Canoa, Ecuador!

Buenas tardes! Finally, I have time to update this about our beach trip to Canoa, Ecuador.

Thursday night at 9:45 p.m. we began our adventure! We arrived at the somewhat sketchy bus station to take the night bus to Conoa (btw I ate a whole box of pizza in the cab headed to the bus station. I am proud of that.) Honestly, the bus ride there was an adventure in itself. Remember me mentioning that cars don't follow rules in Ecuador? Well that is exemplified in the night and seems scarier when driving down 10,000 feet. I am pretty sure half of the drive to Conoa we were on the wrong side of the road lol. After nine hours of a bumpy car ride, extreme ear popping (went from mountain altitude to sea level) and a little bit of sleep (the bus had Spanish music blaring, and also turned into a sauna) WE MADE IT TO THE BEACH! My friends and I walked around a little bit and stumbled upon the most wonderful hotel/hostel, Bambu!

So gorgeous! The place had a delicious restaurant, hot showers, hammocks and was super cheap too. Although it was only 7:30 am when we arrived, we wasted no time and immediately jumped out into the ocean! My friends and I decided to rent surf boards for the day. I've only boogie boarded before, but surfing didn't pose too much of a challenge! Most of the time I surfed on my knees like a wimp, but I did stand up a few times. It was a blast, just hanging out by the beach all day relaxing. This local there, named Manuel, also gave my friends free surf lessons so that was nice (I was all surfed out by this point). Day one- great success! 

The next morning I woke up really early and walked around to take some photos. 

Street of Canoa

The photo above is another example of Ecuador's randomness. That man/woman was selling sex pills along the beach. He/she was FURIOUS when I wouldn't buy any after taking a picture of him/her. Ooops. Another random story: In the buses here, there are always people coming in and out selling goods (I absolutely hate seeing small children, traveling the city alone, selling random things on random buses. It's not right.) But aside from that, the other day on my way to school, CLOWNS entered the bus and put on a show. The randomness here never fails. I love it.

The next day consisted of more beach time and exploring.

My friends and I tried to do one of those cool jumping beach pictures...but failed. Also, notice the random man in the right hand side of the photo. Yeah, no idea who he is. 

Day three at the beach: Honestly, I didn't expect to have a day three at the beach and missed my bus the day before. One of my friends left, others had stayed so we did more beach bumming and exploring. In our adventure, WE FOUND A SEA TURTLE!!

But turns out it was dead.... :(

So, everyone was supposed to leave the night of the third day. Since I missed my bus, and all the other bus tickets were sold out, we had a problem. A random man from Quito I met at the bar offered to take me home, but that obviously wasn't a good idea. It also wasn't a good idea for me to stay in Canoa by myself another night. Luckily my friend Jessica saved the day. She switched her bus ticket to the next available bus with me! (which didn't arrive in Quito until Tuesday morning, ooops missed work and class on Monday) Everyone was gone, but we were still at the beach, bumming around, enjoying the sun and waves. Since I hadn't expected to stay at the beach for a solid 4 1/2 days, I ran out of money and clothes. We met a guy from Quito who let us use his room for free (he is in the above picture) so that was awesome. He was nice, although the only phrase he knew how to say in English was "I'm so cool!" Haha.

Funny story about my last night/morning there. I woke up...SOAKING WET. I was extremely confused since I went to bed somewhat early and was dry.... When I talked to Jessica about it outside some woman came up to me and asked me if I remembered her from a few hours earlier. I didn't. She then explained to me that I was sleep walking, and slept walk into the shower at 7:00 am with all my clothes on. Hahahaha. I'm weird. This was an awesome story until the hotel basically accused me of wetting the bed or pouring beer on the bed/other ridiculous things. I tried to explain to them that I slept walked and took a shower with my clothes on, but trying to explain that in Spanish is really difficult and the hotel thought I was crazy & proceeded to charge me $10 for a wet bed. Oh well lol.

And then there were two...

So the dog below caused Jessica and I a lot of distress our last day. Stray dogs in Ecuador are everywhere. This particular one took a liking to us so we fed her a bit and gave her water. Afterwards, she followed us everywhere. We thought it was cute, until this dog went into crazy protection mode over us. Jessica and I were just strolling the city, passing time. Well, anytime a man walked by, or anyone was on a bike/had something in their hand, this dog went into attack mode. She would bark very aggressively and scared the crap out of people. Jessica and I were the only ones that could get her to calm down, so she obviously seemed like our dog. I think the town hates us and believes two gringas brought a killer dog to their tranquil home lol. This dog seriously caused a lot of commotion, nearly made kids cry ect... Oh it was an adventure. 

My blog didn't let me choose the order of my photos lol so here is a picture of the sketchy bus station we began our adventure at. Also, note the pizza box I'm holding. Yummm. 

So something I've forgotten to mention in all my blogs is how instead of using alarms and such, the way to keep robbers out is putting broken glass along fences. You can't tell from the picture below too well, but just about every single fence in Ecuador is lined with broken glass. I don't think this works very well though since the place my host sister works at was recently robbed. Aye caramba.

Anyways, life at the beach was fantastic! Although finding a way home and running our of money did create quite some stress, the vacation was wonderful and much needed. Monday-Thursdays are the most stressful days ever. Either working, in class, or doing homework. I live for the three day weekends here haha. 

I am not sure if we are going on a trip or doing something super exciting this weekend, but if we do, I will add more stories and pictures soon! Chau!