Under a mottled canopy of thriving trees in Cerro Verde Nature Park’s thick forest, our ever-smiling hiking guide Kevin stops to show off a particularly healthy-looking Platonia tree. It’s famous around these parts. “It’s said that if you hug it, it takes away all your worries about people, health, finances. Just not your taxes. It can’t do anything about them,” he explains to an amused audience.
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As others in the group wrap their arms around it and take pictures, an older El Salvadorian woman looks it up and down and conspires with her relation: “Get a saw, I’m going to chop it down and take it home.”
Soon, the forest opens to a magnificent view of Lake Coatepeque, and verdant volcanoes in the background. As we pause for another photo opportunity, Maria – an El Salvador-born US resident – explains to me that she and her family are here on a big reunion.
In their week together, the family has toured volcanic landscapes, horticultured cities and archaeological sites in Latin America’s smallest but most densely populated country, known as “the little thumb of the Americas.”
They are heading towards La Libertad, the country’s surf hub that’s 45 minutes south from the capital, San Salvador. Maria’s partner is planning on taking on La Paz: a slow wave that stretches far across the Pacific coast, making it a beginner’s wave with bragging rights. The older generation plans to hotel-hop. “You can buy day passes to luxury hotels for around US$20 (£15), and use their pools and facilities. That makes things cheaper,” Maria explains.
The surf, the volcanoes, the forests, the resorts. If it reminds me of my time in Costa Rica several years ago. And the two nations have much in common.
El Salvador is 450 miles north of Costa Rica, both on the thin sliver of land that links North America with South. They share similar topography of volcanoes and rugged coast, a tropical climate, and a history of Spanish colonial rule. But since independence in 1821, political instability, civil war, and finally gang violence have left El Salvador trailing behind its more tourist-friendly neighbours.
Los Tercios waterfall is just outside Suchitoto (Photo: Central America Tourism Agency)
However, in the past two years, the government has cracked down on gang-related crime. Homicides have dramatically reduced in what was once the world’s murder capital and it is now much safer to visit – though it is worth noting there is a cost – human rights organisations say that during the state of emergency, many people have been detained without due process.
Still, as the country has become safer, visitor numbers have increased dramatically. In 2023, El Salvador ranked as the World Tourism Organisation’s fifth best-performing destination. And at the start of this year, visitor numbers were 35 per cent above the same time last year.
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Driving around the country – the same size as Wales, but rather more abundant in street art and tropical flower displays – it feels on the cusp of encapsulating Costa Rica’s positive mindset of “pura vida”.
For tourists, it helps that El Salvador is easy on the wallet. Meals, transport and activities generally cost a third less than Costa Rica, and are especially cheap if you get a taste for the national dish, pupusa: thick corn tortillas stuffed with stringy melted cheese, meat or beans, served from street vans with zingy salsa. Divine, filling and often only a couple of dollars.
While the accommodation offering in El Salvador isn’t quite as developed, it is competitive. The average cost of a night at a mid-range hotel is £100 in Costa Rica. In Suchitoto, one of El Salvador’s best-preserved colonial cities and a former capital, the tranquil El Tejado is £65 for a double room.
Even in troubled times, Suchitoto – in the centre of the country – was a popular destination on Latin America’s backpacker Gringo Trail for its streets of historically significant terracotta-topped houses and the emblematic Iglesia Santa Lucia. In the city’s central square, this huge confection of a colonial church is painted so brilliantly white that I have to don my sunglasses to admire it.
It is an impossible-to-miss wayfinder as I amble around, dropping in to the market to gawp at the fantastical yellow of the sweetcorn, and the row of strong-shouldered pupusa-makers, completing iron-hot batches for loyal customers.
The church orients me as I return from a tie-dyeing workshop at Arte Añil, which had piqued my interest when I learned that indigo is a major export for El Salvador Autumn is the best time to travel – eight cheaper, quieter holidays to book now – responsible for Levi’s blue jeans, for example.
Pupusas are a Salvadoran staple (Photo: edfuentesg/Getty Images)
Like Maria and clan, my final stop is also some R&R by the water. Rather than on the Pacific coast, I’m staying at Cardedeu Residence, a sleek boutique hotel overlooking the glassy Lake Coatepeque, which plunges to depths of around 200m. It is the sort of hideaway that makes you reassess your priorities in life.
When my Duolingo-level Spanish means I am forced to mime the words for “where is breakfast?” and “extra towels” to sympathetic faces, I know this is a hidden gem. I hope it retains that charm.
How to get there
Connecting flights to San Salvador are available via the US, Canada and Colombia.
Where to stay
Fairfield by Marriott in San Salvador has B&B from $124 (£93), marriott.com.
Hotel Casa 1800 Suchitoto has B&B from $89 (£67), casa1800 suchitotofig.velvetverandas.com
Cardedeu Residence Lake Cotepeque has doubles from $140 (£105), cardedeuhotels.com.
More information
elsalvador.travel,
visitcentroamerica.com/en
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Publish date : 2024-09-27 18:40:00
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