Crossing Borders

This week Kamilla and I crossed from Estelí, Nicaragua through Honduras to San Miguel, El Salvador. Now we´ll spend a few weeks traveling around El Salvador.

We decided not to take a first-class bus, instead doing the connections ourselves. It was simple and cheaper to do so, but the trip is unavoidably a long one. To break up the journey, we spent the night in the Honduran town of San Marcos ($12 for the room, $4 for dinner). Here´s how it broke down:

Estelí-Somoto -- 2 hrs. -- $1/person
Somoto-El Espino -- 0.5 hrs. -- $0.50
Leaving Nicaragua -- $2
Entering Honduras -- $3
Hitching El Espino-San Marco -- 0.5 hrs. -- FREE
San Marco-Choluteca -- 1.5 hrs. -- $1
Choluteca-El Amatillo -- 2 hrs. -- $1.50
El Amatillo-Santa Rosa -- 0.5 hrs. -- $1
Santa Rosa-San Miguel -- 1.5 hrs. -- $1.50

After crossing into Honduras, we chatted for a while with the friendly border guard. Indeed in our brief time in Honduras we were surprised by the extreme kindness of the local people. But it was getting late so we hitched a ride from the border to San Marco in the bed of a pick-up truck. The scenery was as it had been for most of the day: simply beautiful. The expansive green valley fell away before us, and we leaned back against the cab, marveling at what lay before us. The sun dipped behind the mountains in the west, lending them for a little while a golden crown.

The total cost of our trip was $7 per person (with $5 for custom´s fees); a first class bus would have been more than double that. We spread out the 8.5 hours of bus time over two days.

And so here we are, safely in El Salvador, with a new country to explore.