WHALES

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yesterday my pilgramage to see the whales started..
! I got up at 4oo in the mornign and arrived here in puerto lopez 12 hours later with a hellish change in guayaquil, a bus that should have taken three hours taking 5 and being squashed into a tiny seat. Ecuadorians have no respect for your personal space, if they sit next to you they lean on you put thier kids on you, generally just squash you and then the ones standing in the aisles lean on you from the opposite direction,(peta if youre reading this its a bit like goan buses) and there
was a really rude french couple in front of me who stole my seat and wouldnt give it back so
> i had to contend with sitting on the wheel arch in an already cramped
> space and an angry ecuadorean too..not fun..

the only intresting thing about bus rides here is the variety of snacks you get offered. They usually consist of deep fried something, adn today I tried a sort of salty (of course) bready fried thing with hot banana mash inside..surprisingly nice...
Guayaquil was the type of place i was glad I was passing through, Its massive, and in common with seemingly all south american/ecuadorian towns, is extremly polluted and dusty. The terminal was a three storey nightmare, with guards whose inf o would probably been helpful had i know the differenct between inter provincial and iner cantonal....

when i arrived in puerto lopez i felt so overwhelmed and lost and alone (this being my first day of actual solo travel excluding qutio and I had got very used to the security of a group and enjoyed it very much. Unfortunately Maria has already been to Puerto Lopz and theothes wanted to go to guayaquil first)

Anyway this ovverwhelmedness lead me to break the golden rule of travelling and let myself get swept away by some guy offering tours and taking me to my hostel and the bus station to buy my ticket for quito...i just felt dazed and confused and before i knew it i wasgoing along with it! I feel really stupid! It wasnt that he was dangerous..that i wouldnt have gone along with, but it just leaves you open to unwanted hassle and unwanted money spending.I did book a tour with his agency and while i may not have got the best deal, today i found out i got an alright one (more on that later)

He took me to this hotel which had a sea view but was dingy and horrible(owned by the tour guys dad or something) -I felt so lonely and ii knowew i couldnt stay especially as i had a long wait today for my bus and there was nowhere there to sit..I just wanted to be in a hostel withother backpackers, especially due to his offers of keeping me company..so I puled myself together, found the hostel I wanted to go to and changed, and it was the 'save the day action' as this is a place with other backpackers so I'm not alone!!!
He kept coming back and offering to pick me up and take me to a private beachthats really secluded and beautiful after whale watching ...in what universe can he hink that just becaue im on my own thats an attractive offer? MADNESS...south aerican man cocky madness..now I really think he would have just hassled but not actually tried anything, thats what tends to happen, but WHY are they arrogant enough to think that I would want that???.

So anyway, that was yestrday, I was tired and finished y book which ive been trying t eke out..I can recommend it..its called the host...

Today was AMAZING! My highlight so far! Well this afternoons not been so great, just hanging around waiting for my bus, which is now fairly soon..Puerto Lopez is a cross between a tourist town and a fishing village. The beach is filled with fishing boats, which in turn are mobbed by gulls and brown pelicans which are huge... The fishing bots vy for space with the tour boats for whale watching and visiting the isla de la plata where the birds and turtles live. There seem to be an awful lot of young men (and old for that matter) jut hanging about on the beach with nothing to do...I think if hey dont fish, its tourist trade, so they drive the tuk tuks or work in a hostel and it leaves them with a lot of free time. Another nice thing here is the massive fruit market, full of huge fruits that I dont recognise but are far too big to try and massive bunches of bananas..i didnt even know they grew like that.
The fruit here tastes different. Pineapple for instance is white and entirely different from the golden one we have at home..much sewwter and not as nice. The also sell a lot of strawberries in juice and milkshakes but i havent seen them for sale...
As I have run out of money and the cash point doesnt like my card, i have vbene eating the local hot bread/pastry from the bakery, nothig tasts as you think it will, especially if it has a suggestive name like cheesy something..thats a definite giveaway that it will tast of something totally different. Like the vanilla cake that turned out to be orange...
The men in the tour agencies are just bored and sit along the steet...i definitely notice the difference being on my own..thy are so annoying..again..what gives them tht level of arrogance?
There is also the obligatory uotient of stray dogs wandering around....

anyway none of thats my highlight..the highlight of course was the Whales!! I actually got quite a good deal because we had th only two level boat which gave a much better view, and lef to my own devices I wouldprobably have gone for the smaller cheaper one and regretted it..
Anyway about twenty mins out to sea we encoutered a small group of humpbacks two huge females and the smaller whales and we watched them for about an hour and a half..It was totally aweinspiring. The male must have jumped in the ai about 50 times and his whole body comes out and then smacks down on he water sending up massive amounts of spray, and the females smack the water with their huge tails..When you see their full length and their strnge heads when they swim along the surface its just amazing how big they are in comparison to the boat, rhey could be so dangerous if they wanted to be, instead they seemed to be putting on a show for us. I also loved the sounds they make when they use their blow holes..It really was a sight you cant get enough of, but they did eventually just swim away...it really was awe inspiring..Im so glad i came (and Ill try and remember that on my 11 hour cramped bus journey!!) Ig ot some good photos of them jumping too although most of the tim e i just wanted to watch..

so soon ill be in quito moving into my home for the next 5 weeks, looking forward to it but nervous at the same time....

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