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We've been travelling now for 6 weeks so we both thought we needed a break and decided to head to the beach. Originally we wanted to go to Cartagena in Colombia on the Carribean coast. Every single traveller we've met has raved about Colombia and 35 degrees in the Caribbean sounded fab. Unfortunately it was Colombia's factory fortnight so even though the 3 flights there from Quito didn't put us off, there were no rooms available at the inn. So we decided to try Ecuador's coast instead - it's Pacific not Caribbean, but still more exotic than the North Sea…Sheila decided she also needed a little bit of a sunshine break, so we decided to take a road trip to Canoa, 7 hours from Quito, then Jon and I would bus hop down the coast and get our flight to Chile from Guayaquil airport.
As we were driving, Sheila brought her boogie boards which we all had a go on. It was the first time I've used a boogie board - bear in mind I had swimming lessons 18 months ago to learn front crawl because I didn't like to put my head in the water. I wouldn't say I totally rocked the boogie board thing but I was better than Jon which is the main thing. But other than that we spend most of our time in Canoa in the 'beach position' - kindle in hand, suncream on face, bums on deckchairs. Turns out it's also quite useful to put suncream on your back, but I could lay down after a couple of nights so it wasn't the worse sunburn I've had (that award goes to the time I fell asleep on Bondi beach, directly under the hole in the Ozone layer - remember the Ozone layer from the 1990s??)
We had assumed the beach position when someone came up behind me and started shaking my deck chair…. Except there was no one there. I looked around to see if the others had noticed - Sheila also felt the earth move, and Jon … well he slept through it. He claims he didn't. There had been a 5.0 earthquake with its epicentre just off the coast but quite deep. Sheila works in disaster relief and was provisionally planning our route to the nearest highest place in case of a Tsunami, but it turned out ok. But the boogie boarding that afternoon was wicked. Even Jon could do it.
After bidding goodbye to Sheila we headed off to Puerto Lopez, about 75km down the coast. 6 hours, 4 buses and a tuk tuk ride later we arrived at our hotel. It felt like a very authentic travel experience, except this time there were less vomiting children as it is nice and flat on the coast. But the beach ay Puerto Lopez was lovely, and this time we were in a beachfront hotel with private hammocks both on our balcony, and in shaded huts on the beach. I'm glad the hotel was so nice, as I ended up with travellers stomach and - if I was going to be hotel bound - this was the place to do it.
Neither Jon or I particularly wanted to visit the Galapagos which Ecuador is probably most famous for -combination of cost and birds. But Puerto Lopez is close to Isla de la Plata, known as the Poor Man's Galapagos, so we decided to head there for the day. Unfortunately that was the day I was sick so Jon went on his own, and here are his thoughts…
Of all the days for Jen be sick, I think with hindsight this was probably the 'best' one of the trip so far…. It was a combination of the hour and a half getting to the island by a very small boat across choppy waters combined with the local bird population of the island (named boobies on account of their blue feet - yes really…!) deciding to never stray more than a foot from the path you walk on that meant that this may have been a bird watching experience too far. As the guided tour was 'solo espanyol' I only managed to pick up bits, the main thing being that at night the island is taken over with giant rats…
I'm not sure how giant rats came up in conversation in a weeks' worth of Spanish conversation classes, but Jon's teacher did numbers so I respect her methods.
We also took a trip to Los Frailes, one of 'Ecuador's most beautiful beaches' in the Manchanilla National Park. This meant we got to go in another tuktuk which made me happy. The driver arranged to pick us up couple of hours later and for the first half of the morning we were the only people on the beach which was good. We took advantage of the situation by playing Frisbee - some of you reading this have far too filthy minds. Our parents read this blog!
The trip to the next resort of Montanita only took an hour and one bus but it was another world. Think Ayia Napa, Malia and Magaluf in a small town in South America. It's the best surf beach in Ecuador so there were lots of surfers and hippies around, playing drums in a circle. There were also a lot of 16 year olds around so it made us feel very old. We were there for the weekend and Saturday night was crazy…we struggled to get a room at short notice but the 6 year olds and hippies didn't let that stop them, they slept in their cars or on the beach. On the Sunday night we toasted our last night in Ecuador with, what in retrospect, was probably a bit too much red wine and embraced a bit of 'if you can't beat them…' thinking.
We had to get our coach from Montanita to Guayaquil the next day at 5.45am. I was so keen to make sure everyone on the bus (mostly Argentinian teenagers) had at least one authentic Ecuadorian travel experience I vomited shortly before arriving into Guayaquil bus terminal. We have now lost one of our hand luggage bags, as that was the only thing handy. It does not pay to drink Smirnoff Ice on the beach 5 hours before taking a long coach journey.
This week we...
STAYED
· At Hotel Amaluya in Canoa, based on the fact it was the number one recommendation on trip advisor. The food is great, and the people that run it are lovely, but the rooms are like ovens, with no ventilation at all, and a fan that just pushed the hot air around. But for $20 a room per night, it feels wrong to complain. If we ever went back I would stay at Hotel Bambu, which is where we watched sunset from most evenings, the only place on the beach front.
· At Hostel Mandala in Puerto Lopez which was fantastic. The owners are lovely and helpful and they have 5 giant dogs. Absolute beasts. We referred to them by number - my favourite was number 5, who had a pink collar and like to try and hide under the table which was half the size of her. We had hammocks on the balcony, on the beach (so more renditions of STOP!Hammock time!) and we played scrabble in German. Well german letters to make English words.
· At Hotel Hvuniek in Montanita. Really central, but a couple of blocks away from the main pounding pounding techno music. A bit overpriced for what it was, but that really applied to Montanita as a whole.
ATE
· Lots of delicious seafood and fish (Jon and Sheila) and lots of chewy meat (me)
· Something which made me sick. Booo - I have my suspicions on where it came from…
LEARNT
· I am too old for this
· It pays to pack a spare, empty carrier bag on long journeys.
· It's hard to write a blog based on the subject material of sitting on your ass on the beach all week….
CLOSE ENCOUNTERS WITH OUR FEATHERED FOE
· We had to walk past some vultures on the way back to our hotel in Puerto Lopez from town one day. They looked like mid-sized black birds but with a metal helmet on. There even looked to be a gap between the helmet and the skin and feathers on their neck, like it was a bit too big for them. Ugly, mean looking birds.
· There were also pigeons on the beach in Montanita, which I found quite upsetting, particularly as the hippies would glare at me if I tried to shoo them away.
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