This unnamed place was in Mariscal, otherwise know as "gringolandia". And while i'm on the subject, i'm going to digress for a second. My host mother, Rosita, gave us a lesson on why white people are called gringos. It originated during the Mexican-American War. The americans wore green suits and to make a long story short, the mexicans wanting the americans to leave would say "green goes". Back to gringolandia. Our group got on the subject of how medicine should function: With an ethics-centered approach or more towards the business side of the continuum. After much discussion and beer/wine, we concluded that there is no correct answer that could ever make the entire medical world happy.... no duh!! We then somehow got to the subject of religion versus science, but I wont go there!!
After leaving the no-name restaurant, the group split up. I went to a bar called "el bote" with some of the group and the others to another adjacent bar. We chatted with some locals about our age that were playing a form of pictionary with movies and they would draw on a blackboard. Some movies included Pulp Fiction (that was the one I had to draw, and I had a hard time!!), Silence of the Lambs, Top Gun, among others. Almost all the younger crowd smokes in Ecuador, especially the bar-goers. Unlike the states, there are no laws regarding smoking in bars, so it definitely burns the eyes and one reeks like smoke after leaving. Let me add that the party never stops in Quito, there is no 2am last call and the streets are packed all night.
The next morning a group of three of us hopped a bus to a small surf town called Canoa. Let me just say that a bus ride like that is a culture experience in and of itself. First off the bus drivers would give Jeff Gordon a run for his money if he were driving his pregnant wife to the hospital. I do not believe there are passing/ non passing lanes and if there are no one pays attention to them. The roads to the coast are very windy with very deep ravines on one side, so its always in the back of your mind.... guard rails are too frequent. There was a lot of construction on the way over and as I side note I was surprised to see how all the equipment (i.e. Excavators, Back Hoes, Graders, and Rollers) was brand new. On the cultural experience. After getting out of the mountains, everything is fairly flat compared to the Andes. This is where "Ecuadorian time" really comes in. The bus stops all the time to pick up people. When the bus stops, vendors hop on the bus and try to sell you things.... mainly food and drinks. They'll hop on and walk up and down the bus saying "agua agua agua" or "pan y pan y pan" or "agua jugo cola". Basically you can get the entire Ecuador experience form an 8hr bus ride for about ten dollars. Everyone packs into the bus, combined with the Ecuadorian music, food, and sights, and good ole personal space goes out the window.... oh and the humidity combined all adds to the cultural immersion. Its better than TV... cheaper too! For many this may not seem ideal but I loved every minute of it.
We had a pit stop in San Antonio (no not texas) to change buses to Canoa. The whole "blending in" thing goes out the window with six white people standing on the corner. Another side note is yes, people stare, and they stare a lot!! Waiting for a "trole" in Quito there was a group of young Andean girls who were simply mesmerized by the sight of me. There about four of them with their mother and these little girls just stared and stared and stared. The bus ride from San Antonio to Canoa just the same, with Jeff Gordon behind the wheel. I was airborne a few times out of my seat. One thing I found that was different was how the streets were mostly paved but every now and then there would be a 50ft patch of dirt, and the pavement would continue again.
We arrived in Canoa around 7pm. Above is a picture of the roads (dirt), my favorite place to eat (on the right), the hotel we stayed in the first night (to the left), and where the party went down (the end of the road). When we arrive we all headed straight to the water to see how warm it was. Just as I suspected, it was very warm. Surprisingly, it wasn't as warm a the pacific of Costa Rica however. Then we checked into a hotel and headed for the bars. The bars in Canoa are amazing. There is a stretch of bars, restaurants, and huts all along the beach. The bars have no doors, for the most part no walls, and not a cover charge in sight. And yes the beer and tequila is cheap, and the women are beautiful. Every bar plays music extremely loud so one has to stay out until the bars close. We spent most of our time dancing, and when it got too hot, we would go jump in the ocean and do it all over again. Later we made our way up to the street above where they blocked off the road, put up some very large speakers and projection screen. It was a party for one of the local surfers who was going to represent Ecuador in some competition (he was the self-proclaimed best surfer in the country). There was great music and lots of dancing in the middle of the dirt road... it was great. Some of the locals brought out some gasoline and made a ring of fire that they were dancing in. They were doing a lot of "dance fighting" (if you don't know it, look it up) which was cool to watch.
The next day was mostly exploration and laying out on the beach. We tried to find some caves we heard about to the north, but I think you can only get there at low tide and via kayak. Even though it was cloudy for the whole day, it was warm and humid and I got a little too much sun thanks to the Doxy. Around two, we went to in my mind the best restaurant in the town. I'm not good with names but it was the furthest north restaurant. The camarones (shrimp) are spectacular. Four of us spent about five hours just hanging out. The atmosphere was great. The costal feel, humid, warm, Ecuadorian-Reggae music, palm trees and sand made it hard to leave.
We then checked into "el coco loco" hostal (above). This hostal was really cool (in spanish its hostal). Everything was made from concrete and palm trees, even the beds and spiral staircases. The night continued with more dancing and intermittent trips to the ocean (only a few hundred feet away). Go figure the weather cleared up the morning we left, but i'm not sure I was ready for that kind of heat. It was only Mid morning and I was struggling if I wasn't in the shade.
This is a view of the beach and also how fishermen get their boats to the ocean. They basically leap frog the logs and slowly roll the boat up/down the beach. Its fun to watch them head out to sea because they hit the waves head-on and the boat gets practically vertical.
The bus ride back was less than convenient of well planned. In the end I felt it was fun because it honestly felt like I was on the amazing race. We started in Conoa and caught the only bus out of town to San Vicente. It is very frustrating to not be able to understand people for directions considering this will be my ninth year of studying spanish, but a lot of people honestly just mumble when they talk so its impossible to understand them. From San Vicente we went to San Antonio (but we should have stayed on the bus) due to either misinterpretation or bad directions. From San Antonio the only direct ride to Quito didn't leave until 2am. We caught the first bus to Chone (where i'll be next week). From Chone we had to catch another bus to the Chone bus terminal which was nice to get a preview of the city. The bus terminal in Chone was insane. There were people everywhere yelling at you trying to get you to come on their bus. We went to Santo Domingo because the only direct ride to Quito was at 4pm (it was 1:30). The Santo Domingo terminal was crazy as well. People everywhere and it was a 1hr wait just to get a ticket. It rained so hard there that the rain on the roof of the terminal made it sound like a jet was landing on top of us. From Santo Domingo we finally made it back to Quito and everyone was pretty burnt out. That was around an 8hr trip of hopping from bus to bus.
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