Playa Xanadu

Today we visited Plaz, a friend of Dr. Romero's sister at his beach home about an hours drive from San Sal.  On the way we got to stop for agua de coco (coconut water), which in true El Salvadorian style came in a small plastic bag with the coconut meat in the bottom with a straw in the bag so we could drink it.  I'm super glad I tried it and it is definitely better than the canned/bottled version we have in the States but I honestly am not itching to try it again any time soon. Being on the beach in the northern part of the country was a completely different experience than yesterday.  The beaches were beyond beautiful and the size and strength of the waves literally cannot be put into words.  The coastline in this part of El Salvador consist mostly of cliffs and rocks with small beaches carved out by the waves.  Plaz's community has a private beach which was especially nice and we got to enjoy several hours in the sun.  He also had a small charcoal grill at his house and I got to cook dinner for everyone there.  Anyone who knows me well, knows how much I like to cook and it was awesome to get to grill out in another country.

The drive back was quite an adventure.  Tons of traffic and the engine of the car we were in overheated several times causing us to have to pull off the side of the road.  We were fortunate enough to pull into a roadside restaurant on one such occasion and Dr. Romero treated us to Salvadorian quesadillas which are nothing like the mexican quesadillas we are used to.  I know it sounds ridiculous but imagine a cross between cheesecake and cornbread. It was amazing and I will definitely be having it again before I leave the country.

I would have put this post up a few hours earlier but I seem to have just caused a catastrophe in the apartment.  Anyone who knows me even the slightest bit can attest to the fact that if there has ever been  a big ole white goof its me.  I have been known to trip over lines painted on football fields and wrestling mats, fall and almost drown in mud puddles and honestly very often just have plain old bad luck (you all should be very thankful I am not going to be a surgeon), and it seems as though this has definitely followed me to El Salvador.  I let everyone else in the apartment do laundry earlier in the weekend because I had enough clothes to last until tonight so when we got home I decided I would go ahead and wash some clothes.  Attempting to complete my least favorite household chore, which I hate with a passion and definitely am not very good at (my wife can tell you it has took me over a year and a half to finally do a load of clothes correctly) seemed to be my ultimate downfall tonight.  I washed the first load without problem, took them out of the washer and placed them in the dryer and started my second load.  I came back to the bedroom Tenke and I share and began working on this post.  I had just finished the second paragraph and Ryan came in our room and said the laundry room and kitchen were flooding.  He wasn't kidding.  The entire laundry room was already full of water and it was starting to work its way out into the kitchen.  Thank God he caught it in time, I feel certain if he hadn't our furniture would have been floating very shortly.  I immediately stopped the washer, turned off the water, yelled frantically for towels because of course we have no mop in this apartment and we began sopping up the water.  We were using every dry towel, dish rag, blanket and sheet we could find.  We decided it would be best if we went to our neighbor who is the owner of the apartment to see if she knew what was going on.  She rushed, over yelled "Ay Dios Mio" (oh my God in Spanish)  and went to call our friendly maintenance man Eduardo.  She offered to come back and translate if we needed her too but me feeling ultimately responsible I decided there was no need and I could handle it.  Eduardo came up quickly disgustedly looked at the four of us working as hard as we could to sop up the water with all the towels sheets and blankets and announced in Spanish that someone, that would be me, had put too many clothes in the washer which had caused it to overflow.  I can only imagine how red my face was, so he immediately knew it was me and jokingly, or at least I think and hope it was jokingly, began to mutter some words I didn't understand so I can only imagine it was the first time I had ever been cussed out in Spanish!  We spent the better part of the next hour cleaning up my disaster.  I have had a good bit of time to think about what just happened, I can't help laughing about it but I also think it might somehow be better to just wear dirty clothes for the rest of the trip! I hope this at least makes you chuckle on Monday morning and remember, no matter how bad your Monday is you didn't flood your apartment in El Salvador on Sunday night!

Playa Xanadu (which means Paradise in Mayan), it is hard to appreciate in pictures but the sand is black.

Amazing view of the beach from the water

My view while grilling

El Salvadorian Sunset