Hotel Bahia del Sol Marina, El Salvador
15 December 2016
So, yes, of course we made it over the sand bar and into the Bahia del Sol Hotel Marina. It was really kind of anti-climatic, but that's a good thing! People keep telling us "You still need to leave!".
Our arrival at the dock was full of pomp and circumstance. Bill, who lives here and runs the San Salvador Rally, had guided us across the bar in his panga boat, and gone ahead, had arrived at the dock before us and told us on the radio, which slip to enter. We had followed behind the catamaran Rapscullion across the bar and we were to dock on the opposite side of the dock from them. There were plenty of people on the dock to assist with the lines as there was still a current running from the high tide. In addition to the line handlers, Bill's wife Jean, who placed drinks in our hands and welcomed us to El Salvador, also met us! To our surprise, the Port Captain also came down to shake our hands and welcome us into his country. Introductions all around, including our new friends, Pamela & Henry from Rapscullion, and I barely had time to throw some shorts on before we were ushered up to the Port Captains office for check-in, barely having time to say hello to our friends from s/v Solar Flair, who had arrived from Chiapas a few days before us. It was all such a whirlwind of activity. The welcome cocktails we were sipping went straight to our heads after 2 days at sea and being slightly dehydrated.
After check in, we stopped at the restaurant/bar area to 'hydrate'. We met some more nice people from s/v Someday and then everyone else joined us before we decided that we should have something to eat. Heading back to the boat, we felt so happy with big smiles on our faces. What a nice way to enter a marina! I joked that they must have put something in our drinks to make us so happy that we wouldn't want to leave, haha.