Life's a Beach!

So last weekend we gave ourselves a little vacation from service, school, and hiking though the jungle and took a nice little trip to Atacames in the province of Esmeraldas. It was awesome. I don’t know how many trips I have deemed awesome but that just tells you, you can't get bored traveling here in Ecuador and I'd recommend it to anyone and everyone! Kendra and Colen went a little earlier than Zac and I and our bus rides could not have been any more different. Zac and I called a couple agencies to find out the bus schedule and we headed off to the station.

Unfortunately, Ecuadorians have a tendency to tell people what they want to know even if it is 100% totally incorrect, so beware! We arrived at the Trans-Esmeraldas station to catch the 6.15 straight to Atacames, but before we bought out tickets I made sure to ask the woman behind the desk if it was really going to Atacames, "No," she said. My heart sunk, of course! "Not until 11.15 and 11.30." "At night?" I asked "Yup." "So there are no buses to Atacames tonight until 11?" "Yup" (Literal translation.) She old us to go to Terminal Terrestre which is in Old Town because they leave about every hour from there. Little did I know that again someone was telling us what we wanted to here.

Zac and I jumped in another cab and though it took 30 mins, (because when the Spanish conquered the Incas and set up a traditional colonial city, they did not account for massive mounts of traffic,) It was only $1.75 try to find a taxi anywhere in the US for that! Again, no buses left for Atacames until 11, we checked all 4 companies that go to Atacames and heard the same thing. Let me tell you, know what you are doing before you enter a big station in Ecuador, no one helps you nor cares where you are going but they all want you to get on their bus, no matter where you are going. "?A donde van?" (where are you going?) said a little man, "Atacames" we replied "O we're going to Guayas (Guayaquil) we'll drop you off" At this we proceeded to walk away because Guaya is about 12 hours from Atacames. We finally decided to just take a bus to Esmeraldas the capital of Esmeraldas and take a cab from there to Atacames because its only 45 mins. We left immediately on the 7 a clock bus for a 6-hour bus ride... We didn’t get to Atacames until 4 in the morning; 9 hours.

Because of the heavy rain this "winter" here in Ecuador the Costa was cut off from the Sierra by bus for a while and still has not recovered. Many mudslides and bridge collapse have made it very difficult to travel on the roads, but hey! its part of the adventure right? We drove about an hour and a half NW and then stopped. The road was closed. You'd think if anyone should know it would be the bus companies. We had to turn around, drive another hour and a half until we passed Quito and drive around it and passed through Santa Domingo de Los Colorados where the natives use a seed to make a hard red paste they put in their hair and this is why they are called the Colorados, (colored.) The first half of the trip they played Mel Gibson’s Apocalypse, which is about a young native man who is captured but some Aztec/ Mayan type bounty hunter to be sacrificed for the Gods and then escapes to save the rest of the family. The movie totally lacked plot or any type of twists, but it was hilarious because they speak a native language the whole movie so it had to be translated into Spanish, but all of the voices were done by one guy; the guys the gals and the little kids. It was hilarious! I LOL-ed.

Esmeraldas has a very unique history; during the slave trade in S. America a ship full of Slaves straight from Africa was sailing through the pacific Quito close to the shore and sank. The slaves swam to shore and created their own colony. Because of its distance from the cities, the defenses of the newly freed slaves, their good relations with the surrounding indigenous populations and their own ability to govern and make deals with the Spanish they established their own small state for a period for time. They had their own nobles that would travel and negotiate and their ancestors live on today all along the cost of Esmeraldas, so the majority of the population is Afro-Ecuatoriano.

So when we arrived in Esmeraldas, not a city by the way, more like a couple streets, it was dead. The only person out was some old dude who looked like he was falling asleep, I don’t blame him. We got our cab and arrived at 4 in the morning. We knocked on the girls’ door and passed out after some uncontrollable laugher from them. Three hours passed and we woke up to beach it! The two days we spent there were amazing, it was so hot and there were big waves to body surf in and people walking up and down the beach trying to sell you everything, you'd think it might become annoying but you get used to it, although you're better off wearing a "No Gracias" sign, and even though there was an army of plastic bags in the water it was so nice to swim. At night we just hung out in the hammocks and threw back wine and beer. A great weekend and I'm sure you'd all like to know the ride back was only 6 hours. I miss you all and hope all is well! Saludos!