We weren't best prepared for the world outside Comalapa International Airport. Making our way to the taxi was spent intently rehearsing the few Spanish words we knew, just enough to assemble a coherent greeting the Salvadoran driver. A bright 'Hola!' followed by 'to the beach at La Libertad!'. He got 'Hola' alright but stumbled badly on 'la playa La Libertad por favor', due to missing words, imaginative pronounciation, and New Zilond accents, we gathered.

The journey kicked off in Dublin, taking in a snappy stop in the herbal haven of Venice, L.A., before connecting onto a 2am TACA flight to the Pacific-rimmed Central American nation of El Salvador; The first port of call on a ten week romp around that rich thread of land holding the North and South Americas together.

The name still conjures up striking imagery of civil war that ravaged throughout the 80's, fought between the left-wing revolutionary guerrilla group known as the Farabundo Martí­ National Liberation Front (FMLN) and U.S. supported right-wing government. The fighting was brutal with the government's Death Squads killing thousands throughtout the FMLN's rural civilian support base. In a single bloody day, known as the El Mozote massacre, an entire village of 900 men, women and children were raped or tortured and executed. The tragedy was denied by, and dismissed as FMLN propaganda, by a Reagan administration bent on bolstering the Salvadoran government's reputation in human rights, and the military aid kept flowing. When the smoke cleared in 1992 after 12 years at war, 75,000 Salvadorans were dead, a million left homeless with another million forced into exile.

Revving off in a cloud of blue smoke we headed south toward the coast through tangled lush jungle, our necks craning in all directions as the densly organic air occupied the void between body and clothes and the two became one in with the heat. The dusty seaside town of La Libertad approached through a herd of neatly dressed school kids hopping through a zebra crossing. After filling up on the cheap and tasty refried bean-filled tortillas known locally as Pupusas, we boarded a highly adorned rainbow-coloured bus that looked like something out of a Mardi gras float, smiled to all the staring faces of more well dressed residents beginning their day and chugged along the coastal cliffs to our first destination of El Sunzal.

After some searching we located the owner of the only cheap accommodation we saw in the tiny settlement, checked-in and followed a mosquito-ridden path overhanging with dripping vines to the dark sand and pebble bay, home to the main surf break. This deep water, predominantly right-hand breaking wave isn't too demanding on a small to medium swell but as it gets bigger you can expect some serious power as the place can hold almost any size swell. It's a popular spot being so close to the town of La Libertad but the peak tends to move around a fair bit so over-crowding isn't much of an issue. A few friendly exchanges with the locals and I was furnished with the name and directions to one entrepreneurial chap who had a small quiver of boards to choose from. If you're combining surf travel with wider explorations and therefore can't bring a board or two from home there's usually someone about who can provide you with a donated or salvaged surfboard for a reasonable sum of money, usually negotiable on price and almost always battered in condition!

Surf travel is all about the waves and having the craic with the locals and so, as anywhere, sharing good vibes in the water is important in keeping the karmic wheel spinning in positive circles. One particular early morning session, when the swell was pulsing, ended rather badly as my leash was torn off during a punishing wipe-out. The swim to shore was against heavy backwash from the steeply-shelved beach and after five minutes of persisting with the direct route in I was exhausted. I was only ten metres from land but it was impossible to get any closer, as if my magnetic field was the polar opposite to that of the beach, or that last pint of Guinness back in Dublin was the tipping point, so I rolled over to float in the wash for a rest. Just then two burly Salvadoran body boarders I'd been sharing waves with during the now long-forgotten session had paddled in to me and called out something in Spanish to which, without actually knowing the meaning of at the time, I understood solely from its context in the situation and replied back by throwing my hands in the air and pointing to the beach. They proceeded to tow me into shore. I caught my breath and thanked them profusely, to everyone's amusement! Someone else had retrieved the runaway board for me from down the beach, also laughing, but at the ding that rocks had inflicted on it.

After hearing word of another right-hand reef break not far up the coast in a town named El Zonte, we filled our packs, boards under arm and jumped onto the back of a fully-loaded bus heading north. The young lads holding on at the back with us took a great interest in the strange tourists and, once they knew our Spanish sucked, had a great time cracking each other up at our expense! We legged it from the bus at the moss-covered El Zonte signpost in the fading light to the end of a deserted lane, past muted gatherings behind bushes and toward floodlights. After fording a small river and avoiding the mangy dogs looking for a scrap we landed at the surf 'resort' of Horizonte. This place was an oasis among the ramshackle surroundings, cleaner than a nuns nasty and $7.50 each sharing. Result!

The new morning greeted us with fresh faces with whom we would soon confuse with Spanish phrases patched together ad hoc. The friendly restaurant girls accepted the challenge and every time we ate our stomachs and vocabulary expanded! Many an hour was killed under its palm-leafed roof looking out onto the break, supping cold beer, scribbling down thoughts and images, and chatting with anybody who looked interested. We surfed morning and night with the offshore breezes on the snappy rights, fishermen casting their nets wide over the shallows to a backdrop of a visibly steaming jungle looming large overhead.

One day the rains arrived and never left. The once-gentle river we'd crossed days earlier was now silted up and raging, turning the usually clear waters into a cold, brown soup. With this turn the decision was made to return the rental boards and hit the interior armed with what must have now been a fifty-word, multi-phrase vocabulary and enough surf stoke to last us until Nicaragua; Our next surfing destination, three countries away.