Guayaquil

I made a brief stop in the coastal town of Guayaquil during a lengthy bus trip into Peru. It is the second largest city in Ecuador, but not all that great for tourists. I spent about four hours there and it was about the perfect amount of time. I started in a park downtown with large iguanas roaming around the statues and palm trees.

From there I went to the waterfront park that replaced the old concrete-and-crime waterfront that they had until 2000.

At the end of the waterfront there is a hill with a lighthouse you can climb with a little chapel at the base. Nice view of the city from there, and I hit it just at sunset.

Puerto Lopez

I continued along the coast to another small town called Puerto Lopez. It doesn't have much going for it except for its proximity to Ecuador's only coastal national park. That park encompasses a dry forest, Ecuador's best beach, and Isla de la Plata, or "poor man's Galapagos." First I went on a combined whale watching/Isla de la Plata tour. I had my camera, but left my memory card at the hostal, but again my friend Andy was kind enough to share his amazing pictures. If you want to visit his website it's andyradin.com.

The boobies prefer to nest on bare soil, so the paths that traverse the island are PERFECT... except the the pesky humans that keep disturbing them. The female boobie is slightly larger than the male, and has larger irises. Normally an imbalanced sex ratio is an indicator for intraspecies competition for mates, but it is the males who do the courting in boobie culture, so I don't know why the boobie bucks the trend for larger males.

Fluffy masked boobie chick

A masked boobie

Red tropic bird

The only red footed boobie we saw

Frigate bird and chick

On the way back from the island, we were lucky enough to see a humpback breaching repeatedly very close to the boat. It was amazing to see them so close and so active.

The next day I hiked a small portion of the mainland portion of the park. There were small lizards sunning themselves all along the path, so that every three steps that I took I could hear them scurrying off into the fallen leaves. It is the dry season now, so the forest was dormant and brown, but there was one vine with large, bright pink flowers climbing the bare trees. Seeing that bold spot of color in an otherwise barren landscape was quite striking. The path lead to two beaches, where for the first time on the coast I saw the sun. I went in the only slightly cool water, ate the ceviche I had packed, and sat in the sun for a while before heading back to town.

Crab tracks. Why do they roll the sand into little balls?

Montañita

I spent nearly a week on the Ecuadorian coast. The first town was Montañita, a town of about 1,000 people with a unique beach economy. Every morning the streets are lined with yellow carts. One block is selling fruit salads and fresh juice, the other, covered by tri-colored umbrellas, churns out ceviche until the afternoon. I have never had such fresh seafood. I´ve always found squid to be too rubbery for my taste, but here they pride themselves on serving only what has been caught that day, and every piece was fresh and not the least bit chewy. Served with fresh limes and fried plantain chips, with coconut juice to counter the acidity, it is an incredibly satisfying lunch. At night, the ceviche carts are gone, but in their place are carts selling the worst hamburgers I have ever had, fried chicken, french fries, grilled corn served with mayonnaise and cheese, grilled chicken and sausages on a skewer, and one lonely taco stand. On another block stands selling cocktails have opened up, each with its own stereo system blasting latin music, as if sheer volume was a reliable proxy for judging drink quality. Behind these carts are discotechs, each blasting their own music until four in the morning.

My first night there I made the mistake of staying in a hostal only a few blocks off the ``strip.´´ Going to bed at 11, I could not only hear the music but feel the bass. It was a restless night, as you can imagine, and the next day I moved even farther away, to what was my favorite hostal in Ecuador. The room was on the top floor of a three story building in the middle of an orchard of unknown fruit(?) trees. It´s a warm climate, and it is very open to the air. To my girlish delight, there were very romantic mesh mosquito nets over the beds. At night you could still hear the music, but the crickets were louder that it, and in the morning the birdsong was beautiful. The walkway was lined with flowers and you could spend the afternoon in a hammock and watch the hummingbirds fly from blossom to blossom.

I mostly sat around and ate a lot, but one afternoon I did rent a boogie board for an hour and hit the surf. It was loads of fun, but even with my rash guard I walked away with a severely skinned stomach and upper legs. It was worth it though.

Cuenca - mercado

One of my favorite places in Cuenca was the mercado. Walking through the southern entrance you were surrounded by bags of peas, tomatoes, various greens, cauliflower, broccoli, and other vegetables.  I drew you a picture!

Not to scale ;-)

Walking through the aisles of the herb merchants was delightful, the air smelled amazing, and the piles of green leaves, mixed with flowers such as amaranth and chamomile were beautiful. The butcher section was interesting in a completely different way... The food court was my favorite place to eat in Cuenca. First off, it was cheap, only $1.50 for a meal. Though a smaller portion than other places, that was fine with me, since I can only eat half of the meals they normally serve here. Even at the mercado, I´ve never cleaned my plate while eating out. After ordering food, I would walk over to the juice section and get a cup of coconut-mora for $.50. Mora is a dark berry that is similar to our blackberry, but tarter and firmer. That juice, which is really more of a smoothie, is absolutely amazing. Creamy with a thick head of foam on top. I encourage everyone to try to make it at home.

Cuenca

I have spent the past week in Cuenca, which is in the Southern highlands of Ecuador. The city is beautiful.  Narrow cobblestone streets run between moldering brick and stucco buildings and you are never far from a plaza surrounded by colonial architecture. It is safe to walk alone, there is very little trash in the streets, and the food is plentiful and cheap.

I have been taking two hours of spanish tutoring with another girl staying in same hostal. I have noticed a leap in comprehension, but still struggle to compose my own sentences, mostly due to lack of practice on my part. In the afternoons I´ve been taking little trips around town. I´ve visited a museum with some interesting modern Ecuadorian art and beautiful batik prints, made an urban hike to a church overlooking the city with a group of five people from the hostal, and went bouldering in a rock gym. The gym was closed, but we were able to climb over the chainlink fence (did they really think that would stop climbers?).

The flower market

A shrine with hair and bones tied to the gate.  Didn't know why, so we asked. Turns out people bring in bits of livestock in hopes that the offering will bring a good year with lots of healthy stock.

A man holding scissors and biting his foot... dunno why.

There is some construction going on around a park there, and they have placed a plywood wall around it. People have covered it with street art, and I took pictures of some of the most interesting examples. Around the corner, it appeared that they were reusing plywood from a older site, because all the art was rearranged, like a jigsaw puzzle put together wrong.

My most interesting night there happened in front of one of the colonial churches. There was a celebration of the virgin of that church and it began with several performances of local dances and the launching of paper lanterns, which were reflected in the stained glass windows of the gothic cathederal as they flew away. Then they cleared the plaza of all the chairs and sound equipment and the figures of a bull and a matador, rigged with fireworks, terrorized the crowd. People were screaming and running away (myself among them), but were blocked by the people behind, so they stomped out the fireworks whirling at their feet, and brushed the embers out of their hair. As if that wasn´t enough excitment, there was a tower 20 feet high, an elaborate system of pinwheels and shooting lights that dramatically unfurled a banner of the virgin as the finale of fireworks exploded around her. It was delightful to witness something that would certainly not happen in a city in the United States. I didn't have my camera with me, and all of the pictures following are from a wonderful friend I made on the trip who is a very talented photographer. If you would like to view his other photos, visit andyradin.com.