Blogs from Canoa, West, Ecuador, South America

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South America » Ecuador » West » Canoa July 28th 2014

Our Arrival We arrived at 2:35pm from Quevedo. The bus drove into town along the main road, turned left along the main road to the beach and turned around in a dirt area in town. This is where we got off the bus. We turned left and were on the main drag to the beach. Where We Stayed Hostal Shelmar - $10 for a double room with shared bathroom. Room was small with worn away cushions instead of pillows on the bed. The bathroom was downstairs and there was only one shower/toilet combo for everyone. This meant a wait of 15mins to brush teeth or use the toilet if someone was showering. You were able to use the restaurant kitchen. There was internet but it didn't work very well, even downstairs. What We Did Hung out ... read more

South America » Ecuador » West » Canoa March 2nd 2014

To give you some background on the journal below we were volunteering at a ranch in Ecuador in exchange for a free place to stay. We were only required to work 2 hours per day. The ranch had recently been purchased by an English couple who needed people to look after the place until they were able to return from England. I absolutely loved my time at the ranch! March 30th, 2013 This morning we had a lovely breakfast of fried potatoes with onions, peppers and scrambled eggs, it was delicious. After breakfast we all agreed to forgo our 2 hours of work today and go to the beach in Canoa. We walked down the very muddy road to the paved road where we found a local woman waiting. She informed us that the bus had ... read more
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South America » Ecuador » West » Canoa March 1st 2014

Ecuador ist das zweitkleinste Land des Kontinents, doch die Diversität hier ist unglaublich. Im Westen des Landes, an der Pazifikküste treffen sich die Fischer und Surfer an den traumhaften Stränden, in der Mitte sind die Anden mit aktiven Vulkanen über 6000 M.ü.M. und im Osten die gewaltigen Regenwälder mit Flüssen, die in den Amazonas münden. Genau so unterschiedlich wie die Landschaft ist auch die Bevölkerung, die in den jeweiligen Regionen leben. An der Küste geht alles ein bisschen länger und ohne Stress, die Hitze drückt und man liegt lieber in der Hängematte als sich ums Geschäft zu kümmern. Die "Serranos" (Bevölkerung aus den Bergen) sind dagegen konservativer und geschäftiger. 25 % der Bevölkerung sind "Indios" und leben ihre Kultur auch weiterhin, während es vor allem in Quito schon ganz westlich zu und her gehen kann. ... read more
Juampis Rockkonzert
Schweizer Spassgesellschaft :-)
Montanita

South America » Ecuador » West » Canoa February 16th 2013

Blog time again, Its Ben this time, Shelly is on Photo duty. I thought i'd better get cracking before my memory starts fading again. Well its been two weeks now since we left Nica Spanish School with our Pidgeon Spanglish to help us on our travels! We are definately alot more able to make ourselves understood but when they answer the question or ask one, this is when the problems begin, usually because they talk so quickly and miss the endings off most words!!! Paul Whitehouse doing the impression of the Spanish weatherman comes to mind!!!!! El Scorchio!!!! So, we finished our last week at school and we were both chomping at the bit and raring to be back on the road again! We decided to head to Ometepe which is a small island in the ... read more
Ometepe, Nicaragua
Ometepe, Nicaragua
Ometepe, Nicaragua

South America » Ecuador » West » Canoa September 4th 2012

My boyfriend's family came for a visit and I mentioned to him that maybe we should all take a little trip to the beach. I needed a getaway, especially because I had just gotten back from traveling in Europe and I was getting antsy from the lack of seeing new places. We decided on Canoa which is about a 4 hour drive from Quito (6-7 hours on the bus). This was a cute little town though very small and not really prepared for tourism compared to some of the other beach resorts in Quito, like Salinas. We rented a car and drove up there; I recommend leaving as early in the morning as possible to beat the traffic on some of these one lane highways up through the mountains, along cliffs. We found a pretty hotel ... read more
Collecting shells and crabs on the beach
Collecting sand dollars on the beach
Swimming at our hotel

South America » Ecuador » West » Canoa July 26th 2012

Ecuador- Erin Sadly, the time had come for us to leave Colombia. After saying goodbye to Rob very early as he left for his flight back to KC, we packed up and made the same trip to the airport through the mountains of Medellin for our afternoon flight to Quito, Ecuador. We made the decision a couple of months back to fly to Quito rather than take busses due to rumors that there is once again some a FARC presence in some southern regions of Colombia. Travel by bus (especially overnight) was not advisable; therefore we did not want to take any chances! Our flight via TACA airlines (one of my favorite Latin airlines to fly) was short and a nice change from grueling bus rides. I was especially a very happy traveler because they served ... read more
Cuy Dinner
Beach again in Canoa
$2.50 Ceviche!!

South America » Ecuador » West » Canoa April 26th 2012

So this is the entry where you say "screw you man, I don't need to hear about all that sunshine, beaches and surf." But please wait, I promise it wont be one of those entries. Canoa was great but it had it's share of mosquitos, sun burns and locals who like to steal the gringos sandals and laugh because they don't sell anything in that town larger than a size 9.5. However to be honest, I didn't want to leave. Skipping the 2 weeks where we did nothing but enjoy the beaches in Ecuador I will write about where we are now, Peru. We took a big ol' bus from Ecuador through the expansive desert of northern Peru to the capital city of Lima. It was incredible to drive through such a landscape with the ocean ... read more
Cotopaxi
sunset
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South America » Ecuador » West » Canoa March 5th 2012

Alright, the first blog of our Central American Adventure. We started the trip by leaving from England and heading across to Madrid before boarding a flight across the altantic, bound for Bogota. We then had to change planes to get to Quito, Ecuador. We had an overnight stopover in Quito, then jumped on our last planes to the ecuadorian coast. Our friend Eddie who we met in Cornwall, had organised a guy to pick us up at the airport and take us to his town, Canoa. The car journey was a couple of hours and the driver didnt speak any English but was keen to tell us about things. So we did as best we could with our spanish phrasebook and Dinis iPhone app "Spanish for Dummies". I reckon we did pretty well for first timers. ... read more
PRAWNS!!!
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South America » Ecuador » West » Canoa January 25th 2012

Hello! So we haven´t really had a lot of time or the means to write a whole lot lately so I will try to fill you in on the latest. We are now in Canoa but got here by travelling up the coast after Vilcabamba. We had a hard time deciding what to do about Machu Picchu. It was much more expensive and time consuming than we had imagined. We had a long debate at a mexican restaurant in Vilcabamba (you all know we really wanted to make it to Machu Picchu) so we decided to flip a coin because the decision just was not coming to us easily (one of the downfalls of a loose itinerary...one move decides the whole rest of the trip, if we went to Peru that would mean only 4 days ... read more
vilcabamba
game of chess
el caballero

South America » Ecuador » West » Canoa January 23rd 2012

So here I am almost just past the halfway point in my travels. I am behind in blog posts but not in stories to tell. Maybe one day I will catch up, who knows. So 7 months in and I have been to only 3 countries. At the beginning of my trip I imagined I would have covered a lot more territory at this point . But I guess I have always been the slow steady type. If you were to ask me what would I have changed up to this point in my trip I say nothing. I spent almost six months in Colombia, never thought I would have been there for so long. Four of those months at Manos Amigas and Let's Go Volunteer working with the kids, which so far is the highlight ... read more




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