One of my friends in high school was Emely.  She and I met through our church and went to high school together.  For most of my high school years (until Emely graduated–she was a few years older than me) we were like two peas in a pod…always doing things together on the weekend and with our youth group.  Emely was born in El Salvador…this was something I forgot until she reminded me just before I flew there!  My whole week I was in El Salvador my mind kept flashing back to Emely.

One of my fav photos of Emely and I. Summer of 1994… this photo was in the local paper because we were at a youth event in the park called “the Gap”.  We thought we were playing it cool standing on the sidelines of a game checking out boys…but the reporter snapped this, and totally ratted us out in the paper!

Visiting the country of Emely’s birth gave me a whole new insight into my friend. That’s the awesome thing about travel is that you can see for yourself how others live…you can be told, but without seeing it for yourself and experiencing it it’s not just not the same.   I loved El Salvador…the people are so friendly and the country side is gorgeous.  Emely I’m so glad I can still call you a friend…and that after all these years we have reconnected! Here’s some stories and photos of your birth country…enjoy!

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Over the course of the week I was in El Salvador I took about 1400 photos…edited about 300 of those taken. Now I’m trying to figure out how to share them without overwhelming the internets with photos from El Salvador!  I think I’ve come up with a plan to blog my trip by breaking it up into a few posts.

Are you ready for some photos and stories from my week in the sunshine? It’s hard to believe it’s was 3 weeks ago I was enjoying my first evening in El Salvador with my mum. Our trip went from Thursday to Thursday…February 13th to the 20th.

It was a 5 1/2 hour flight from Toronto to San Salvador…we had a bit of a delay (about an hour 1/2) before taking off with a small mechanical issue with the plane. (Apparently those don’t just happen with planes flying in Nunavut!) We were excited to be in El Salvador and had about a 2 hour bus drive to our resort. We were provided with a fun box filled with snacks…

During my trip I was able to snap this awesome shot out of the front window of the bus.

Here’s a map of the route we probably took from the airport to the resort. (Airport is point A and the Resort is point B!)

Enjoying the views of the Royal Decameron Salinitas Hotel…and seeing the sun set the first night!

The next morning there was time for breakfast and then lounging beside the pool…reading books & jumping in the pool for a quick dip when the 32C got to be too hot to stand!

The Resort was gorgeous…the room was awesome and grounds were gorgeous! It was just like a picture perfect post card.  

Watching the sunset.  It was so gorgeous to just watch it slip down into the Pacific Ocean and disappear!

On Valentine’s Day my mum and I went to one of the restaurants…we were greeted with a flower at the door! It was the perfect ending to a perfect first day lounging in the sun.

The resort was awesome…so many shady spots to sit and read!

Pool side fun…the days I was on the resort I joined in an aqua aerobics at 11am.  Mum also enjoyed the pool…doing lots of her physio exercises 2-3 times a day! 

What’s a holiday without a few drinks?  Here’s the awesome bartenders that made me the perfect ‘fruity’ sweet cocktails that were ‘strong’…I have no clue what they made, but it was darn good!

…have I mentioned how awesome the sunsets were? Feet in the Pacific Ocean… 

I went on 3 different day trips to explore a bit beyond the resort!  For the first day trip on Saturday my Mum joined me as we explored a few villages and a coffee plantation and factory–it was called the Craft & Culture Tour with Coffee Tour.  On the Second day trip on Sunday I headed off on my own, leaving my mum pool side at the resort! I went to Copán, Honduras (via Guatemala) to visit the Mayan village of Copán. On the third day trip on Monday I headed off on my own again.  I went to the Port of Libertad Fish Market then San Salvador Volcano finshing the day with a stop at  Lake Coatepeque!  I’ll post photos and stories from those trips  soon.