El Salvador

A Maya farming village buried by volcanic ash around AD 600, preserved with extraordinary fidelity and often called the Pompeii of the Americas.

A vast volcanic crater lake in the Santa Ana highlands, formed by a series of huge eruptions between 72,000 and 57,000 years ago, now famous for its startling blue water and the island of Teopan at its centre.

A compact surf beach on the Pacific coast of La Libertad department, famous for consistent breaks, its iconic rock formation at the shoreline, and a lively traveller scene that has developed around it.

A stratovolcano that rises immediately northwest of San Salvador city, its original crater nearly filled by the newer Boquerón edifice, with the prominent El Picacho peak reaching 1,960 metres and the surrounding national park accessible by trail.

A colonial hill town in Cuscatlán department that was the site of the original founding of San Salvador in 1528, now a cultural tourism destination known for its whitewashed church, cobblestone streets and artesanía workshops.

A pre-Columbian Mesoamerican architectural complex at Chalchuapa, excavated and restored by Stanley Boggs in the 1940s–1950s, with some of the earliest metal artefacts in Mesoamerica.