Ruta de Las Flores

As is often the case, our intended route to Santa Ana changed in the colourful town of Ahuachapan where we were convinced that the longer hillier Routa de las Flores was worth the effort. We passed some heavily loaded firewood carts as we climbed the first hill, had a lunch/juggling break in Apaneca's nice central park, and rolled on towards more beautiful volcanos adorned with patchwork forests of coffee and shelter trees. As we started into the last big hill of the day we came to a coffee processing facility where the smell of coffee drew us in for a sample, but the giant map of coffee farms and little roads around the volcanoes really caught our interest as it looked like there was a way to circumnavigate Volcan Santa Ana on dirt roads through coffee plantations. We reluctantly got back on our bikes and started up again, enjoying beautiful views over the valley as we climbed. We camped at a church outside of Los Naranjos and had to stake our tents well for the first windy night in a long while - at least it made for a comfortable sleeping temperature!Read more