  But, the rate they gave was 3 lempiras for 1 quetzales, so nice and uncomplicated, and I felt like it was good service to be able to change my money right there while waiting for my fellow shuttle passengers to get their passports stamped.  However, I do think the man I dealt with tried to short change me by 10 quetzales/30 lempira (which is only a couple bucks, really, so even if I had let him get away with it still not the end of the world).  I had my calculator open on my phone to calculate along with him and showed him his mistake and he fixed it politely (it is, I suppose, possible it was a genuine error, but I doubt it).

Once across the border, Copan is just ten more kilometres, and we arrived at 10:00.

I was exhausted from lack of sleep, and also dehydrated and hungry, because, although we did have one stop prior to the border, I had not eaten or drank much, and it was far hotter than it had been at any point during my few days in Guatemala.  Actually, it was not even that hot, but the sun was extremely intense.

Copan is small, so after applying sunscreen diligently, I walked across it and I checked in at my hostel, the Iguana Azul, which seems lovely.

This is my nice, quiet, street:

The owners also have a bed and breakfast next door, and when they told me they were still serving breakfast, I decided I better do that.  I drank over a litre of water, and had a big cup of coffee, and freshly squeezed orange juice, eggs, bread and marmalade, and so on in the bed and breakfast's garden, and it was wonderful.

Then I showered and lay down for an hour before deciding I better make the most of my afternoon.  I walked along the outskirts of Copan towards the main highway.

Along the highway there's a bit of a pedestrian path out of the town and to the main ruins (there are minor Mayan ruins all over the countryside around Copan), and even in the heat of the day it was quite a pleasant walk.

I bought my ticket at the ticket office ($15 USD) and entered the park.

Before reaching the ruins, there's a nature walk off to one side, and I decided to take that path first.  

It was really peaceful and the shade was nice.  I disturbed countless lizards and a frog or toad, but actually did not seem much in terms of wildlife.  

I enjoyed the walk anyway and eventually I reached a spot where I could see the Copan River gurgling by.

I looped back to the main path and entered the gates at the ruins.  The first thing I saw here was not Mayan relics but macaws up in the tree!  I watched them for a while before finally carrying on, but it was not my last encounter with these incredibly gorgeous birds!

More serious tourists than I would have hired a guide or else joined a tour of the ruins, but I just clambered around on my own and read the article about them on Wikipedia.  

There's little point in me trying to recall what I read in a Wikipedia article, and the pictures give a good idea of what the ruins are like visually.  

I think for the most part the artwork (see jaguar, for example, below) is at least partially reconstructed.

Obviously there has been less reconstructive work on the temple structures such as this one with full grown tress growing out of them!

This staircase is by far Copan's most significant Mayan ruin (again largely reconstructed), because of all the hieroglyphs (which the picture doesn't capture).  Because it is so historically valuable, the staircase is permanently covered by the canvas, whereas the other ruins are entirely exposed to the elements.

This structure is part of a sports field (the bird's head you can just see towards the centre left is apparently where one team scored their points).  I overheard a guide tell a large tour group that little is known about how this game was played.

After seeing what I wanted of the ruins, I headed back towards the gate, and lucky me, it was macaw feeding time!  The macaws are being reintroduced to the area, so they were born in pseudo-captivity (there is a macaw sanctuary near Copan) and are now in the archaeological park free to fly as they wish.  At least daily and maybe more often, however, the macaws are fed by humans, so presumably few have much incentive to go far from the park.  They are tame enough to allow people to get quite close.  I might have spent as long watching the macaws as I did looking at the ruins, because they are both (obviously) colourful and have incredible (mostly obnoxious and grouchy) personalities! 

Once I tore myself away from watching the macaws, I walked back into Copan.

I had not eaten since the late breakfast at the hostel, and now it was about 16:00, so I stopped for a late lunch of pupusas.

Then I climbed to more or less the top of the village (Copan is almost entirely on a hill, with the Copan River at the bottom) . . . 

. . . to where there is an old fort . . . 

. . . and Catholic shrine . . .

. . . as well as a view of the valley.

When I came back down the street . . .

. . . and into the centre square, I was in the middle of a political rally, that was clearly the highlight of this early Sunday evening.