Apparently it´s been a week since we last posted anything! Really falling behind here...so, I will probably cover more information than usual today. I´m writing today from Alegria, El Salvador...computers are pretty hard to come by, but the one I found actually has a regular English keyboard. I didn´t know this before our trip but in latin america they use a slightly different keyboard...you may have noticed that I have not been capitalizing letters and leaving out a lot of punctuation, now you know why.
The last few days have been some of the quietest of our trip, due mostly to food poisoning, recieved somewhere in El Zonte...got me a bit, but hit Sophia pretty hard (don´t worry folks, she is recovering well). In the last few days we have set new records on brick breaker (you blackberry users know what i´m talking about), mastered sudoku and gone through miles of toilet paper...lol...sorry, I had to do it.
Before the sickness we were having a great time in El Zonte, super tranquilo little beach town where your either in the surf business, resturant business or hotel business. We took a lesson from Alex Novoa the owner(with his wife) of Escenia Nativa , a surf hostel and surf school...we learned some great techniques and really got an incresed appreciation for surfing. With so many great surf spots along the way we are both much more inspired to work on our skills and get to enjoy some world class waves! I got to spend some great time hanging out practicing spanish and practicing rum drinking with the locals...these guys all live a pretty simple life, board shorts are the official uniform and they are either surfing or teaching surfing. Our lesson did end with some drama, 4 local girls hanging out in the ocean got pulled in by the rip tide, 3 were brought to shore relatively easily while 1 was pulled out past the 6=8foot breaking waves...Alex came to the rescue, paddled through the surf on long board got the girl and after the 30minute ordeal brought her safely to shore. I have no doubt that those girls learned a whole new appreciation for the ocean!
As many of you have seen, Sophia and I set up our own youtube channel, so I wanted to link up a couple videos for you...first is the class 4 rapid we went over when rafting with omega tours in La Ceiba
Next is the pulhapanzak waterfall...the video really doesn´t do it justice, but when we arrive they tell us that there are caves behind the waterfall that you can take a path to...I suppose that´s one way to put it...the other would be start with a small cliff jump in bubbling pool of fast moving water, climb out of there and hop from rock to rock until literally through the waterfall and clinging to rocks for dear life, not to mention with millions of gallons of water coming down you can´t see the person in front of you, making holding hands the only way to know which way to go...then you realize the person your holding onto (sophia) has let go of the rest of group and your stranded yelling and hoping that the guide comes back for you! Of course he does and leads you a few more steps to a small cave behind the falls, there you get to rest before doing it all over again...
El Salvador has been an amazing experience. The tourist travel here is a fraction of the other countries we have visted and I like it. I´m sure it won´t stay this way forever as all good things are eventually exploited...obviously, once a cities economy becomes based on tourism, things change, for the most part, El Salv is not that way, the vendors push items harder on the locals than they do us and besides being starred at and having little kids call me a Gringo, it great.
Another very memorable experience was our visit to Tacuba, El Salv. We stayed at hostel mama y papa´s and did some pretty hardcore hiking with one of their guides...in the states most the trails have switchbacks, here they just carve a trail straight up the hill. Then the rainy season comes and the trail gets washed away...hence the guide.
Hopefully Sophia will be back to 100% tomorrow, Alegria has a beautiful lake sourrounded by mountain peaks on all sides. Hopefully we can visit tomorrow and take some pictures. I forgot to mention that Alegria is El Salv´s highest (in elevation) town, so we went from sea level to about 5,000 ft. in one day. This morning I jogged to the lake but forgot the camera (the steepest jog ever). Either way, we should be continuing onward tomorrow and making our way into Nicaurgua either tomorrow or wednesday...gotta keep moving...lots to see!
Miss you all! Brett
