San Andrés Archaeological Park

About this place

San Andrés Archaeological Park holds the remains of a small Maya capital in the Zapotitán Valley of El Salvador. Two pyramids and platforms rise among wide green lawns with distant hills behind, making it one of the country's most pleasant and quiet ancient sites to walk around, close to Joya de Cerén. Settlement began around 900 BC as a farming town in the valley. The enormous Ilopango eruption emptied it, and people returned in the fifth century. Between AD 600 and 900 it was the capital of a Maya polity with supremacy over other sites in the valley. In about AD 600 the South Seat was filled with adobe, leaving a tunnel to the original, to build the Acropolis. The Acropolis holds the main pyramid and ceremonial and political buildings, with rooms at its edges where governors lived, two of them rebuilt. In the North Seat stands a pyramid called La Campana, the bell, a green grass-covered mound. The residential area is not yet well studied, so most of what you see is the political and religious centre, with stone steps among the grass. The park is 22 km in a straight line north-west of San Salvador. The same newspaper gives Tuesday to Sunday opening. The ground is exposed, so bring a hat and water and start in the morning. Do not climb the pyramids, and keep to the paths. It is best paired with Joya de Cerén on the same day, and it is wise to carry your passport or a copy.