Sad times in 'Sleepy' Suchitoto.

This post was going to be about the sleepy El Salvadorian village of Suchitoto. It was going to extol the place's colonial charm, it's white washed building and their red tiled roofs. It was going to wax lyrical about pupusas, the latest in a long line of food stuffs that involve tortilla, and it was going to say that Suchitoto is the perfect place to chill out for a few days.

Then we decided to walk to the waterfall.

Yes that's right, after surviving a night in San Pedro Sula (Central America's murder capital) it was in tiny Suchitoto that Rachel and I had a gun pointed at our heads and our bags emptied.

In the role play section of my GCSE Spanish oral I had to pretend to have been robbed so I am blaming the entire incident on my Spanish teacher Senora Costello, it was her who taught me the word 'testigo', clearly equipping me for this event in my future.

This picture come courtesy of Rachel who didn't get her camera stolen

I actually didn't have to use my muddled Spanish. Rachel whose fluency makes her the best travel buddy ever hastily described what happened whilst I attempted to chip in and just generally make a nuisance of my self. As amazing as her Spanish is Rachel is not clued up on her gun lingo. After repeatedly describing the weapon as a pistola the policeman asked us to draw it and then glancing at our attempts (Ms Lewis, my art teacher never prepared me for this) sighed and corrected us. 'Un revólver'. This was followed by a surreal moment in the police station where everyone was getting their guns out for our comparison and drawing their own version of what we attempting to describe.

The report finished and our contact details left (they even asked us for our facebook, not the most official of channels) we were done. Our entire foray in to violent crime lasted about two hours and left us both with a deep sense of annoyance. It is just one of those things and Suchitoto is genuinely a great place to visit. It was only after our mishap that we learnt you could get the tourist police to walk you down to the falls and avoid such unfortunate incidents.

But, as my father said when I called him to break the news 'you live and learn' and I guess we will.