Having pleasantly spent our first two weeks in El Salvador in the city of Santa Ana and its surroundings, it was a good time to head to the coast. As a destination for our beach time we chose the neighboring villages of El Tunco and El Zonte, situated west of the country’s principal port city, Puerto La Libertad.
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El Tunco Beach is located 86 km away from Santa Ana and could be reached in little more than an hour if you drive yourself or arrange a private transfer from a site like this one. But in our case, as in yours I suppose, we did the trip by cheap public transport.
Unfortunately, there are no direct buses running between Santa Ana and El Tunco, El Zonte, or even La Libertad. We had to change three buses to get there, paid a total of $3.90 per person, and spent some 4 hours on the road.
First, we caught bus 201 from Santa Ana to San Salvador. That departs from the bus stop in front of Santa Ana’s Instituto Nacional (coordinates: 13.9804, -89.5638) and the ticket cost $1.
Although you could catch another bus to the coast from the capital’s terminal, you’ll save significant time by asking the driver to drop you off at Parada La Ceiba, by Monumeto al Soldado Salvadoreño in San Salvador’s western outskirts (coordinates: 13.6828, -892417).
From there, you want to catch bus 102 to the coast. Some of them, the minivans, go directly all the way to El Tunco and El Zonte, but they aren’t all that frequent. In our case, the chicken bus was the first one to pass, and that goes only as far as La Libertad. The ticket cost $0.59, but we ended up being charged a double ticket for our backpacks. Generally, I have found out that, in this country, whether they charge you or not for luggage depends solely on the driver’s temperament.
We soon got off at the first bus stop in La Libertad, in front of the dock port (coordinates: 13.4874, -893193) whence we caught minivan 102A straight to El Zonte past El Tunco. This trip cost $1.50 and the driver didn’t charge for our luggage.
After a short ride through the area’s lush environs, we made it to El Zonte. Originally, we were planning to stay there. Bus as we found out that accommodation in El Tunco was slightly less crazily expensive than in El Zonte, we just headed back hitching a ride on a passing-by pickup truck.
Accommodation and Activities in El Salvador
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