Beach Living

Life settles into a rhythm fairly rapidly when one is based in a surf spot with few other occupations. Days normally start at around 5.30 with an early morning stumble out to a wave to try and beat the crowds and the wind, enjoying a solitary hour or so before the hordes descend. Breakfast and coffee follow, normally reading or writing for a while before picking up the board and returning to the ocean for more time in the water.

Of late this has involved hopping on a crowded public bus and spluttering along the coastal road with nothing more than board, the clothes that will be surfed in and enough change in pocket for a return bus trip; normally about 70 pence. Discharged on the side of the road, a walk commences through small settlements to beach access and the surfing session and then a drip dry walk back to the road to await the bus or, with luck, a successful hitch hike afterwards. A late lunch follows before cowering in the shade from the blistering heat of the day reading, playing cribbage or watching one of the countless pirated DVDs floating around the hostel. As the day cools, Surf Number 3 commences with a return to the hostel in time to cook supper before the hordes of hungry insects arrive to devour every inch of uncovered flesh. One large beer and a game of cribbage later and self mummification in bedsheets to protect against mosquito death squads ensues shortly followed by sleep at around 10pm to prepare for the same thing the following day.

El Tunco, El Salvador
26th August 2009

Local Hospitality

Written just in front of the Punta Roca surf break, just outside La Libertad. Despite stories of dire events, the attitude in the water has been fine, with no trouble from the locals and respect shown all round.

La Libertad, El Salvador
26th August 2009

Living In The Shade

My current base of operations from which I point myself towards various beaches can best be defined as the "cheap and cheerful" end of the spectrum. Run by a pair of very amiable San Salvadorian brothers, Jose and Mauricio, La Sombra tends to attract the slightly more laid back crowd, leaving the partying to the other end of the collection of hostels that is spread along the beachfront from the main road up to the rivermouth. Home to a trillion mosquitos, funky odours from the septic tank, sporadic and untimely noise from the construction site of a more upmarket hostel in progress and the most damp smelling couches in the history of mankind sheltered under a leaking palapa in the tv area, the place is still held in fond regard by its owners, guests and various passers through, myself included.

El Tunco, El Salvador
25th August 2009

Aquafilth

The last two nights have heralded ear splitting storms, tearing palms from trees, flooding roads with torrents and drenching all and sundy with near sideways rain. I, naturally, slept like a baby for both nights, waking in a slight confusion to stories of the others of hours of window shaking thunder and lightning.

At these times the rivers swell, pregnant with the weight of rainwater, and gush out into the majority of the surfing breaks, turning the water an opaque brown with the weight of silt and mud. It also brings other unwanted gifts to the surfing line up, as I discovered when paddling out the day after a big storm, dragging my arm through plastic bottles, crisp packets and packaging of all shapes and sizes; the glorious effluence of a growing consumer society eagerly stoked by plastic loving multinationals.

"The people in the villages up in the hills just throw everything into the river; there's no refuse collection services provided" explained my Argentinian roommate Nico, as we sat watching detritus turning over in the brown foam of one of the local waves, Bocano. "As soon as there's a big rain, it all gets dragged down here. I've heard of dead animals floating around out there, and a lot of surfers get really sick after surfing when there has been a storm. I've been up the hill to the river source," he added somewhat whistfully, "and the water is beautiful and clean there."

Water pollution is a huge problem in El Salvador, with the government taking no initiative to assist those who live on the coast by providing public services for dealing with refuse and educating the coastal populus on the issues of sustainability of the current approach. With the local residential and business communities placing online petitions to try and draw the attention of the government, steps are being made but progress still seems like a distant hope; in the meantime the water users of El Salvador keep their mouths shut when in the sea and hope that it keeps raining often enough to flush out the steadily building refuse piles up in the hills before they get too big.

El Tunco, El Salvador
22nd August 2009

Morning Time In El Tunco

My alarm cheerfully sounds its irritating reminder at 5:30 in the morning; rising groggily from my slumber I haphazardly rub a fresh layer of wax on my board and slip out of the front gate of my hostel, La Sombra, sleepwalking down to the beachfront and tread heavily along the black sand, heading for the local point, Sunzal. The water is warm as I wade in and climb onto my board for the paddle out, creaking shoulders grumbling at the injustice of it all. As I get further out, the dark walls of water rising out of the distance change shade, glassy and orange as I pull myself through the smooth, liquid surface.

I reach the takeoff, where the waves rear up and begin their final rumbling phase of their long journey and pull myself up to sitting on my board, my shoulders aching. Looking out to sea, dark clouds frame the horizon, forked lightning jumping down to strike the distant liquid line at the edge of the world, thunder rumbling across the miles. I turn and look towards the shore to see the sunrise seeping around the clouds, a thick golden blend of colour that sarurates everything it touches, bathing the landscape, the water and the two solitary surfers who have dragged themselves up at an equally unsociable hour in an incredible light. I turn back to sea and wait, watching as a bulge in the water thickens and rears up in front of me as I turn and coax a few more paddling strokes out of my shoulders, feeling the wave take me as I rise to my feet and drop smoothly down its glassy face, heading back the way I came, into the sunrise.

El Tunco, El Salvador
19th August 2009

Paddling Out

"I guess we to in here?" one of my Australian companions suggests, lacking the certainty that I'd hope for. Thirty feet of rounded boulders covered in scratchy marine plantlife stand between us and the thundering point break of Punta Roca just outside the main beach of La Libertad, which periodically disappear from view as the whitewater from the waves powerfully surges over the rocks. With boards underarm, we skip from rock to rock and brace ourselves every time a wave comes crashing across our path, like a game of statues but with serious consequences as the black specks of surfers already in the line up observe us with interest. I survive 3 waves until my feet are swept out from under me and I am dragged across ten feet of cheese grating stone, almost totalling one of my fellow rock hoppers, frantically cradling my board against possible injury while sections of my skin are removed. Gently bleeding into the water, I brace myself against rocks and heave back into a standing position, preparing to attempt the same distance for the second time.

"There's someone getting in over there" someone says, and suddenly everyone freezes, 3 pairs of eyes swivelling to follow the progress of a lone figure hopping across a section further down the same unrelenting rocky point. As we watch, he totters to shin depth and waits, crouching, asa wave breaks and the white water hammers towards him. As it arrives within feet, he leaps over the jumbled heap of foam and paddles furiously out to sea, sucked sideways by the after tow until, finally released, he slogs his way out of the churned up inside section and duck dives through the advancing waves that follow. Within minutes we are, with varying degrees of success, following his example, bouncing between rocks and off the shallow bottom in a frantic flap out to sea, which eventually rewards us with the welcome experience of waves that don't break on our heads as we sit in the lineup.

"We weren't supposed to get in at that spot, were we?", one of my group asks another surfer as we sit waiting for one of the grinding sets of waves to come through. "Nah man," comes the reply, "but we thought you must be Brazilians." After a brief pause, he adds, almost by way of explanation, "They alway end up getting into macho shit like that."

El Tunco, El Salvador
17th August 2009

Surfing and Nowt Else

My bus snakes along the coastal road of the pacific, shrouded by jungle and dipping through tunnels carved into the hills when the calculations of the road engineers had presumably decreed that it was not worth going around. The almost incessent and, for the most part, incomprehensible chat of my driver, with whom I had "bonded" while having money extorted from me is occasionally distracted as the jungle surrounding the road opened up to reveal rumbling waves; point breaks, beach breaks, all clean and perfect, all completely empty of surfers.

El Tunco is a tiny collection of hostels and restaurants sitting just off the coastal highway, a 10 minute ride from the bright lights and conveniences of the two blocks of La Libertad, and with at least 10 other world class breaks within half an hours bus ride, three of which are right outside my hostel. Apart for two months of the year, there are always waves here, at around an average height of five feet; chances are that the local forecast update shown below will agree. In a nutshell, this is everything I could want for the next few weeks in which I plan to exercise a complete defecit of responsibility.

El Tunco
16th August 2006

Jolly Nice Corruption

Another day, another country. Tearing myself away from the comforts of Xela to head for the long lusted after surfing breaks of El Salvador, I found myself being dragged from my bed at the ungodly hour of 4:45 in the morning to make a direct shuttle transfer bus to my starting point of choice for my wave hunt, El Tunco.

My head bounced up and down on the thick book that I was trying to use as a pillow as I slumped across three seats, trying to make up for lost sleep. Eventually giving up, I raised my head to see that my bus (of whom I was the only passenger) had reached the border. Groggily I dismounted and wandered towards the window indicated by the driver, passing my passport through the tiny window to the official with a scraggy moustache on the other side. He recieved it with the wearyness of seasoned officialdom and tapped at a couple of keys on his keyboard, frowning at his screen.

"There are problems with your passport," he explained in Spanish, "And I can clean them up for you for 25 dollars. Otherwise," he helpfully added, "I will not let you into El Salvador."

"I have 96 Quetzales," I flatly replied, almost expecting this kind of outcome, "Will that be sufficient?". "There is a cash machine one kilometre back up the road." came the merciless reply.

"Make sure that you tuck the money over the counter when you give it to him; they don't like it to be obvious" explained my driver, who had been smiling cheerfully next to me for the duration, as we returned armed with the full exit stamp ransom to the window. "You know," he continued as we drove across the border having completed the suitably subtle transaction, "You were very lucky. We came from Guatemala where the people charge you less than the other direction, and at one of the nicest checkpoints. One of my passengers last week, an American girl, had to pay 140 dollars to get a problem fixed."

So it was that I complied with a corruption payment larger than my disasterous Mexican border crossing with good grace, in the knowledge that I had recieved a discount.

El Tunco, El Salvador
12th August 2009

Slides and Freewheeling

Some 1500 vertical metres below Xela lies the wonderous water park of Xocomil (sounds like "chocomilk"), a theme park on a Mayan theme, resplendent with bright concrete "temples" that contain fast food restaurants and effurgies of glowering natives about to throw spears into the defenceless waterslide riders.

Through the local knowledge of one of the people that I had come to know I ended up freewheeling the vast majority of the route to the park on a rented bicycle over the course of an incredible hour and a half of high speed, steep corners on a road that dove through tunnels, of foliage through green rainforest and stone through mountains as stunning vistas shot past of towering cloud forests, deep ravines cut by fast flowing rivers and the impressive mountainous terrain of Guatemala.

I would be pompously self rightous about the rough riding of commercial opportunism for a Mayan theme park over cultural heritage if or weren't for the fact that the park is so much fun that anyone who spends longer than 10 minutes in it is reduced to a squealing childlike state. Personal favourites include the Speed Slide (shown below) and El Regresón, which spits the screaming flume rider some 30 feet up a large quarter pipe before gravity has a chance to do its thing.

Xela, Guatemala
9th August 2009

Moving Backward to Go Forwards

Swept up in the scholarly environment perpetuated by the multitude of language schools in Xela, I decided to enrol for a week to decide for myself if the one to one tuition method of Spanish classes was preferable to the group lessons that I had been recieving in Mexico. Slightly overwhelmed by the quantity of schools available I opted for Kie Balam, at which my directionally challenged taxi driver had stopped at to request advice following my arrival in town, and thanks to who I had subsequently found the elusive Yoga House.

After a written exam that determined that I was, for the most part,completely ignorant about prepositions I was introduced to a tiny and very giggly (characteristics that seemed to be consistant with most of the staff) teacher who proceeded to shephard me through the fairly tattered remains of my Spanish. It was certainly a more active process one to one, under the obvious circumstances that I had to be either listening or speaking at one point or another unlike the group lessons which had allowed me ample opportunity to switch off while my classmates took a more active role in the proceedings. However, I could see how it would become all too easy to get comfortable speaking only in situations with a private tutor and not carry conversational confidence into other scenarios, an acknowledged possiblity that accounted for the prevolence of homestays and structured activities by the majority of schools to provide a diversity of opportunities for students outside tuition contact time.

We waded through unfamiliar topics before a fresh assault on the other "modes" of speaking that I had begun to learn in Mexico. As briefly as possible; in Spanish there are different methods or conveying orders (the "imperative") and also for "unreal" things, such as opinions, desires, hypothetical situations and doubts (the subjunctive). These are things that a beginner speaker is oblivious to, happily using the "indicative" mode (for "real" things, such as events, descriptions etc.) for everything. The equally infuriating thing is that if you only use one mode to speak you will be understood by the vast majority of people perfectly well, and most Latinos that I have met have difficulty in diffentiating between modes anyway, due to them being drummed into them from an early age without any formal tuition. So, with this in mind, why bother with the other modes of speaking? Good question...

By the end of the week my head was bulging with concious thought process about how I should be correctly saying things, which chipped away steadily at my speaking fluidity and confidence. They say that the best approach is to launch yourself into conversation without too much active thought, but I struggle to see how I can improve in areas which are not fundamentally essential for language "survival" without taking a hit on my capacity to communicate in the short, or even medium, term. With this in mind I'm back to earlier days of careful communication and consequently tripping over things that previously came to me easily, hoping that a mindful approach will eventually plaster the differences in modes to the correct bits of my brain, thus earning me the heady title of "upper intermediate"; a worthy goal indeed.

Xela
8th August 2009

The Joy of Xela

Akin to the island of the Lotus Eaters in Homer's Oddessy, Xela is a place that all too easily allows a person to pass time without realizing it. Through the connection of my friend, I found my way to Yoga House, a communal rental spot whose subtle front door sandwiched between buildings gave no indication of its labarinthine interior. Standing on the doorstep with my various belongings hanging from me, the door was flung open by someone of whom I had absolutely no recollection. "Hablas ingles?", I ventured, as I watched her face crack into a wide smile. "Big Jon!", she exclaimed, and ushered me inside. It turned out after short discussion that we had met on my previous trip to Lago Atitlan (in conjunction with my university friend, Little Jon), and proved to be an excellent welcoming step to what was to be a welcome respite from the pressures of relentless movement and uncertainty.

Xela sits in a bowl formed by mountainous terrain, a quirk of it's location being that it is some 2500 metres above sea level, thus providing a welcome break from the blistering heat of Belize. Unlike its neighbour, Antigua, it seems to have retained some of its spirit outside of the ultimate purpose of being a tourist serving town, despite the prevolence of language schools that have given it something of an international reputation as one of the best places to learn Spanish.

Aside from the aimiability of the people and the general atmosphere of the place, I was also really taken with Yoga House; the connections to people that it offered and the abundence of excercise and physical activity that became instantly accessible, making me realise both how much I had missed it and the company and influence of people for whom it was an important part of life. Within a few hours of arriving I was wheezing around a frisbee pitch, feeling so glad that for the first time in weeks, I felt absolutely awful.
With 3 yoga classes a day and 3 boxing classes a week included in the criminally cheap cost of taking a room in the house, I would have quite happily run myself into the ground if it wasn't for the fact that, shortly after some of the boys took me for a run up a very large hill outside town (shown above on the right) I succumbed to a killer cold and my head filled up with mucus, preventing normal breathing and hence further exhertion. I can only assume that weeks on the go coupled with various traumas finally caught up with me, but at least had the decency to do their worst in a place where I could quite happily extend my stay from a couple of days to a week and a half without a second thought.

Xela, Guatemala
2nd August 2009