🇸🇻 Santa Ana Day Trip
On one of my last days in El Salvador I decided to take a day trip, with the two options being the surfing town of La Libertad on the Pacific coast, or Santa Ana, which is famous for the surrounding volcanoes and plethora of sporty outdoorsy activities one can do while staying there. As you can tell from the title above and the photos below, I ended up choosing the latter, and obviously doing nothing even remotely sporty. No regrets, as I ended up having a great day in the town.
Catedral de Nuestra Señora Santa Ana
This Gothic revival cathedral is by far the single most famous attraction in the town of Santa Ana, for both locals and tourists, but even more so for the pigeons….
Great food, exceptional geography
I arrived in Santa Ana mid-morning and wandered around keeping an eye out for an appetising spot to grab some pupusa for breakfast. So when a guy sitting outside a restaurant tried to get me to come in, my instinct to always reject such overtures was overruled by my stomach. And a good thing too.
The place was super hot and stuffy, with one tiny fan in one corner, but totally packed, and the pupusas were great. I also spent so long looking at the other food available that I ordered this chicken taco for dessert.
Best of all was the service though, it turned out to be a family-run place with seemingly three generations working. And the grandson not only spoke English, but was also quite astute when it came to geography - knowing both Alaska and Slovenia (as well as the bonus of Yugoslavia, despite not being alive when it existed).
I planned to come back for lunch before leaving the city, but unfortunately wasn't hungry again. Next time though!
It's called Comedor y pupusería Margoth and is on Google Maps next time you're in Santa Ana, El Salvador....
Piñata Fever
The first thing you notice about Santa Ana - or at least the first thing I noticed - was that it's got loads of piñata shops. It seemed like there was one on every block in the city centre, and at any given moment if you looked around you could see at least one person carrying a colourful papier-mâché future beating victim.
Since statistically speaking Santaneños can't have more birthdays or other celebrations than the average Salvadoran, they must just have more bottled up rage. Perhaps it's got something to do with the nearby volcano.
NB: It's also always nice to spot a certain Nintendo plumber enjoying his freedom out in the wild.
Everyone Loves Elvis
Another Elvis sighting in Latin America - the biggest and best one yet. And all the more surprising, as it was on the backstreets of Santa Ana....
Santa Ana street art
Some Santa Ana street art....
Electropolis
Love both the name and the font of the sign. If I were need of furnishing an apartment in Santa Ana, Electropolis would 100% be the first place I'd check out fridges, fans and whatever else they've got inside.
My kind of water park
You won't find it in Lonely Planet or even Atlas Obscura, but this abandoned, overgrown spa centre was not only the coolest individual sight I saw in Santa Ana, but perhaps all of El Salvador. Some serious post-apocalyptic vibes....
World's smallest mall
This might be pushing the limits on the definition of what most people consider a 'mall' to be, but at least its proprietors and their goods aren't subject to the daily whims of a naked emperor and a clown car full of financially illiterate economic advisors. Presumably....
NB: When this was originally posted in early June 2025, the US regime's slapdash, flip flopping, not at all well thought out China tariffs were in the news.
No JFK
"I have come to serve, not to be served”
Based on this quote alone, I was going call this guy the Salvadoran JFK, but then spent about two minutes googling him and turns out he was a CIA-backed, right-wing dictator, who oversaw the worst of the death squads and whatnot during the country's civil war in the 1980s 😬
Cool middle name at least. No one can take that away from him....
No funny business
Don't even think about trying any funny business at the sinks of this public bathroom in Santa Ana's central market, because you're being watched. Maybe. Obviously no one was on guard when I took this photo, or I almost certainly wouldn't have taken it.
Mercado Central
I unfortunately didn't spend much time there - I was too busy on the other side of town, serendipitously coming across overgrown swimming pools, eating ice cream and drinking coconut water out of plastic bags, etc - but Santa Ana's central market looked amazing.
More an entire area of town than a proper market, it was just block after block of dodgy little covered alleyways and dirt streets lined with locals selling all manner of things. Reminded me quite a bit of the Arab souks found all across the Middle East and beyond.
Of course I took virtually no photos - only this one the toilet mirror one above - so you'll have to use your imagination, or even better visit yourself one day.
Disappointing
El Salvador not only made a great first impression on me, but pretty much every individual person I met was super friendly (at least to me). But every now and then you do get reminded that the average Salvadoran is a very conservative Christian, and historically their government's various death squads have been armed and trained by the world's second foremost purveyor of death squad armaments and training after the CIA.
Sassy Trash
Kia Soul Capital of the World
And the single most surprising/memorable thing about Santa Ana? The prevalence of Kia Souls. No joke. At any given time you could see a minimum of 2-3 of these boxy little hatchbacks - either stuck in traffic or parked. It was madness.
After getting back to San Salvador, I even spent some time googling "¿Por qué hay tantos Kia Souls en Santa Ana, El Salvador?", and got lots of results on YouTube and TikTok, but unfortunately zero actual concrete answers. So the mystery remains.
Apparently it's just a good car, but only Salvadorans are aware of this fact en masse....
