Christine’s Travel Report: El Salvador (14 Feb–4 Mar 2026)

El Salvador is the smallest country in Central America and lies between Guatemala and Honduras on the Pacific coast. The country covers around 21,041 km², roughly the size of the German state of Hesse. About 6.5 million people live in El Salvador.

Geographically, El Salvador is strongly shaped by volcanoes, mountain ranges, and fertile high plateaus. The climate is tropical, with a rainy season and a dry season.

Historically, El Salvador was a Spanish colony and part of Spain’s colonial empire in Central America. The country gained independence from Spain on 15 September 1821.

Coffee arrived in El Salvador in the 19th century and quickly became the country’s most important export product. Thanks to the favorable climate and volcanic soils, El Salvador was particularly well suited for coffee cultivation. For many decades, coffee shaped El Salvador’s economy, politics, and society, and it remains an important part of agriculture and national identity to this day.

El Salvador defines six coffee-growing regions, two of which I visited this year (Apaneca-Ilamatepec and Tecapa-Chinameca).

As always, my trip begins with a visit to the ISC Instituto Salvadoreño de Café, which is part of the Ministry of Agriculture.

The ISC has several departments, including the coffee school. Here I meet Manuel Vindel, Samuel Anaya, Fernando, and Mario Escobar. They train coffee experts at the national level. Their courses range from barista skills, latte art, and catación (cupping) to roasting. Mario has been roasting the coffees for the Cup of Excellence in El Salvador for years, and all of them serve as judges for this competition and for the national championships.

We have known each other for many years, and the exchange is valuable. It brings me up to date and allows me to assess the national coffee market first-hand.

With Mario Escobar, I record a short video with roasting tips for Pacamara for Instagram.

Another visit is to the Quality Lab. Jorge and his team regularly taste all coffees produced in the country that are intended for export or the local market, and they monitor quality with regard to defined flavor profiles, processes, and varieties.

A highlight of my visit is a cupping of samples I brought along: Arabicas from different producing countries, but above all Canephora and Liberica, both of which are species that are not grown commercially in the country. I encounter them again later in the institute’s variety garden. This variety garden has existed since the 1950s/60s. It serves research purposes and showcases a wide range of coffee species and varieties from around the world. Jorge gives me an overview. Of course, this also includes the emblematic Pacamara that was bred here.

The cupping is exciting for all of us. The current president of the ISC, Mauricio Calderón Sansivirini, also takes the time for the cupping and for an exchange.

The ISC is ultimately in ongoing, direct contact with producers and the local coffee scene.

Departure early in the morning at 5:30 a.m. from Santa Tecla heading southeast. The drive takes about three hours, through rush-hour traffic in the capital San Salvador, and then more or less parallel to the Pacific coast over the Río Lempa. We stop there for breakfast, then continue to Usulután in the coffee region Tecapa-Chinameca. This region, like most coffee regions in El Salvador, is shaped by volcanoes.

Shortly before Usulután we turn left toward California, and from there it gets pretty bumpy going uphill. We pass the entrance to Finca La Vega (which I visited last year) and continue up to Finca La Belgica. This finca has been in the family since 1913 and is managed by Ernesto, his wife Liza, and their son Rodrigo on behalf of the family.

The large, old farmhouse in a traditional style with wooden cladding is beautiful and full of memorabilia: old household items, children’s toys, and photographs. The family still spends a lot of time here, and you can feel the glow of earlier times.

Around the farmhouse, large trees are blooming in a bright yellow: Cortés Blanco, a tree that provides valuable timber for construction and furniture. It has been and still is used on the farm itself, and it is also a welcome additional source of income.

In an outbuilding, coffee is still being roasted for sale on the local market. After refreshments with freshly prepared mandarin juice, we head downhill to a lot where Kenibon is mainly grown. Harvest on the farm is already completely finished. Only very few cherries are still hanging on the shrubs, but you can clearly see the structures. The lot, under mostly old native shade trees, consists of partly old plants that have been repeatedly pruned back, with thick trunks, and younger replanted plants. Pruning and maintenance work is already in full swing. We meet a group of employees who selectively decide where pruning is needed and which plants must be replaced.

Afterwards we drive to the beneficio (wet mill), where a few lots are still drying on African beds. With fine-mesh nets stretched above, sun and shade are controlled deliberately to avoid overheating and ensure as even a drying process as possible. Next door, under old trees, are the tanks in which the cherries are anaerobically fermented before being dried on the African beds.

Miguel has worked for L’Etranger for a long time and explains the process while two employees turn the coffee.

The drive back to Santa Tecla offers time for exchange before a long coffee day comes to an end.

I have arranged to meet Lucia on two days.

First, we drive together with her sister-in-law Silvia to Finca Las Mercedes, in the same region as Café L’Etranger’s Finca La Belgica, but on the other side of the mountain. So it’s the same route at first, then on to Santiago de María and from there up to the finca.

I have visited this finca several times before and I’m impressed every time by the entire setup. The core consists of the main house, the beneficio with patios and African beds for drying coffees, huge water tanks in which rainwater is collected during the rainy season, the technical equipment for depulping coffees, fermentation tanks, and storage rooms for dried coffee. From there, it is transported by truck to Beneficio Tuxpal/Tejemet, where intensive quality control takes place and the coffee is hulled, sorted, and packed for export.

The site is functional and impeccably clean and organized. The staff are well trained, and Lucia doesn’t just supervise: she also helps hands-on when sorting cherries. The processes are standardized and everyone knows exactly what to do.

A walk around the site is part of the visit, as is a pickup tour to the higher parts of the finca, where plenty of coffee is still waiting to be harvested. We stop here and there for explanations. The views over Santiago de María, across the volcanoes and the plains, are breathtaking. Lucia knows every lot on the finca in detail: where and when what was planted and what the current status is.

On the lower part of the finca, where coffee cultivation no longer works due to climate change, Lucia and Silvia have set up new greenhouses and growing areas for fruit and vegetables, which are sold at the local market and to restaurants in El Salvador.

This time I even have to use the service of the finca’s own clinic, where they bandage the foot I sprained the day before. Normally, employees are treated here with medication or in case of workplace accidents.

After lunch we return to the beneficio, where the harvest workers have meanwhile arrived with today’s pickings. Each sack is weighed individually and then pre-sorted separately on African beds (removing unripe cherries, etc.) before the harvest is kept varietal-pure in the large white-tiled collection tanks and then sent for further processing depending on the chosen process.

As soon as all sacks are empty, the helpers head home. We do the same.

On the second day, I meet Lucia at Beneficio Tuxpal. It belongs to another branch of the Pacas family and is located right next to Café Pacas’ Beneficio Vivagua.

This is where Lucia’s coffee is later processed to be export-ready. But this is also where intensive quality control happens. In the Quality Lab, Cristian Arevalo, the reigning Cupping Champion 2025, is responsible for the cuppings. Together with him, Lucia cups every single lot. She knows her coffees extremely well.

On this day, we also cup together with Jairo Palacios, the roaster of VivaEspresso, the first coffeeshop chain in El Salvador, and Lily Pacas, the head of the beneficio. Wonderful coffees, which I have also tasted in previous years. Interestingly, my favorite is almost always the Yellow Icatu, which we bought last year as Tigrito.

The exchange in this cupping round is lively: everyone comments on every coffee, with flavor profile and overall assessment. An intense coffee day!

On the first day, Alfredo Pacas picks me up. There are other guests with me as well: two coffee roasters from the USA who have been Café Pacas customers for a long time.

We drive to Finca San Joaquin, a finca on the slopes of the Santa Ana volcano. The farm covers 31 hectares and offers spectacular views both over the surrounding slopes and out across the plains toward Guatemala and Honduras and, because of the clear windy weather, even south as far as the Conchagua volcano.

Mainly Bourbon is grown here, but also Bernardina, among others. This variety is, so to speak, Café Pacas’ signature variety, with which they have regularly celebrated successes in the Cup of Excellence in recent years.

In the lower part of the finca, directly behind the older buildings that serve as storage, we walk through older plantings. Employees are carrying out a final harvest step: cleaning the plants of all remaining cherries (unripe, dried, overripe, etc.) without damaging the flower beginnings and buds that are already present. The foreman Vidal leads the way and shows us everything. Alfredo explains (there is a video of it).

Then we continue in the back of the pickup to see the Bernardina. And unfortunately, that’s where it ends for me: when getting out, I twist my ankle. Foot sprained. There’s no way I can walk through the steep plantings. Very frustrating.

I’m driven up to the very top in the pickup, where I wait for the others and enjoy the view.

After the finca visit, we go to Café Pacas’ Beneficio Vivagua. There, Maria Pacas is waiting for us with a small presentation and an overview of the harvest year, a short tour of the beneficio and the warehouse, and of course a cupping.

There are 11 coffees on the table: an overview of the range as far as it is already available. First we taste blind, exchange impressions, aroma notes, flavor profiles, and ideas, and we find that we are well calibrated. Then Maria reveals each coffee: which one it is, which process, and which variety. Some of the coffees we had in our range last year (Tita Toni, Diamante, and El Nano) are included again and perform well.

The next day, Maria picks me up. The planned finca visit unfortunately has to be canceled due to my sprained foot, so we spend the entire day at the beneficio and use it differently.

First, we do another cupping with additional coffees, this time mainly from the “Incunables” product line, which are Café Pacas’ top coffees. This includes the famous Bernardina, once processed as natural and once as honey.

Then I spend a lot of time with Jeny. She is responsible for marketing at Café Pacas and records several videos and interviews with me. We also want to make the work beyond producers and harvest workers more visible: for example office work like marketing and export handling. Social media is indispensable at origin as well. Just as we present producers, producers also present their buyers. Videos and photos are created. The mutual appreciation of the collaboration is tangible and real.

The fincas of the Duarte family are in the Apaneca-Ilamatepec coffee region, to the north near the border with Guatemala. I spend two days in Ahuachapán to combine several appointments here as well.

A meeting with Fernando Silva, the managing director of Beneficio Los Ausoles, is on the agenda. For several years now, the Cup of Excellence lots from El Salvador have been managed and stored here during the competition and shipped to the respective buyers after the competition. The logistics behind this are demanding, and because of the international reputation of CoE, it is a responsible task.

Luis picks me up early for the finca visit. The drive is not very far, but after a short stretch on the main road we turn off and then crawl uphill for a long time on very bad, steep, dusty gravel roads.

First we visit Finca San Miguel, which I had not seen on previous visits. A small, beautifully located farm with wonderful views toward Guatemala and Honduras. The small house at the entrance is uninhabited, without water or electricity. Until recently, it was out of the question to set this up permanently for an employee, because due to the poor security situation and the threat posed by the maras, nobody would have wanted or been able to live here. Now it is an option for the future.

So far, workers walk the long way in the morning, and during harvest season the coffee is picked up by pickup in the evening. Logistically, this is a problem, or a major challenge in times of labor shortages.

The plants grown here are mainly old Bourbons, repeatedly pruned back. In the longer term, the stock will be rejuvenated here as well.

Harvest is already over here too. The coffee from this finca goes into the SHG that we have in the program as Cayetano, which is a mix of different varieties from several farms of the Duarte family.

Then we drive back a bit and turn onto another path that runs along the slope to the other side of the ridge, to Finca Miravalles. I have visited it several times in the past. This time, unfortunately, I cannot explore this truly beautiful finca on foot, with its old tree population and an almost endless abundance of native plants. So we stay at the collection point, where the pickers have already spread out the day’s harvest at this time and are pre-sorting it here as well. Short conversations with some of them round out the day.

After the finca visit, we meet Luis’s father, Luis Sr., for lunch at the Tayau Bosque restaurant, where coffee is also roasted. The roasting room with a panoramic glass front is right next to our table. Luis Sr. was the managing director of the Coex cooperative for a long time, where Tacubaya’s coffee is processed for export. Today he helps take care of the agricultural side of Tacubaya’s coffee farms.

We drive back again, past Ahuachapán to Laguna El Espino. Two large beneficios are located here: Fernando Silva’s Los Ausoles and also COEX. And the Duarte family has built a small beneficio here as well. This is where the specialty coffees (including La Gloria and Cayetano) from their own farms are processed, while standard qualities are brought to COEX due to space and capacity constraints.

We tour the facility, and Luis explains everything in detail.

The coffee is dried on African beds in layers that are not too thick, to ensure optimal ventilation and avoid overheating/fermentation. The coffees are turned regularly and, depending on weather conditions (temperature, cloud cover, precipitation), covered if necessary. Once the optimal moisture content is reached, the coffees are stored as pergamino until further processing for export.

Luis also has a small lab here for cuppings, although for larger volumes the lab at Coex is used.