“Tunco” is colloquial Spanish for “pig.” At the beachhead of this mellow Salvadorean surf town is a striking black rock formation (see above) that rises abruptly from the water. The rather large Pacific waves are relentless in their violent battering of this stoney pig that gave El Tunco its name.
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| World cup watch party with a bunch of Brits |
After my sole and extremely unsuccessful try at surfing last year in Lima, I wasn’t sure I would even try to surf in El Salvador, maybe just a loungy beach experience… Looking back now, surfing at El Tunco may have been the highlight so far of my Central American trip. I started out (wisely) hiring a local kid to give me a lesson. Evar, a Salvadorean that looks like a Quiksilver commercial, showed me the mechanics and repeatedly helped me position my board to catch the waves.
The next day, bursting with confidence from catching quite a few small waves with Evar, I decided to strike out on my own with a smaller board (harder to balance but more maneuverable). The smaller board made the simple task of staying on my board while paddling to catch a wave a much less trivial task, not to mention that Evar was not there to point out where to catch the good breaks or how to judge which waves are too big (result: drinking lots of salt water), too small (promptly sinking into the wave), or just right. During the ensuing struggle I managed to forget Evar’s lesson number one of surfing: never put the board between yourself and the waves. Consequence, I took a well-deserved smack to my left cheek (lucky it wasn’t to the nose or an eye). Obviously my batting average took a huge hit; while I caught at least 10 waves with Evar, I only caught two on my own, but boy was I PROUD of those two (truthfully puny) waves.
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| Beach puppy cheering me on |
The waves at El Tunco break over a gorgeous tar black sand beach. The fine volcanic sand is filled with minerals that sparkle in the sun, and it also forms an ethereal black mirror when wet from retreating waves. The sky here is a worthy backdrop for the beach. Compared to other coasts the sky just feels bigger. Maybe the large tranquil clouds causes a bit of a optical illusion, or perhaps the beach juts out into the ocean so more of my peripheral vision is dominated by the ocean and sky instead of coastline, whatever it is, the world seems more vast here.
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| The blood of christ… has power? |
Since leaving San Salvador for the Pacific Coast, I’ve felt great vibes in this stretch of El Salvador. I had my first chicken bus ride into La Libertad, the coast town that serves as the gateway to surf villages like El Tunco. Chicken buses are repurposed American school buses that are used all over Central America for public transportation (so named because locals take chickens to market on them). They have all been decked out in vivid graffiti, and are often given pious monikers like “Sangre de Christo.” The rides are quite fun (as long as they’re relatively short). Each ride is inaugurated by a procession of vendors for nuts, juices, plantain chips, and other snacks of local appetites. The journeys are usually accompanied by a lively soundtrack consisting mostly of 90s American pop (think Black Eyed Peas and Britney Spears).
By the end of my five-day stay at El Tunco, I had grown quite fond of surfing as well as this beautiful town. It was fun demystifying surfing (albeit at a very very basic level) one wave at a time. In the process I managed to reawaken an old arm injury from getting beat up in middle school, and also throw out my back when a wave caught me unawares in the shallow waters and pretzeled me against the sand. I left battered but satisfied, mentally marking this beautiful stretch of coastline, along with the likes of Buenos Aires and Rio, as places I am determined to make my way back to someday.
