Travel to El Salvador

Travel with Amateur Traveler Podcast

In this episode of the Amateur Traveler Podcast, host Chris Christensen interviews Jayne Dear, author of 'Tales of a Traveller in Central America,' about her transformative

Key takeaways

• El Salvador's transformation from a high-crime nation to one of the safest countries in Central America is largely due to President Nayib Bukele's aggressive anti-gang policies.

Main topics

• El Salvador's safety transformation
• Volcanic landscapes and natural beauty

Notable quotes

"El Salvador was definitely a hidden gem. I hadn't really expected it to be as amazing as it was." – Jayne Dear

Conclusion

El Salvador emerges as an unexpectedly safe, affordable, and culturally rich destination in Central America.

Transcript preview

Speaker 5 (0:00) This episode is sponsored by Smart Travel, a new podcast from NerdWallet. You know that one friend who always finds the best travel deals, picks the right cards, and somehow ends up in first class for the price of coach? Smart Travel is like that friend, but in podcast form. They cover all things finance, like which travel cards earn their keep, and which are just heavy, shiny metal. The quick math for knowing when to pay with points or just swipe the credit card. planning group trips that won't ruin your budget or your friendships. If you haven't heard the story about friends who won't speak to each other after a one-week vacation together, buy me a Diet Coke sometime and I'll tell you. The nerds at NerdWallet know this stuff better than me, and that's why I feel great about recommending the Smart Travel podcast. After all, we nerds have to stick together. Travel smarter and spend less with the help from NerdWallet. Follow Smart Travel wherever you get your podcasts. Speaker 4 (0:57) Hey, it's Christopher Kimball from Milk Street Radio. Sounds like I'm bragging, and I am. We're the number one most downloaded food podcast in America. You know, Milk Street Radio travels the world in search of the very best food stories. You'll hear about smuggling eels on the black market, the secret intelligence of plants, and insider tips to eating in Paris. And every week, listeners call in with their toughest culinary mysteries. Discover a world of food stories by searching your podcast app for Milk Street Radio. Speaker 5 (1:26) Amateur Traveler episode 1014. Today Amateur Traveler talks about volcanoes and lakes, markets and beaches, coffee and pupusas, as we go back to El Salvador. This is Chris Christensen from Amateur Speaker 4 (1:42) Traveler. Let's talk about El Salvador. Speaker 5 (1:48) I'd like Speaker 4 (1:48) to Speaker 5 (1:48) welcome back to the show Jane Deere, who's come to talk to us about El Salvador and has recently released a book, Tales of a Traveler in Central America. Jane, welcome back to the show. Speaker 1 (2:01) Thank you very much for having me back, Chris. I always enjoy listening to your podcasts and always use them for my travels. Speaker 5 (2:09) Oh, excellent. I always like to hear that. Speaker 1 (2:12) for producing so many. I think it's a thousand now, isn't it? Over a thousand. Speaker 5 (2:16) Over a thousand, yeah. Well, and I think the fact that we're doing a trip to Bolivia next year with the Amateur Travelers, somewhat related to one of the recent episodes we did with Jane, was on Bolivia. And I know I listened to that episode and I wanted to go. If you're interested in... Potentially joining us, listen to Jane's last, not last episode, last episode was on train travel in Finland, but the first episode we did. Speaker 1 (2:42) Absolutely. I can recommend it. Highly recommend it, Olivia. Speaker 5 (2:46) But you've been traveling in Central America. Speaker 1 (2:49) I have, yes. It was one of the areas that I hadn't traveled in before, apart from a few trips to Mexico, which I do include in my book. There's debates about whether Mexico is part of Central America. It feels that way to me because it's part of Latin America. They speak Spanish. So, yes, I did include it. And I absolutely love Mexico. But I traveled from the southern states of America through Mexico and then through Central America, including El Salvador. And I have to say, El Salvador was definitely a hidden gem. I hadn't really expected it. to be as amazing as it was. It's a very small pocket-sized country. It's about the size of New Jersey, Speaker 3 (3:37) slightly smaller Speaker 1 (3:39) than Massachusetts, but in Britain we always compare it to Wales and it's similar size to Wales. So that's Speaker 5 (3:46) why. So Speaker 1 (3:47) it's quite small. I don't think it's the smallest country in Central America, but it's one of the smaller ones. It certainly doesn't compare to its neighbor, Guatemala. So I came in from Guatemala, which is a huge country, across the border. To the north is Honduras, which is still quite dangerous. And to the east is Nicaragua. And until quite recently, El Salvador was the murder capital of the world. So most people would never have considered going there. I don't know how people got through it to go on trips through Central America, but they must have just taken transport straight through and barely stopped because it was very dangerous. Honduras still is quite dangerous. So actually, it's a welcome route that's safe going through Central America now. Speaker 5 (4:45) And I was surprised when I did my Central America trip, which I've talked about on the show back in February, that... Of the five countries I went to, so I didn't do all of Central America at that time. I did Costa Rica, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala, and just a little tiny bit of Honduras for reasons that you mentioned. That the safest rated one of those, according to the U.S. State Department, was El Salvador. And we have traveled to Costa Rica so often as American travelers that... I was quite surprised that it was rated safer for crime than Costa Rica these days. Speaker 1 (5:25) Yeah, I think it's rated safer statistically than North America and even perhaps Britain, which you generally feel are safe countries to travel to. So it really has upped its game. And in 2022, they had a big crackdown on gang membership. Niall Bukele, the president, basically put them all in jail. So that's been controversial. Speaker 5 (5:56) It's been controversial. We should say that. Speaker 1 (5:58) It has, yes. Speaker 5 (5:59) From human rights advocates. And I understand why it's controversial. I would say he's very popular with the people there because it has gotten so much safer. I agree. Are there some people in jail who probably shouldn't be? I wouldn't be surprised. I won't say that this has been a perfect solution, but he is quite popular because you can safely walk the streets. Speaker 1 (6:23) Yeah, absolutely. They went from a situation where it was a very high murder rate, about 700 murdered in a month in a small country, only a few million population, to hardly anybody. Speaker 1 (6:40) You've got to balance it, really. I watched a British documentary when I came back, actually, about Seacott, the huge prison that they put gang members in. And basically, if you have a gang tattoo, you're in prison and they're very little rights. And it was heartbreaking to watch them in huge cells for 23 and a half hours a day. There's no mattresses. They can only exercise for half an hour. But having said that, the people were having to tolerate a very high murder rate. To get into a gang, you had to murder 10 people. Oh my Speaker 5 (7:21) gosh, okay. Speaker 1 (7:22) All right, I Speaker 5 (7:24) feel better now about the gang tattoo thing then. Speaker 1 (7:26) Yeah. Speaker 5 (7:28) Let's skip over that a little bit to right now. It's 2026. Why should someone go to El Salvador? Speaker 1 (7:34) Oh, I would suggest it's an absolute hidden gem. Go for the scenery. Very diverse scenery, beautiful volcanic scenery. They've got 23 volcanoes. You can't move for seeing a volcano. And absolutely beautiful forested highlands with coffee plantations. I'd suggest anyone that's not had the opportunity to visit a coffee plantation in other places. around the world to go to a coffee plantation and see how they pick, process the coffee because it's a big coffee producing country. And much of the wealth that you see, turn of the century architecture in the cities came from the coffee plantation wealth that they had certainly back in the late 19th, early 20th century. As I say, it's safe. The people are very friendly. I think because for many years they didn't have foreign tourists. They're really keen to welcome you and help you out. So I crossed the border in Guatemala and got on a what you might call a chicken bus. It's an old American school bus. It changed in Cincinnati. And then my first place where I stayed was Santa Ana. which is the second biggest town, a very pleasant town to stay in and great for exploring the Western Highlands. The bus was about two and a half to three hour journey. And that cost me one dollar eighty cents. The buses are really cheap. And OK, it's a chicken bus. It's not that comfortable, but you get to meet the friendly locals. And I arrived in Santa Ana after dark, which is one of my rules that I sometimes broke just because of not being able to get to where I wanted to before dark. Speaker 3 (9:39) When I Speaker 1 (9:40) was traveling in Central America, it was not to go out after dark. So I arrived and it was getting dark and I had to walk across town to my hostel, very pleasant hostel. Speaker 1 (9:53) I didn't feel particularly unsafe. There was a few down and outs and there were some stray dogs. But apart from that, people went out of their way to stop their moped and asked me where I was going, what I was looking for and directing me and helping me out. Very friendly people. When I got there after dark, there aren't many people out after dark because old habits die hard. And before 2022, nobody went out after dark because it's too dangerous. And people still have that mindset. So I would generally recommend not being out after dark. But as I say, I was out after dark and I lived to tell the tale. So I like Santorana as a first stop. You'll either come in over the Guatemalan border or come in the other direction. Or if you're flying from the States, I guess you could either fly to Guatemala City or you could fly to San Salvador if you're just having a week. That's fly to San Salvador. You've got the advantage of you're on a similar time zone and the currency is American dollars. So that makes life very easy. for Americans and Westerners in general who tend to travel with some American dollars in order to change. So I started off in Santa Ana. I based myself there. Pleasant town. It's not a colonial beauty like Antigua in Guatemala or Leon in Nicaragua, but it's perfectly pleasant. It's got some nice, pleasant turn-of-the-century architecture. Speaker 1 (11:33) in the centre, surrounding the typical square. So it's got greenery, a bandstand. It's got a pleasant cathedral, consecrated in 1913, because any previous cathedrals