This is our only picture of our week-long bus ride from Guatemala down to Panama. This was one of MANY stops along the way, where we had to take our passports and forms from one official to the next, and then back again. Here in El Salvador, after we thought we had cleared all the hurdles, and EVERY official had had a look at our passports and stamped some official papers, all the passengers on our bus were asked to take all their luggage off the bus for one more inspection. The bag of chips made the ordeal bearable for Rudy. Part of an email I wrote about the bus trip follows: After a month of living the great life in Antigua, establishing a sort of routine which made it very comfortable, Sue and I booked bus tickets south. Our first stop, after an afternoon of travelling along the Panamerican Highway, was the Salvadoran capital San Salvador. Again, just as we were about to disembark the bus, one of the passengers who had been on our trip files by and asks us where we're spending the night. When we tell him, he looks back and says to us, "Be careful. Don't go walking. You're in the most dangerous country in the world!" And with that he's in a taxi and gone, leaving 2 Canadians standing at the bus stop, wondering what they're doing there. Okay, we didn't go out that night. We stayed in our hotel room. Well, hotel room might be a bit of an exaggeration. But the next morning we were back on a bus at 5:00 am, bound for Managua, Nicaragua. As we drove through the garbage dump that is El Salvador I was amazed at the sights and sounds. I don't mean the national flower, which apparently is the blue plastic bag, thousands of which we saw blowing around EVERYWHERE. No, in El Salvador and in Honduras I saw ditches FILLED with broken glass, plastic Pepsi bottles, thousands of old tires, dead horses, rusted differentials, even old BlueBird bus carcasses (and I don't mean just one bus, I saw at least a hundred of them). When you see the chicken buses of Central America (brightly painted condemned Bluebird school buses [with mudflaps that proclaim 'Jesus mi mejor senor' over the sillouette of a very shapely Playboy bunny!] from Canada and the US which spew out dark blue smoke as they haul 150 passengers plus animals all over the country) you'd think that the people here don't throw ANYTHING away -- but they do! The difference between the countryside and our landfill site at home is that we organize our garbage. Back on the road. Bump, bump, jostle, jostle. Stop for the border. Line up at the border office window. Passport! Stamp, stamp. Next window. Pay $2.00 U.S. Stamp, stamp. Back to the first line-up. Pay more. Fill in official looking papers. All the while being hassled by local 'money-changers' who want to rip you off. Back on the bus. Drive 2 miles, stop for police check. Everybody take out their passports. Okay. Repeat at 5 mile intervals another 3 times. Actually riding the bus is somewhat like a long international flight. Except: Instead of microwaved psuedo-steak you get a couple of small boys who come aboard for a few miles, walk up and down the aisle trying to sell you a bag of crab apples or a package of homemade corn tortillas. Instead of cheap uncomfortable re-usable headphones you get to sit right under a blaring distorting speaker, volume on high, alternator whine and buzz drowning out whatever dialogue there might be in the movie -- did I say movie? Smeary dubbed and subtitled copies of copies of copies of Abbot & Costello, followed by 'Night of the Living Dead', followed by the most violent movie ever made by Mel f**king Gibson -- no wonder these guys are all so fascinated by guns. Reminds me of when the Grunthal boys came to town to watch Burt Reynolds in 'White Lightning' on Friday nights and then when the movie was over they raced up and down Main Street in their dad's pickup truck -- that's what the Salvadoran men reminded me of -- Grunthal cowboys with real guns. Instead of a canned safety video and a demonstration of how to operate a seatbelt -- there were no seatbelts, no folding table trays, no life-jacket under the seat. But it DID remind us of a marathon flight, with turbulence -- major turbulence sometimes -- all the way, and sitting next to the bathroom smelled about the same as it does on a lengthy international flight. In Managua we checked into another flea-bitten excuse for a motel. No air-conditioning. 'Security' boys everywhere. Go out in the evening for 'supper' at a local favorite kitchen. An enthusiastic Salvadoran who had been on the same bus as we saw us walking by and invited us to join him. Sue and I poked at our fried chicken bones and 'gallo pinto' (a popular mix of beans and rice) and listened to the warnings of how 'moy peligroso' (very dangerous -- I got to know some Spanish words very well) the area was. Warned us not to walk after sunset. We didn't.