RTW North to South: Lake Atitlan & El Salvador

CN - Tuesday

We left Quezaltenango at a decent hour and planned to get across Guatemala to position ourselves to cross into El Salvador the following morning. The ride started out on perfect tarmac - the road winding up to 9500ft with big views of the countryside. Guatemala really is a beautiful country once you can look past all the trash that usually surrounds. Lots of fun long sweeping turns with perfect road conditions made for a good morning of riding. Our plan for the day was to ride to Lake Atitlan to see the lake, surrounding Volcanos and have lunch. On the outskirts of the town we saw a Suzuki dealership and stopped to see if they had the breathable seat covers we had been seeing since entering Guatemala. We also still needed a bolt for Ken's chain guard he broke off and an emulsion tube for my carb. We ending up scoring on the seat covers and bolt, but still no carb parts to be found. My bike is pinging badly at lower altitudes and we knew we would be dropping down to near sea level that afternoon. The lake was right around 5000ish feet and he lake and surrounding volcanos were quite the impressive view. We got to the town of Panajachel and found a lunch spot with table side parking and dined on salads and shrimp ceviche - not the freshest shrimp, but the vegetables were quite good. My body had been craving vegetables after days of dining on tacos and pupusas. Not sure the slaw mix on top of the pupusas qualifies as the recommended daily allowance of vegetables.

After lunch we decided to head a different route out of the town from the way we came in. The way in was a steep grade down cobblestone streets with heavy traffic. Climbing out uphill in traffic would not have been fun. Garmin routed us on a road skirting the lake and then climbing out to the east. The road was strangely empty as we got further and further from the town and soon turned into cobblestone again - then to dirtied sand. rom dirt and sand to loose rock and deep rock infested ruts from runoff - and then started climbing up the hillside. Ok, wasn't exactly expecting this type of road, but we went with it - we do have dirt bikes after all. As the road switched back and forth up the hillside it became steeper and more challenging - all with blind corners not allowing line picking until the very last second. I ended up losing momentum on a particularily steep section while getting caught in a deep rock filled rut and dumped the bike. Luckily it was a slow speed crash and both me and the bike came out unscathed - only my confidence was shattered, at that point not knowing how much more dirt we had left. Luckily we hit the tarmac again a few minutes later and I was able to relax a bit. Looking at my GPS, we had climbed around 1200ft on that challenging dirt road.

We then dropped from 6500ft to approximately 500 feet that afternoon. The sun was setting fast so we started looking for an auto hotel as there were very few towns in the area. We found one alone the roadside and pulled in the gates to be greeted by two large German Shepherds - at least we know bike security would be good. Soon a large gentleman came out to greet us and quoted us a rate for the night. He indicated that the gates were closed at 8pm and the dogs roamed the compound all night so we knew security would be good. Turns out he was a Frenchman who had been living in Guatamela for quite some time. He seemed like the kind of character that left France for a reason and probably couldn't go back. It was probably one of the most sketchy rooms we have stayed in on the trip as we shared it with lizards, cockroaches, ants and mosquitos. It was only the second time of the trip I had to deet up to go to bed. The bright side was that it did have a toilet seat on the head - which is not always the case.

The next morning we were planning to finish off the 85k to the Guatemala/El Salvador border.

CN - Wednesday

This morning Ken got up first and went outside to have a look at the weather and bikes and was instantly greeted by charging and barking dogs. I heard the dogs barking and a second later Ken was racing inside barely slamming the door before the dogs got him. We then waited for the Frenchman to get up before going back outside to load the bikes - damn scary dogs! We got one of our earliest starts, hitting the road at 7:30am. When we arrived to the border crossing the scene was quite hectic. I guess we got lucky on the previous two borders as we were basically the first in line to every window we approached. About a half mile from the border a bunch of guys on small motorbikes started chasing us down and motioning us to pull over. We knew instantly these were "helpers" that would assist with processing the necessary paperwork and guide through the maze of steps required for entry for a fee. We had not used any helpers during the previous crossings as it just wasn't necessary and it was all pretty straightforward and easy to navigate. This time we decided to go ahead and solicit their assistance as we had heard the El Salvador portion can be a bit confusing. The whole process took about 3 hours. There were many trucks lined up coming into and out of El Salvador and most booths were 20 people deep in line. The helper would use his connections and get our paperwork in front of a government agent to stamp and process w/o having to wait their turn in line behind the truckers. I think without the helper we would have been looking a 6 hours instead of 3 so I guess the money we paid for their assistance was worth it. Nothing was clearly signed and some of the offices were tucked around corners, etc. El Salvador uses US currency so we changed our Guatemalan Quetzal for a familiar currency - now not having to do math in our heads every time we have a transaction. Unfortunately we will only be in El Salvador for two days so the convince will be short lived.

After getting through the border the road dumped us into the congested town of La Hachadura. There was lots of road construction with only one lane open to get through town. The flaggers were directing traffic to the one available lane, so the line while waiting for the back and forth sharing of the one lane road was crazy long. The temps were in the 90's so we were heating up quickly in our gear. While we were wondering about the lane splitting rules for motorcycles in El Salvador, a motorbike sprinted past us in the right shoulder so we followed suit, weaving our way in between the cars, pedestrians and vendor booths along the roadway. We would have been there for hours had we not started splitting. Once free of traffic, we made our way along the coast for a bit and stopped for lunch at a roadside stand. Three US dollars and tasty!

The road then wound around and took us a bit inland before coming back down to the beach. It was here, in a town called Lomas de San Blas, we found a cool little beach hotel called Sol Bohemio to stay for the night. This is most definitely our nicest location spot so far. This resort is right on the beach with beautiful views of the Pacific Ocean. We actually fully went swimming in the ocean waves this time - in Sayulita, we basically had just waded in up to our knees. The surf was pretty powerful and you could feel the currents trying to suck you out to sea, so we stayed in fairly close to shore where you could still touch bottom. The hotel had a restaurant and the food was pretty good - the fresh shrimp ceviche was the highlight. I ended up falling asleep early as I had not slept well the previous night while Ken scoured the beach by flashlight with the night manager looking for turtles. Unfortunately none were spotted. We plan to spend Thanksgiving day enjoying the morning at our hotel on the beach, with a late start in the cards due to the short distance we need to cover. The goal is to position ourselves for a double border crossing on Friday - El Salvador to Honduras and then Honduras to Nicaragua. Ken has a contact in Managua that we hope to visit.