Blogs from Guayaquil, West, Ecuador, South America - page 13

Cerro Blanco is located only some 20 km outside of Guayaquil, Ecuador. It is a tropical dry forest with a rich flora and fauna. During the rainy season (January to May) it is all very green, but the rest of the year the forst is dry and a number of the trees loose their leaves in order to survive the intense sun. The forest is home to many animals, including the blue morfo butterfly. Also there are 54 species of mammals, including ozelot, howler monkey, guanta and saino. Cerro Blanco is known for its diversity in birds, with 213 species, including birds of prey like hawks and the Papagayo de Guayaquil who only lives in Cerro Blanco and in Esmeraldas in the north of Ecuador. This parrot only builds his nest in one type of tree, ... read more

First stop in Ecuador is the 2nd largest city (behind Quito) of Guayaquil. (though most of the inhabitants think Guayaquil should be the capital) After setlling in we head down to the Malecon 2000, which is basically the seafront in Guayaquil. Actually its more of a huge river than leading out to the sea, but im happy in the fact that I have just wasted a few seconds of your life by stringing this sentance out. Actually as it´s costing me money to write this I guess the joke is very much on me....bugger. So anyhoo the Malecon is basically a rejuvenated waterfront area that has a few bars, restaurants etc. It´s also home to an art museum, a really cool garden and an Imax cinema. If you can imagine Embankment in London you are kind ... read more

Friday morning we received a phone call from Karla, and she invited us to her university in Guaranda. We stopped by and got a tour the school (public university) - I liked it better than mine because it had normal people. Karla’s mother works there so we stopped to talk with her. As soon as the ladies of the office saw us they ran out into the hallway and set up chairs so that we could all chat. Most of the ladies were between 40 and 60, and they LOVED Richard and Howard. They told Richard that he was better looking than Superman and they called Richard “crusty” in English. It took us a while to figure out that they were calling him “Crusty” - a clown from the Simpson’s. Once I described what we thought ... read more

At 3am my alarm went off and I managed to get myself ready to be picked up at 4am by Richard and Howard. Shortly after we met up with Hermann the German, who was driving the other pick-up truck (the semis left the night before because it takes twice has long for them to drive anywhere). The trip took about 6 hours to get to Babahoyo, our first stop. While there we unloaded water, clothing, and food. As we drove to the Air Force base, which was an hour south, we saw all of the fields and homes that were flooded and damaged. At the base, we met Comandante Juan Valvero (3 stars). He welcomed us and had his soldiers unload our trucks into one of their jet hangers. It was quite the experience standing inside ... read more

UNIFORMS While my uniform is not the most comfortable or attractive set of clothes I own, I am very grateful for it, here are a few examples of the other possibilities that I really wouldn´t prefer. There´s the all-girls school with white dresses, which look fine, except that for some reason they stuck white starched pinnafors on top with sleeves that poof out about a foot in the air. Then there are the skirts that are neon pink and black plaid with suspenders.. not the worst but I´ll stick to navy blue thanks. Also the “UPS” uniforms as we´ve nicknamed them, which are all-brown, well, UPS uniforms. And big lace-up boots. The girls from that school have more of a safari-look going. Finally, there are all of the military academies; they have great looking uniforms, button-down ... read more