Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
1500 deaths and leaving 100,000 homeless. It has also been assailed by
both floods and droughts.
The first major city in El Salvador I'm running through,
Ahuachapán, has bustling, crazy, crowded, haphazard streets, with
hordes of pedestrians defying death by blithely crossing the road in
the face of wild-eyed drivers. The teeming markets were riots of sights
and smells I've never encountered before. People at the thrown-
together stalls were selling fruit and vegies, watches, straw hats, cheap
musical instruments, T-shirts and work pants, colourful dresses, ice-
cream, meat and fish. Stews comprising God knows what bubbled in
big metal pots over open fires. The aroma was delicious, but I didn't go
near them; another dose of diarrhoea is the last thing I need. I resisted
the cries from the people stirring them that I should try some.
Leaving Ahuachapán and entering the rural regions is like step-
ping back in time. The side of the roads are spread thick and wide with
maize which has been left there by the growers to dry in the blazing
sun. I saw a wooden cart which had to be centuries old being pulled
along by an ox. The beast, and the bloke driving the cart, seemed to
