Winter in Ecuador

I guess it’s time to start writing a few entries into my blog about my travels since leaving Guyana. I returned to my home state of Alaska, in July 2016. I had just completed my 27 month service in the Peace Corps. Kodiak Island is one of the most beautiful places on this earth, and I feel that the food served on my table and the table of my friends is the best you could ever eat in terms of freshness, wild game and fish availability, and variety offered. I savored every meal I ate for those 4 1/2 months in Kodiak.

 But then the weather started to chill, in fact I never got warm coming from a hot steamy tropical climate such as Guyana, to a cool, breezy, often drizzly Kodiak. So I’m off again, This time traveling around Ecuador.

I started out in Quito, a quaint and totally Ecuadorian experience. Cuenca was also a mountain city but subtle differences from the capital. Both charming experiences and of course every place I travel to in Ecuador has it’s charm depending on who I am with and what am I doing. One night in Guyana, I sat with friends at a roadside restaurant and proclaimed my love for Guyana. They literally died laughing because it was noisy traffic passing by, the same garbage in the street, blaring music. But I was in lust and so the place grabbed me and made me feel so many things.

So too in Ecuador, the people make each place. They are so open to conversing in Spanish with English as 1st language idiots. They are so accepting. And so many interesting people cross my path, some immediately feeling like friends, and others that are just there. Some Ecuadorians, and some foreigners from all over the damn place: Germany, Switzerland, France, Sri Lanka, the US, Venezuela, Argentina, Chile, the UK, Canada, Uruguay, Colombia, Puerto Rico. 

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  Street in Quito

City of Quito

People of Quito

Street in Cuenca

lunch in Cuenca

Earthquake damage in Canoa

Ayampe resident

San Alejo resident

Looks Ecuadorian! Yes?

Crabman

treats galore

Christmas in Cottages by the Sea

Mompiche

Cottages by the Sea

Mompiche

Murals everywhere

Hanging a net in Canoa

Puerto Lopez

A whale of a tail

Cuenca

One day visit with my sister Charlene in Quito

For the last month or more I’ve been exploring the lovely beaches of Ecuador: Manta, Ayampe, Puerto Lopez, San Alejo, Bahia de Caraquez, and presently Canoa. Bahia and Canoa were hit pretty hard by last April’s earthquake and are still rebuilding. Many residents still live in tents, but construction is on going and new homes are visible throughout these towns. The sentiment here that I’ve seen displayed in publications is “Tourists don’t give up on Ecuador, the communities need your dollars!” 

Now I am sweating every day and the equatorial sun is burning all my white areas. I walk to the beach every evening at 6:00 to watch the sunset and drink my proverbial cocktail. I study Spanish using 4 online programs most mornings and then I mingle with the people and try to understand what they are saying to me. I spent a couple of days with a young couple from Chile who told me even they have a hard time understanding Ecuadorians, because the pronunciation is different than Chilean Spanish and the Ecuadorians have words for things that they do not use anywhere else in South America. So good luck to me.

Middle of the Earth

Puerto Lopez

A couple traveling from Argentina to Alaska