Thoughts on Remote Work Life in El Salvador
More specifically, El Tunco, a little surf town.
Every year, one of my best friends, Cam, and I, plan a co-living house in Central America. Our criteria for planning these trips so far has been:
- Great waves for surfing within a ~5 minute drive
- High speed internet
- Low cost of living
- Good community
- Ballin’ airbnb game
- New country — we want to see what the world has to offer.
At this point of time, I have done this for 5 years and co-lived/surfed in Nicaragua, Portugal, Morocco, Spain, Costa Rica, Mexico and as of writing, I am currently working and living in El Salvador.
In all my previous trips, most people have been very receptive and excited about the location chosen. El Salvador was not received quite as well. We got countless messages from people warning us about how dangerous it was and how prominent the gangs were. They had not experienced it themselves (or had been to El Salvador themselves), but were certain that it was a bad idea to choose El Salvador for our next coliving house.
Oh also — the president is crazy and just enforced Bitcoin on the whole country.
So, I have been here for two months now. Whats my hot take?
Let me break down my thoughts in a few sections:
- Safety
- Bitcoin
- Surfing
- Internet
Safety
In one sentence I would shoot all concerns with one line:
‘99.99% of people are good, want to do good and return the energy that you give.’
Is El Salvador dangerous?
It can be (just like any country).
Is everywhere dangerous: No.
We are living in El Tunco and we have not had a single problem and have actually been impressed with how friendly the locals are and even other surfers are.
Friendly surf line ups can be rare.
Is gang activity a real concern? Are there gangs?
We haven’t seen any sign of it in El Tunco, however, though we have not seen it, we have been told that there are ongoing conflicts between certain neighbourhoods and regions of El Salvador. However we are assured that tourists are almost never mixed up in it and the locals and government make sure of this.
The locals and government want tourism to pick up in El Salvador and as tourism isa valuable component of the ocean side communities like El Tunco, they make a conscious effort to leave tourists alone.
Going into this trip we were concerned about theft as we had been robbed dry on a previous trip in Ibiza. We asked our host if we should be concerned about theft here and we were told that the last time a theft happened years ago that the military had been brought into the neighbourhood to catch the bad actors. For me this goes to show that they take tourism experience fairly serious here.
I was even pulled over by the police here for not having my helmet on while motorcycling and though I did not have my helmet handy or my drivers license or registration, I was simply instructed to turn around and go home and get my helmet with a smile. That’s all. No bribery, no stress and overall a very friendly interaction.
Bitcoin
Do you need bitcoin everywhere? Nope!
I am a Bitcoin investor myself, and I am honestly pretty underwhelmed by the Bitcoin options here. For the most part even though most places you could pay in Bitcoin, it’s much simpler and easier to pay in cash. Generally I’d say the locals prefer cash. What I will say though, is that the Bitcoin infrastructure does exist and is pretty damn good. Pulling cash out of ATM’s here is not only expensive but its pretty damn inconvenient. We get hit with 5$ withdrawal fees and most of the time we are only able to pull out about ~300$ a time (some of us have been able to get out $500, others have not been able to get any out).
Alternatively there are Bitcoin ATM’s and the official one in La Libertad which operates off the Chivo wallet has no withdrawal fees and actually sells you the Bitcoin at market rate which is pretty amazing. I don’t think I can get my cash into Bitcoin at market rate anywhere in Canada.
For anyone coming down here, I recommend adopting Bitcoin yourself and using it at the Chivo ATM’s to get your USD. Have some fun, try it out and you will be pleased as it’s the easiest and cheapest way to get cash down here and you will also get a little taste of the future!
Surfing
Surfing here is top notch (especially if you are a regular footed surfer (left foot forward)).
There is a great mix of beach breaks and point breaks to choose from. Within a 15 minute drive from our house we can choose from over 5 breaks.
- Punta Roca (for advanced surfers)
- Bocana (also advanced-ish)
- Sunzal (our favourite)
- El Zonte (also known as Bitcoin Beach)
- K59 (most scenic break)
These breaks range from shallow aggressive take offs at Punta Roca for top level surfers to beginner friendly surfing at Sunzal where you get a good mix of both large and small waves. Almost all spots allow for nice long rides if you catch the wave right and even the occasional barrel (I have not personally experienced one).
We also did a 3 hour road trip down the coast to Las Flores on the border of Honduras. Las Flores was mind blowing. It has a beautiful sandy long beach, views of volcano’s in every direction which make for epic sunrises/sunsets but also has one of the best point breaks I have surfed in Central America. There is not much to do in this town other than surf, but if surfing is your goal then a Las Flores trip is a must.
Internet
Internet was a bit of an iffy one. I won’t lie to you. Our first spot, One Wave Surf Villa, had reliable high speed fibre optic internet. We got about 30mb down/up most days. Our house here was at the El Sunzal point break, and we were told that this was the furthest north that the fibre optic internet had been extended too. We can confirm this unfortunately as well. At one point we had to move a 5 minute drive further north for 2 weeks to a place called Atami and the internet was 2mb down/up (on a good day). Pretty high stress situation for those of us doing daily video calls.
We ended up having to hot-spot at a cafe which had a direct line of sight to a cell tower most days. It worked, but it was unreliable, a little loud and not ideal for those of us who have pretty serious work to do and we need our space to focus.
So whats my take away? Really do your due-diligence on the internet before committing to your stay in El Tunco. Fibre Optic does exist, but it is hard to come by and for the most part does not stretch north past El Tunco. Make sure your host understands the needs of a remote worker and have them send you a screen shot of internet speed tests from the house.
High speed internet does exist but it is scarce. I expect this to change greatly in the next few years.
So, in conclusion?
Yeah, El Tunco is great. If you like surfing it doesn’t get much better. Outside of that in my opinion, there’s not a whole ton else to do, but its a great place to get healthy, to focus and load up on vitamin D. I’ll be going back and I expect this place to blow up just like other surf towns in Central America have.
Have any questions? Hit me up on instagram, always happy to lend my advice!
@miketsolty