We arrived in Guayaquil,
Ecuador’s largest city by inhabitants, in the middle of the night. Carina found
that her mobile phone and some 10$ or so had been stolen from her handbag
during the journey. We went back to the bus to check if it wasn’t somewhere underneath
the sear or so. But bad luck that night. That stuff was gone for good. Tiring.
And super annoying.
At least, the cab drivers
hadn’t gone to bed yet, and we found an acceptable, though pretty pricey room
for the three of us.
The next morning, Carina first
of all blocked her mobile phone. That went smooth. And to start the day happier
than the last one had ended, we indulged in a massive fruit salad breakfast
(ca. 2$). That’s the way to get going!
We walked along the river
front to do some obligatory sightseeing. As a man in a white shirt approached
us, I spontaneously decided to donate some blood. Julez had done so just before
Galapagos, so he was still in his recovery period. In Ecuador, you obviously
don’t get paid for donating blood like in Freiburg, for example, but the guy
gave me a lolli. *ha* Well, that’s was a kind move.
But we needed more. Some real
food. Some delicious McDonald’s Burger. And we found them right at the
riverside as well. Maybe the most scenic McDude I have been to so far.
The following shopping trip to
find a new handbag for Carina (the zipper of the old one was broken, which made
accessing it involuntarily easy), but at least we found those huge iguanas in
the iguana park again. All good. :)
We checked out of our hotel
like 10 minutes too late, which brought a discussion of another 15
minutes onto ourselves with the receptionist and the security guard to not pay any additional
fees. Hey – at least we saved that dollar in the end! ;)
And then we left. None of us really
likes Guayaquil, it’s big, dirty, not the safest place nor backpacker friendly
– we haven’t found a single proper hostel there yet. Furthermore we were all
looking incredibly forward to head to the beach. *g* Salinas was the next stop.
We arrived, had a frozen
yoghurt (for research purposes only, of course!) and walked straight to the
beach. Packed all our luggage next to a pair of bins, challenged the winning
team at the beach volleyball court and played cards while waiting.
Honestly – I think we were
more successful with those card games than in volleyball that afternoon. We
lost our first game against a team which wouldn’t really deserve to win. Given
the fact, that I have played tournaments with Carina in Freiburg and kicked a
lot of Papimiento farting asses on Aruba with Julez, the combination of the
three of us wasn’t as amazing on the court as it usually is. But hey – at least
we won our second match, which was also the last one for the day; the sun set
and sight became an increasing problem. Anyway, with a better feeling for not
totally losing we set off to find ourselves a cozy place to stay.
We found one: The local
campground. An incredibly friendly owner sold us a double bed in the camp
kitchen to match our price expectations, and we happily agreed. We would have
to snuggle together a little to fit ourselves onto those mattresses, but we
worked it out after we had been strolling along the beach for a little and
feasted with two family pizzas. Ahhh, life is amazing! :) Good night Salinas.
After sleeping in a little the
next morning, Julez and I whipped our white asses out of bed to work out. A
little running to warm up, and then letting those masculine muscles play on the
home trainer that we found in the patio of the campground compound.
We really deserved our massive
fruit salad and yoghurt drenched cereals after that. And
Carina – well – she deserved it for taking pictures and looking good. ;)
To digest this mouthwatering
meal a little, we started to hang out in the hammocks and consumed another two
super fresh fruit shakes…
…but only after we had washed
off the sweat in that open air shower.
Around noon we had to leave,
even though I would have loved to stay in that place for weeks! But Julez’ job
in Montañita was calling…
A bus took us to Santa Elena,
from where we hiked over to the main street to hitchhike our way up north.
In the back of a pretty shabby
car we got up to a gas station…
…where two ladies picked us up
in the back of their Hilux. Cruising up north with another guy and his dog in
the back, we got stopped by police – these bummers told us it was illegal to sit
in the back of a pick-up! How gay is that? The sun had already set, and we
weren’t looking too forward to spending the night on the side of a highway.
After the driving lady had
negotiated for around 15 minutes with the cops, we were allowed to hop back in
and arrived safely in Montañita. The other guy in the back explained that cops
often invent random rules to cash bribes. Lucky us that we were riding with
locals…
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