El Salvador

Ok, it's a little late, but here's my blog on my last destination on my vacation to Central America. Our reason for going to El Salvador was because Marisol's mom's side of the family is from there. Her mom was actually born there, and Marisol has always wanted to visit. One of her Aunts owns a house in San Salvador, and Marisol's grandma was there when we were, visiting from her home in L.A., so we stayed with her. It was nice having a free place to stay, but I really would've been okay with staying there only a few days rather than 6 days as we did. San Salvador isn't really a tourist spot, so there wasn't a lot to do while we were there. It wasn't really safe to walk around, so there was a locked gate in front of the house. There was no cable or DVD player in the house. There was no hot water in the house, and after a certain time in the day, no water at all. Marisol's grandma doesn't drive, and taxi's weren't really driving by every minute, so we had to plan our outings strategically. Also, Marisol's grandma doesn't speak any English, but she does talk a lot, so I was often left out of the conversation and barely talked to anyone while we were there. Having said all that, I was happy that Marisol was finally able to visit the country where her roots stem from, and her grandma was very sweet and hospitable.

We did meet a family who were related to Marisol through a distant cousin of Marisol's mom, and they were nice enough to drive us to a small town up in the mountains where we saw some very traditional El Salvadorians (I think that's how you say that). By the way, this family also did not speak English, except the father, who knew a few English words and phrases.

We also visited this little shop where thay created fabrics using old-fashioned machinery.

On another day we decided to stay one night at this all-inclusive resort. We took advantage of the AC, hot showers, and free food and drinks.

Our last day there was Thanksgiving. Marisol and I ended up going to the mall there, since we didn't really have anything else to do. We spent most of the day there, watching a movie, getting lunch, and getting our hair done. We hadn't done our hair at all on the trip, and we had barely even washed our hair since arriving in El Salvador because of the shower conditions. We saw a salon that offered to straighten your hair for $6. Thinking that we could get our hair washed as well, we decided to do it, and boy did it feel good to have our hair washed and straightened! While we were there, we also opted to get $10 manicures...we just couldn't beat these prices!

Oh, and one more thing! We experienced an earthquake while we were there. We were sitting in the movie theater in the mall when we started to feel shaking. I turned to Marisol and exclaimed, "Is this an earthquake?!"

"Yes!" she confirmed. "Should we leave?" I asked. We were on the 3rd floor of this mall...not really the best place to be in the middle of an earthquake. We waited it out and ended up staying, but later found out that it was either a 5.6 or 6.0 earthquake thats epicenter was in Panama. All I can say is, I'm glad we weren't in Panama anymore!