On the beach!

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The itching has subsided, the nausea has calmed and finally a restful night. After a week in the jungle, nearly eaten alive (not by snakes, but various insects) and a bout of some kind of food poisoning or flu bug, not to mention the damn roosters squawking at all hours, we finally feel at peace. But only because we have landed on the widest, longest, sandiest beach we have ever seen, with waves crashing in all day long and sleepy streets during this quiet low season. Our hostal of choice, Coco Loco, has a sandy entrance where you can dig your toes in while sipping on a tasty pina colada and then lounge in a hammock. Then hit the waves with a boogie board! Now that's living! LOL Actually we're nearly bored, and ready to move on. But it's been a nice break. Just before here we were briefly in Bahia, which is a main port for people who are sailing the world on their 100 metre yachts (where we actually met some lovely people and were tempted to join them as crew members!) and of course Mindo, which was a bomb in a certain context. But that's another story. We did some very strenuous hiking, but well worth it as we reached some breathtaking waterfalls and felt like we might actually get our butts in shape for the Inca Trail. And there are some great butterfly farms and a small coffee plantation that won "Ecuador's Best Coffee" last year. Before that we were briefly in Quito again for the festivities of 6 de Diciembre which commemorates Quito as a city - parties comparable to what Stampede is like, and before that was our week in the jungle, beginning in the vibrant little town of Tena. We had simple accommodations, but fantastic food, and the activities were adventurous to say the least. We did canyoning (and thankfully no spiders caught in our hair, well mine anyway, as Darren really doesn't have any) and rappelled waterfalls which if you were to do in Canada you would be fully equipped with insurance and proper equipment, but not here, just use all the strength you have, climb the slippery rocks and heave yourself up with the few ropes they did have. It was actually exhilarating! And then we did the ¨downtime" kind of activities like tubing on the river, panning for gold and fishing with nets - which of course people really do here, and it's HARD work!!! We also hiked through the jungle to an indigenous village, which is more civilized than we would have expected, but scarce and simple, if you know what I mean. They live off the land, but have a teacher to come in and teach the kids in a one room classroom every day - ages 6-12. Then they go to another village for education when they're older. Part of their curriculum includes making different handicrafts and agriculture. And then to end our stint of this tour we went white water rafting, which I swear, was even better the Kicking Horse! We had such a blast. Darren's first time, but he loved it! We had the best guide, which can make all the difference in the world. And for some reason, all the guides we had on this little trip insisted on painting our faces with some such thing found in the wild - fruit that produces a bright red paste for painting, yellow sludge for your hair, clay found in the rivers. Good grief. I swear they just snicker amongst themselves after this nonsense, thinking tourists are so agreeable to anything. But we did learn some very cool things about plants and trees found in the Amazon rainforest such as natural medicines to bring fevers down, cure snake bites, make natural shampoo, take away the itch of mosquito bites, even a natural birth control. So anyway, enough of the rambling, we have some happy hour specials to take advantage of and our next move to plan!! Take care, and Merry Christmas to everyone!!!!!! xo

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Photos

Kichwa Kids in El Oriente
This is in the indigenous village we hiked to!

Parrot at Amarongachi
Veronica or Jesus...could never tell the difference, but there was a pair of them always hanging around wanting to sit on your arm or your shoulder!

Monkey in Tena
He´s not dead, just basking in the sun! Not sure what species as they were just running around wild.