El Salvador

Introducing El Salvador

Travel Alert: Hurricane season has arrived in El Salvador and has caused serious flooding and loss of life, mainly in areas around the capital San Salvador. Check the BBC for news updates and BBC weather for weather details. Criminal activity is a problem in El Salvador; see the Dangers & Annoyances section for details.

You're going to El Salvador. People ask why. You tell them about the surfing, the hiking, and the museums, and they've already stopped listening. You mention being interested in the civil war and they turn around and ask you: 'Isn't it dangerous there?' You remind them the war has been over since 1992, for more than a decade. They're not convinced - and they may never be. But that's their loss.

You, meanwhile, will return with photos of cloud forests in Parque Nacional Montecristo-El Trifinio or the moonscape on top of Volcán San Miguel. Maybe you'll learn to surf on the best waves in Central America, at Punta Roca in La Libertad; or catch a funk band at a boho bar in San Salvador? Or perhaps you'll go hiking in Perquín with a guerrilla-turned-tour guide, who'll tell you about the war as it was: terrifying, thrilling, boring, inspiring, confusing, sad. Or experience eco-tourism at its most rewarding, somewhere way off the beaten track, like Tucuba for instance. More than likely, you'll eat pupusas in a city park, watching little boys chase pigeons.

It's hard to understand a place like El Salvador before you go. All you see are the shifting grounds: the gangs, the long war, the refugees. You don't see the broad valleys, the sudden volcanoes, the black-sand beaches, the stories told with a laugh, the people who tell them. Like a colonial church, bright blue, battered by earthquakes, El Salvador is still standing.

Last updated: Nov 10, 2009