Spanglish Dancing Queens

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Sorry, photos will be coming soon!!!

Ecuador and the rain is chasing us. Immigration was ok, in fact better than usual, being super quick, even though we'd been forwarned not to look anyone in the eye, stop or talk to anyone. Always welcoming to a new country. Martin escaped a random checking of his money, by a uniformed officer, though quite what he was checking was not really apparent, but none was taken. The journey was delayed due to the incessant rain, as roads turned to rivers and people waded up to their knees. We arrived in Guayaquil at 8.30pm, a good 10hrs from the beginning. Staying only a night, just to make a connection the next day to Cuenca. This again had been delayed due to the bad weather, and when the proposed time of departure 3pm came and went, we were all a bit agitated, keeping ourselves on tenterhooks til 5pm, when we finally set off. As the rain poured, the darkness set in and the roads got worse. The buses don't really slow down either and so it was a very scary ride, swerving across the bendy roads, avoiding huge puddles or landslides and near misses with cliff edges. We had a random wait for an hour at a police check, but there was no checking, so I really don't know what went on there, I always presume drug smuggling and then just as I finally thought we were making headway, we pulled up at the side of the road at 9pm, where we learnt that was where we were to spend the night. Here a bottleneck of other hopeful buses and lorries conglomorated. How miserable?! And both Martin and I were suffering severe stomach pains, which at any moment of relaxation could've exploded (unecessary details I know, but I want to convey my discomfort) and so I curled into a small ball on the seat until daylight would come and save us.
By 6am most people were awake and conveniently there was a cafe outside. I longed for a hot drink to warm me up, but couldn't face the consequences. We eventually got back on the road by 10am, after a few more false starts and rumbled carefully over the previous night's landslide damage...scary. We arrived in the rain and mist of Cuena at 2pm, a supposed 4hr journey, taking 21hrs.
We had a little wait, whilst our rooms up on the 6th floor of an old building were being prepared, very old fashioned and cosy with a fantastic view of the city, including the impressive blue domes of the beautiful cathedral. Hot water greeted us at last, with more than enough blankets on the bed. This place was ideal. The fact that the light in the bathroom was a bulb with a precarious wire leading up and around the taps was neither here nor there and at one switch would probably electricute us. The fact that it didn't was a bonus.

Cuenca is a really nice city, a collection of architectural beauts, emminating from a central market square selling mostly flowers, in front of a church where the clock has stopped, as if time itself actually has here. The roads are cobbled and the streets are narrow with high uneven roofed houses and balconies, puntuated by the more well built sturdy religious structures. Some of the ladies here are in traditional dress, of big voluminous skirts with numourous layers of petticoats, tights and leg warmers, frilled shirts, jumpers and cardigans of bright garish colours and topped of by a felt fedor hat, usually with a plumage protrusion of fanned ribbon. Their hair is always long and dark and plaited either once or twice.

Cuenca was supposed to be our point of exploring the National Park, and so 5.30am the next morning, saw us all out of bed into the cold to get to the bus station to get a bus there, it's again a couple of hours' drive away. But, unfortunately we have seriously angered the weather god and no buses were running due to bad conditions. Well, at least they're not running and so they don't run a suicide trip. So we quickly rescheduled a trip to some ruins. Another 2 and a half hour journey, though lovely, through lush green hills colourful houses and churches, like toy town settlements or pueblos. We were among 5 or 6 other tourists for once and so got a very unenthusiastic guided tour around various terraced blocks of land, crumbly walls and finally a lookout point with a building on it. I'm none the wiser. I only remember, "come on " and "let's go". Though most things seem related to the sun and the moon, worship and numerous wives that get buried alive after drinking a narcotic.The best part was the journey back, as Sarah and I had to sit at the very back of the bus, where there is NO suspension whatsoever and all the bumps in the roads had us out of our seats and hitting the roof...literally. It only hurt when Sarah hit her elbow on my hip and I hit my head on the window.

The next morning we had a well earned lie in, and breakfast, such a rarity, it's important to record it. We moseyed the old town and the Monastry with it's beautiful stained glass windows and domed ceiling. I'm not religious but I can appreciate nice architecture and in the words of Tim Westwood, this was the bomb. This was my worse feeling day unfortunately, it had amounted to wishing I had my own porta-loo. I was a ticking time bomb as we all were. Something wasn't right with us and like good travel companions we all shared it. As the rain hindered our riverside amble, we made it back where Martin and I took a peruse round an indoor artesanal market, selling all kinds of wonderful tack. The best by far were the purchases Martin made, little random brass crockery pieces, like you play Monopoloy with and a random porceline Owl/Koala/bear type creature with gold horns. Love it.

With a day of minor rain (comparatively) and Martin's last day with us (time has flown) we'd been told this was a chance that buses may be running to the National Park. So we were back at the station for 6.00am and great damnations, no buses were going. So, in an effort to make the most of a bad situation, we hopped on a bus bound for SigSig, apparently where the famous Panama hat can be found (Note- not Panama). It was a lovely ride out (I sound like you Nanny B) but Sig Sig was nowt special. We ended up after not seeing a straw of a hat being woven, down by the river skimming stones like kids playing truant. I'm so crap I can't even make it to the other side of the river. We finally saw a half woven hat tucked behind a doorway collecting dust and cobwebs, maybe a tradition they only advertise in the height of season. So we village hopped our way back until Martin's stomach could take it no more and the bus had sapped us of all our energies. Sorry dude, but these are the facts. We enjoyed a last supper together before conspiring a plan to silence the exessively loud German girls betwen our rooms, at stupid 'O Clock in the morning, when they feel the need to shout and party. Spanish swear words come in handy here....if only I knew any...ah yes,.....

Goodbye Martin: We accompanied Martin to the station, making sure he was headed on the right bus (helpful eh?), and it was like he had fledged his wings, under our guidance and we were releasing him into the wild.....watch him go, spread his wings....ironically, after we'd bought our tickets to Quito, we were heading back into town as we didn't need to check out til later. Ironically because, as we then got the wrong bus back. Yes indeed, a route we'd taken many a time, now had us out on a jaunt to Baños, a sub district of Cuenca. It took about an hour there and back, but it killed some time before our bus! So typical. At least Martin wasn't there to see our mistake!! We sheltered our time away from the pouring rain again until our bus. Just one job to do before and that was to phone our next host!!! Remember Andres, the lovely guy we met in Argentina? Well, nevermind, if not, but he had so kindly offered for us to stay with his family, when we were going to Quito. This of course we took as a nice thing to say, but not really mean. Anyway, he'd already let his family know about us and to just say when we were coming, so we had and it was all ok! How nice is that? So I phoned Iveth, Andres' Mum to say we'd be expected in the morning.
The bus journey was cold and cramped, a different combination of the usual uncomfortable factors (too squashed, too hot, too cold...)

Quito. 6.30am and it wasn't half as menacing as we'd prepared for, by our over protective guard Andres (we're tough, you know we are). With his instructions we actually manged to get ourselves on a tram thing and into the right quarter of town and soon we were waiting for a security guard to let us through the driveway to a little collection of houses. Greeted by Jose, Andres' Dad, off to work so early and fleeting Daniel, one of Andres' brothers. We were made so welcome by Iveth and the tiny Lucia (the maid) who was always smiling, chuckling and happy in her own domestic little world. The house is beautiful and a tardis. One floor being the kitchen, dining room, living room (formal), bathroom, study and mini bar and music room, the next the lounge with the biggest t.v. I've ever seen in a person's house, with our room and bathroom, Daniel's room and bathroom, master bedrroom and en suite and 2 other bedrooms. Up another floor was Lucia's domain I think and then downstairs also was a basement and garage etc. Outside was Cookie and Ducky´s domain, the 2 very excitable dogs, both Spaniels one a springer, the other a King Charles. They were so sweet.

Ah the bliss of a shower and coffee, it was a paradise, except that the work was soon undone by the bitter cold outside. The temperature of Quito was freezing. Muy frio as we constantly heard and said. We had a purpose whilst in Quito, we thought it was about time we went to Spanish school. Having got by for 3 months, it would be nice to know the grammar, verb endings and string a proper sentence together. So we enrolled for a full 5 day week for 6 hours a day!! It would also be one to one, so rather intense and I was very nervous.
Our first evening we were invited to Daniel's band practice, they perform twice a month, mainly doing 80's covers; Blondie, 4 Non Blondes, Guns and Roses, a bit of 70s too. It was at someone´s house, a converted garage of a rather mature member of the group, who had in his hey day been a well known performer. I think, still trying to re-live his prime youth, he ran the scales of his Chaz and Dave style keyboard in between drinking copious amounts of a vile alcohol that felt like you'd swallowed paint stripper on fire. Needless to say the rehearsal got rather messy and the accomplishment of a smooth performance seemed a little sketchy for the end of the week!

So off to school the following day, not the best way to start feeling immensely jaded, and I was so scared. We were about to hop out the door donning our new dictionaries, pens and notebooks, when Iveth insisted on us having breakfast, we felt like little school kids, and found Lucia had a fully prepared spread including freshly made juice she'd hand pressed as she does every morning. It was unreal. The first day at school was covering basics and I found it so hard, having picked up bad habits before. But my teacher Maria was so patient and really interested in my answers and made things really simple for me. Even though she must have felt like she was talking with a 5 year old , she hid it well. I even had homework.
The next few days offered a cosy little routine of school 9-4pm, and homework, which usually took me all evening. Sarh was very poorly and so slept, probably not helped by the fact it always poured with rain as we'd finish school and had the monster task of trying to squeeze ourselves onto a jam packed humid tram and then walk the rest of the way home, quite far and it nearly always took an hour. As the week progessed I enjoyed my lessons more and more and was surprised that I managed to talk for the whole afternoon. The good thing is no English is used at all, so it's Spanish all the way. I spent one afternoon playing cards and talking about boys, whilst Sarah usually had much more sophisticated and educative discussions on the Government or statistics. Friday came and we really had that weekend, school's finished feel, at least until Monday, when we had one more lesson. We were planning to go out and watch Daniel's band perform and so it was essential that new shoes were purchased. It took an absolute age to get home and it got dark and late and we felt like naughty children not coming straight home from school.
The evening was fun. We met some other friends of the band and danced the night away. I do remember at one point, as the band came on, when everyone heads to the bar to get a drink, no one was on the dance floor, and living up to my newly appointed American Indian name; Dances with anybody, (long story) I rallied up the audience onto the dance floor. This perhaps was a mistake as Sarah and I were then double teamed, trying to escape the clutches in a tag like scenario by two guys, both of whom were saturated in their own alcoholic sweat and had enough insulation to keep them warm in the coldest of months. One of which, also a band member, was so drunk, that he forgot his brand new $1000 bass guitar in the back of a taxi.

Saturday was lovely, although achey from throwing shapes on the dance floor, we lunched with Iveth, a major part of the day (3 courses, no need to ever eat again, it felt like Christmas) before going out with her and her parents who live in another part of Quito. We drove to the old historic part of town. The buildings are beautiful and we went in so many churches. We walked around the plazas, where there´s shoe shiners, pigeons and people preaching, it felt very English city. We had coffee in a gorgeous well to do hotel over looking the square, with top and tail uniformed doormen. I couldn't believe it though, when Iveth's Mum ordered a hot chocolate, which came with pieces of cheese, which she then dropped into the chocolate!!?? Why? Why? Why would you do something like that?! Ugh...ugh...?!
Tonight, Jose, or Pepe as preferably known, another brother was arriving from Indiana, staying for a week before going onto Brazil for work. We briefly met and found him to be just as nice as the rest of the family. It was nice to see Iveth so excited for him gvisiting, Mums and their boys ...some things are the same world over.

Mothers Day we spent the morning visiting the Centre of the World. Mitad de la Munde...the Equatorial line which prompted Bart Simpson into the investigation of which way the water spins on either side of it... We went with Daniel and Pepe, going first to a misty volcanic village, then to the real central point, marked by a graffitteed and urine stained monument, surprisingly not the tourist attraction, that happens to be just down the road, with the gimmicky handicrafts and entrance fee. It was interesting though, with various mini museums inside. And at last a hot day! Returned for a very formal lunch, a matter of so many tasty courses I lost count and attempted a mouthful of each, but it was way too much. We presented Iveth with flowers and a pretty plant for Lucia, sorry Mum, but I thought I'd show my appreciation where I could, and little Lucia practically cried. She's so sweet you just wanna pinch her little rosy cheeks and put her in your pocket. She's a real life Mrs Pepperpot.
In the afternoon, we started out on a venture to some Natural thermal pools. It took one and a half hours and was dark and raining by the time we got there and bloody cold. The last thing on my mind was to be standing in my bikini, running from pool to pool. But, braving the cold, it was utterly worth it. I've never felt such hot pools of water, hotter than a bath. One pool was so hot, that I actually couldn't go in it. It gave me heart palpitations and felt like every vein in my foot would burst. Toasty.

Monday morning and our final day at school. It was really good and quite sad to leave actually. It felt like the end of term when you give a thank you to your teacher. After school, Daniel met us to take us to the Basilica, our last chance as it closes so early. It is to me the most beautiful of the buildings in Quito. A lift takes you so far, then you have to use a really narrow, steep staricase that winds up to the very top of the spire. I felt my palms sweat as the wind whipped up and a slight sway took over my head. But the view was brilliant, all across Quito and offers a close look at the detailed carvings of the stonework. Inside I was Wowed, by the most beautiful stained glass windows I have ever seen. The roof was domed and airy, offering light to reflect the flower like mantra design of the windows, illuminating the entire Cathedral. It was first rate open jawed wowness.

Tuesday and we were due to leave, but Daniel had kindly suggested, probably prompted by Iveth, to take us to Baños. Until he finished work, Sarah and I took a trip out to the Terraferria, a very high cable car ride up into the mountains enclosing Quito, offering superb views of the extensive city. It was really good fun, but at one point a little scary as it was incredibaly high. Sarah and I had a car to ourselves and poor thing, Sarah's a real wounded soldier at the mo having just recovered her bad fluey cold, she was suffering a really bad eye.

Anyway, Baños we went, with a friend of Daniels´. A proper road trip . We got there late at night and stumbled into bed pretty much as Sarah was feeling so poorly. The next day had us sight-seeing and trying various gross forms of sugar-cane juice, both natural and fermented...ugh, green, warm and frothy, much like Fairy liquid....and then a chewy type of toffee that is hand made like spaghetti or pasta, stuck onto the door and pulled and stretched thin. Nowhere in England would health and hygiene be so lax. It was good though. All afternoon we´d been hoping to get a glimpse of the volcano, the centrepiece of the area but it was so cloudy. Just as we left, I caught sight of it clearing in the car mirror and as the cloud parted, the crater was a perfect conical hole emitting a genie like cloud of hot ash and smoke!! Cool!

The next few days we spent along the coast at Tonsupa, at a beach-side apartment of Iveth and Jose´s!! I know! How nice?! It was lovely to feel wam again and go in the sea. The bonus also that within the complex was a little swimming pool!! My heaven! I religiously lapped the pool and spent so long in there over a few days that my hair actually turned green. I always thought that was a myth, but no, actually very true!! So a few days of lazing, we were back to Quito, just to return a few borrowed sheets and things from Iveth. We planned to go straight on, to another beach place, but the weather had been very bad and roads had been closed, tranbsport cnacelled and landslides aplenty. Iveth thought it much wiser if we stayed another night with them and join them in her other son´s birthday party!! We were like part of the family! So we met the final son, Alberto. It was a really lovely evening, complete with a piñyata that he had to bash down blind folded, giving out whistles, whilst wearing a very sparkly blue Liza Minelli hat. We were glad that our plans had been changed.
So we left the next day for another coastal destination a little farther away and had to make quite a detour to get there. It was sad to say goodbye, but I think we´d stayed long enough, though Lucia had a tear in her eye as she clutched us into her solid little frame.

Puerto Lopez, a beach hub of relaxation, music and sunbathing. We really didn´t do much here but chill out in hammocks, read and swim. For such a little place, it is usually alive with tourists, but off season it was so quiet. One night though, I was quite tripped out by a fluro, snaking caterpillar train, weaving its way in and out of the back streets and seafront. A place that can suffer power cuts, yet have a fair ground on the beach?! Incongruous.

Beach hopping our way along the coast, we went just 4 hours further south to Montañita, the notorious party place. And how different it is from sleepy Puerto Lopez. With gringos a go-go, it was like the Bangkok of Ecuador. This place has a real party vibe and surf culture. We found a nice enough little room that every night and morning, lulled me into synchronized breathing with the sea. Within a couple of hours, we were shorts and vested up, in search of food. A walk along the handicraft littered mud roads, interspersed with hotels and restaurants, all with fresh fruits hanging up waiting to be squeezed, to a chaotic mix of Bob Marley, Latin dance and pop music and smell of waxed surfboards carried by rippling bodies. I could tell I was going to like this place. Over a coffee, we´d already been targeted by a local, Christian, (soon to become the bane of young Sarah's life..long story) inviting us to the beach with him and his surf bud friend Alexandro tomorrow. That evening we met a few more locals, all a little loco but friendly nonetheless, Henry the bartender, with his name carefully tattooed along his ribs in case he forgot, a head of afro hair and enough teeth in his grin to make an old man jealous.

The next day, we as promised met to go to another beach, further along the coast, a less crowded one with good surf apparently. All of a sudden though, it got a little more complicated as talk of having to stay overnight was thrown in. We could see where this was going. The beach turned out to be one that we had already discovered for ourselves, from a day trip from Puerto Lopez and I think their plans were rather dashed as we sent them off in search of another beach. We got a really cool ride back though, in the back of a truck (I said the back of the what? Blazin´ Squad...sorry) with two little old guys who were selling coco plants. It was full of the things and we were perched precariously on the back of a wooden ledge as we bumped our coccyx into our skulls for an hours´weaving along the pot-holed roads. Classic!

The next few days offered fun in the waves and sunbathing and partying. Alexandro soon moved on to other Gringo girls once he discovered we were not his type of girls thank you very much, but unfortunatley for Sarah, Christian had a little more perserverence and it was soon local knowledge, not to Sarah´s that she was his girlfriend! I then apparently became Henry's! I think not?! What is this place like...like dogs on heat I tell you. Again, soon squashed that idea for him, but unfortunatley for Sarah, Chrisitian had a little more perserverence.....

One night, we went onto a club, of sorts, that to me must have been the set used for "Dirty Dancing" and I expected to see Patrick Swayze step out of the shadows and join the rest of the hip swivelling, bump and grinding, leg humping cast. (Beth, got some great dance moves for you). I myself, might have said I'd carried a watermelon and hidden in the corner. Unfortunately, my new American Indian name preceeded me and I once again found myslef in the midst of the dance floor and at one point confronted by a real life Voodoo doll. He was about 4 foot, with shoulder length hair, sunglasses (yeah, at night) with only his jeans, just hanging onto his little hips, slung too low for your Gran not to blush. I refused to dance with him as he basically scared me too much, I did expect him to pull out a spear and jab it into the air, casting a curse upon me. Met a lot of randoms, but a very funny night.

Whilst out walking the beach, we met Lu! A sweet and friendly Argentinian, looking for some sparkling company...ourselves. We met up with him for dinner and discovered we all had much in common. Though, he actually has a real life as an architect and lecturer!! Whilst watching the sunset Sarah and I met another guy... notice a gender theme here? Barak, from Israel, who´d been working here for a few months and had various ideas and aspirations, none of which I´m sure will ever evolve, but he was nice. We all decided to go horse riding the next day.
After a bit of a delayed start, trying to find 4 ridable horses, we got to a fairly well established looking stable with real ponies and horses, not mules, nor donkeys, feigning to be South American stallions. We had an hour's jaunt into the jungle. I´d been hoping for a gallop across the beach, but Barak had set ideas to the jungle. But what a pace, man alive, I was glad to be barfoot as my flip flops would never had stayed on. We gaslloped through mud, puddles, near misses with trees, cuts and scrapes to the legs being sadistically slahed and whipped by foliage. My horse was very well behaved, in fact took a bit of a coaxing to get moving. Unusual for me as I'm more often tagged wth the loony one, thanks to Barak's input that I'd ridden before. We came acrooss some wild ponies that decided to stir things up and Barak's horse kicjed out at Lu's leg and bombarded into Sarah, sending her swivelling 180 degrees in her saddle. All was ok, just a bit jittery. From the top of the hill, we rested and then took off again at a race of galloping horses, and the two dogs that had loyally followed us all the way weaved in and out of or legs and paths, like we were on a chase. All very invigoating and extremely bouncy, horses have no suspension and when we arrived back at the stable we admired our cuts, mud splashes and chaffing. Sarah was raw on her calves, where the buckle to the stirrup had grated her, I had mld burns and slashes and we were all rather shaky legged. Brilliant!
Needing to cool down, Lu very kindly lent me his shortboard and I braved the waves, though to my own detriment. Not only did my cuts sting like vinegar soaked paper cuts, but I was truly abbysmal. I had a go, which was the main thing and triumped enough to say that I caught a few waves.

That evening was party night, the townies from Guayaquil came for the weekend and you could tell. A different feel to the place was apparent, a bit like Croyde August Bank Holiday weekend. Barak seemed to have turned camp within the space of a few hours, mincing over to us to show his freshly manicured fingernails, wearing the tightest, tiniest top ever, to reveal his mid riff., later crowned by a jester hat with twinkling bells on each stupid protrusion....weird. Throughout the night I narrowly avoided having my hands carress a stripper's very sweaty body, to a dance-off with several club goers. We made friends with the town's notorious Jean-Paul, a huge beast of a guy from the Dominican Republic, who if you asked "give me the line, coz I got the flow", would actually take you around the back and cut it. A harmless enough chap though. We headed onto an open-air trance party place where the local fire dancer, strobed and twisted his fiery flames in the air like they were just extensions of his arms. He's our latest inspiration and soon we will have glow-poi balls, the next step away from fire!!! Danced as respectfully as one could, given the partner choice, until we could bare it no more and tiredness took us to bed....

The next day we were leaving to Peru, having to go back to Guayaquil first as a connecting point. Saying goodbye to Lu was painfully sad. He looked so lost and lonely like a rejected puppy. Never before has someone squeezed the breath out of me, apart from you Dad. Still it had to be done, we were on our way back down to Lima, capital of Peru, and we had booked a bus already so we could meet Sarah's parents, due to land in a couple of days..........

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