Today’s article stars pictures by guest photographer Esther Seiler, who we met in the Casa Mazeta hostel in Juayúa and who came with us on this daytrip. 

At first the national park “El Imposible” seemed true to its name in that the Google-suggested road through it changed from paved to unpaved to unleveled to “there should be a road to the left here” to “okay let’s turn around and drive the long way”.  

When we finally made it to the Mama y Papa hostel in Tacuba the guide we had contacted hadn’t received our last email that we were coming on this particular day and we had to volunteer our car to be able to drive into the park. Roads in El Salvador are so much better than in Guatemala but the steep ascents and descents required some serious low range maneuvering by Michael. 

El Imposible is in the south western corner of El Salvador and spans from 1,500m high peaks nearly to the Pacific coast. It was named for a deep gorge between two mountains that could only be crossed by a dangerous hanging bridge before a stone bridge was built in 1968. 

From the north the park is only accesible with a guide as apart from the “main road” there are no marked hiking trails. Our hike went from the Cerro de los Caballos to the famous bridge. 

It was a beautiful hike through coffee plantations, fruit and vegatable gardens and tiny remote villages where kids giggled when they saw the gringos hiking what is just their regular one hour walk to school. 

Earlier in the day, on our first misguided attempt to drive into the park we’d had great views, but by now it had unfortunately become foggy, so no peak panoramas but only a shot of gringos in the mist. 

On the way back we stopped at the house of our guide Joel so he could introduce us to his wife, five kids and numerous dogs. The kids where very shy at first but as soon as they heard Michael crackling with a bag of crisps they came running. 

We finished the day with a beer at Mama y Papa hostel where the superfriendly hosts were excited to have three visitors from Switzerland.Their son runs a coffee importer in Luzern and they loved the country (and German beer during a quick hop across the border) when they visited some years ago.  If you happen to see some Tacuba coffee in a shop – think of us and our day at El Imposible.