Bye to Cuenca, Hello Guayaquil !!

Allan wrote...


Thursday was our sixteenth anniversary - the first we've spent out of the country - and we decided to have a nice, romantic dinner at el Jardin restaurant, just down the street from our apartment. Becky had picked out the most desirable table a couple of days earlier when we made our reservation, so all was in order when we arrived.

We sat down at 7PM, the first to be seated that evening. A waiter came by to take our order and I thought he was just a bit perfunctory. Not rude at all, but maybe just a bit too formal and hurried.  We ordered our drinks, our appetizers and our entre all at once, which seemed just a bit unusual and hurried.  The bottle of wine arrived along with the seemingly required dinner rolls and we sat quietly waiting for the comida to arrive.

At a certain moment another waiter came by and said "Senor Ramsay? We must move you to another table." As he directed us to the next table, just behind us, we sat down to a beautiful display with a heart-shaped red candle burning at the center, a string of pearls surrounding it and white roses and rose petals spread across the table.  [pic] Our new waiter was joined by another, and for the balance of the evening we had the close attention of both gentlemen. Fantastic service and a delicious meal.

What had happened? Our new friend Gerard - who just the day before took us on the ultimate sight-seeing ride to see Cuenca from the top of the mountain - knows the owner of el Jardin. As we parted company after the ride to the mountaintop Gerard said, "What time do you eat your anniversary dinner?  I'll make a phone call to Senor Duran." And indeed he did. Thank you Gerard for a wonderful evening that celebrated our anniversary, and also our new friendship with you.  Muchas gracias, mi amigo.

---

Roast pig, veggies, potatoes browning in the pan, dirty dishes,
running a one-stop eatery, but without the sanitary
standards we expect at home.

Friday was a surprise as some kind of Montezuma's Revenge caught up with me. I was quite pleased with myself for having eaten adventurously over the week, including a plate of roast pig with hand tossed veggies served by the same hand that took payment, that handled dirty dishes and other sundry tasks I'll never know. Or, maybe it was that corn scramble I ate at Ingapirca. Or some fruit or veggie I picked up at the Fiere Libre mega-market the day before.  Whatever it was, I found myself living in the smallest room in the house for most of the night, downing as many anti-D pills as the instructions for use allowed.

My big concern was not having to be up at 6AM to catch an 8AM ride to Guayaquil. Instead it was the worry about being able to make the three hour ride without needing an emergency bio-break!
Fortunately, with some discomfort, we got on the van to Guayaquil and arrived without incident about 11AM.

On the ride we talked to a gentleman from NYC who happened to be a doctor working in rural and indigenous areas of Ecuador as part of an outreach foundation. He offered some ciproflaxin (used to treat bacterial infections) and a few good old Pepto Bismol. He gave us some advice on how he avoids Motezuma's Revenge by loading up on cipro and also on metronidazole before he heads out to the jungle or outlying areas.  He also remarked that Cuenca was probably the safest city in the country, both from the standpoint safe drinking water and of low crime rates.  He warned us about crime on the coast, saying he'd been robbed there himself.

Well, struggling along after almost no sleep and with the growling stomach, adding crime and robbery to the mix didn't sound too appealing. So we hatched plan B:  forget the coast and spend the night in Guayaquil, then fly home Saturday.  Good plan, but like the Course in Miracle teaches, it seldom pays to plan (with the ego mind) - as if we think we are actually "in charge."

As the van ride to Guayaquil ended, we unloaded our six (yes, too many!) bags from the van and were immediately surrounded by two men grabbing our bags and carrying them off to their "taxis" -- ready to take us. Literally. These unlicensed, fake cabs are often a good first step to really being taken. There are stories about Guayaquil being a dangerous city and most travel sites strongly advise against any but officially registered taxis that carry a certain logo.  I shouted at the guys, "No taxi No taxi" and got a splurge of Spanish as if they didn't understand. After some more aborted conversation they finally gave up. I called the Hampton Inn, which sent a car for us and delivered us into...heaven. A full size Hilton/Marriott-class hotel with a wonderful English speaking staff. A modern bathroom. No covered trash can next to the commode. A king size bed. Air conditioning. All the comforts of home. It seemed perfect.

I called American Airlines and, after a long wait while the agent computed the ticket change fee, including about 5-6 minutes on hold while she apparently consulted her boss (!), she calmly announced that the change fee would be $424 each, or almost $850 total for Becky and me.  No thanks American Airlines. What a ripoff. Is someone taking a kickback?  Or is it just another sign that the once proud and quality airline business has become nothing more than another cash hungry hog. No surprise, as I think back to our flight to Ecuador when one of the flight attendants told us how much she hated her job after 22 years, how underpaid they are and how their retirement program has been gutted.

Becky went to the front desk and negotiated a better room rate so we can stay here until the scheduled flight home on Tuesday.  I went to bed at noon, slept until 7PM, went out for a light bite with Becky then went back to bed until about 9AM Saturday.  Woke up feeling OK and we hit the streets of Guayaquil to see what there is to see!

---

Saturday morning Google maps showed us that we're about 3-4 blocks from the #1 attraction in Guayaquil, the Malecon, a boardwalk that runs along the Guyas River, which in turn empties into the Pacific Ocean. "Boardwalk" is not really the right term. It is a huge park that incorporates restaurants, food courts, an IMAX theater, a phenomenal garden, museums, a playground for kids, shops and tiendas -- all in view of the river -- on a beautiful walkway.

Tour boat on the Guayas River

The Malecon walkway - it goes on for a couple miles

One of many overpasses in the Malecon walkway. Underneath,
on the lower level, you find 100-150 vendors and shops,
a complete "shopping mall", the first in the city.

Remembrance honoring famous Ecuadorians

Just a tiny part of this 3.6 million population city

A tall ship at port. Guayaquil is the port of entry
for all Ecuador. The country's largest city.

We left the hotel at about 1PM and didn't get back until 5:30. A full day walking, and what beauty. My initial skepticism about Guayaquil and its bad reputation is unfounded, at least in the area of Malecon. It's heavily patrolled by security and police. The entire park was filled with families having fun, eating ice cream, watching the kids play in the playground. And young lovers in love everywhere. Becky even saw one couple smooching while the guy was taking their picture at arm's length with his cell phone LOL.


The Malecon Garden is the high point of the entire walk. The architects and designers outdid anything I've ever seen anywhere; at a certain moment it occurred to me that this garden must have been heavenly inspired.  Beautiful.




I hoped to put a video in here showing at least a little bit of the beauty of the gardens here. But we are having a tough time finding a PC, here at the hotel and in Internet cafes, that will read the 8GB memory card from our camera. So most all the pics and videos so far have been from my iPod. Uploading those has to be done by wi-fi and most ISP´s here are fairly limited in servicing larger uploads like videos. So we´ll try again tomorrow to get some video put up here. I´d really like to share the gardens with everyone. In the meantime, here´s a neat thing about iPod: no matter where you travel, you can always find your iPod, and hopefully, your personal location. This pic shows where we are today. If you saw the original map with all the detail exploded out, you´d see that the location it shows is only about 1/2 block away from our actual street address. Pretty neat, ¿huh?

Tonight, Saturday, we had a nice sushi dinner. Sunday our friends from Canada may hook up with us for a while. Monday we may go to a movie. Tuesday, fly away home.

Getting There and Enjoying Our First Day

On 4/30 Becky wrote...
Well, it was hell getting here, but now we are beside the river and have been out walking the town today.  No one wants to cash our Amex travelers checks, so we'll try again Monday.,.hrmpph.   What I keep laughing about is the way our taxi driver pronounced our hotel, which is the Villa Nova Inn.   When he was asking other cabbies where the hotel was located, he would say to them, "Donde es de Bee-No-Bean!"  hahaha.  

The drive from that awful Guayaquil city was terrifyiing for 3 whole hours....the driver sped and passed everyone in front of him on a two lane road all the way, and even did it in the thick white fog!!!  I prayed a lot and somehow we got here without sliding off of a 300 foot drop off and past the mud slide blocking the road.  In addition to all that, the driver played latino rap and rock all the way, you know, that continuous shrill beat that never stops?  Oh and yes, the air conditioning in the van was set at I'm sure 40 degrees.  No way will we go that route back to the airport in Quaya-Kill!   Also, that city is devastatingly impoverished, lined along the roadsides in the city and outside the city were tiny rotten wood shacks where they sit all day and sell their farm produce every day of the week.  Some houses on stilts had no window glass and they were about large enough for two small rooms for the whole family.   A sad sad scene to pass on the road.  And the city is huge with this kind of setup.

Cuenca had some of that on the outside skirts, but it got better as we drove into the city.  It's pretty, quaint old buildings, lots of good food at little restaurants, nice friendly people.   The language was quite a problem in the Quayaquil airport, but we're getting used to communicating now, especially with Allan's IPod language translator.  It works great for immediate on the spot translation of Spanish to English and vice versa.  So when we had lunch today at Kookaburras (English speaking), we breathed a sigh of relief, whew.

Tomorrow we go to our little studio apartment just around the corner and we'll stay there for I'd say about a week.  I'm voting for flying to Quito for the remainder of our trip, as it is more U.S. like and north of it are a group of villages where artists, craftspeople, and artisans gather to market their wares.  Each village section makes a particular things, such as copper pots, another does baskets, while another section does weaving and so on.

It is cool here and very comfortable, sunny days, cool nights, breezy, and the river runs fast over big boulders, a nice sound to sleep by.

...and Allan wrote...

Our first full day in Cuenca was all about walking around town, doing a bit of shopping, checking out a few restaurants and snapping some photos. Our hosts at the Villa Nova Inn are super kind and helpful, and they make a point of having an English-speaking person here 24x7.  Seems they are catering to norteamericanos and others of the English language persuasion. 

It is a relief to come back to the hotel and not have to try to figure out the right thing to say in Spanish.  I'd heartily recommend this hotel and its friendly staff.  Our daily room rate includes an American breakfast at the restaurant next door and the 22% IVA tax (which is, I believe, a VAT tax).  They're even providing the wi-fi we're using to post  blogs, check email, etc.  Not bad for just $49 / night.

As we walked around town today I had many occasions to use Jibbigo (software app on my iPod) to translate for us.  It really is neat to speak to the iPod and have it magically tell me what to say in Spanish.  "Is it made by hand?" I ask Jibbigo.  "¿Está hecho a mano?" says Jibbigo. I ask the question in Spanish and then...hope to understand the high speed reply from the merchant.  Until now I haven't asked the Ecuadoriano to speak to the iPod. I'm just winging it in trying to understand them -- which is actually working reasonably well.  It's a lot of fun trying to communicate and learn a bit of the language. Even moreso because the folks here are quite accommodating and willing to help the gringos out.  Plus, a good many Ecuadorianos do speak English.

We find that crossing a street can be like Russian roulette: make the wrong move and die.  Drivers here not only don't pay much attention to double yellow lines, lane markers and traffic signs. They have right of way over pedestrians. If you step out in front of a car and get hit, it's pretty much your fault. We're double and triple-checking each intersection we want to cross, first to see if it's a one-way or two-way street, and therefore how many directions we have to look to be sure of not getting run down and flattened to the cobblestones.  And while we're looking, a small boy maybe 8 years old riding a bicycle zooms by us on the sidewalk, just inches from the curb and passing traffic, with his 4 year old brother sitting on the handlebars.  Ouch!  I can't imagine letting a small child have the run of the sidewalk amidst all that traffic.  I guess he's used to it and probably has a better sense about him, and about staying alive, than a kid at home who is probably watched over continuously and carefully by mom and dad.

I've read that Ecuadorian law is based on civil law, not common law. The difference is that common law uses judges and "rule of law" precedent to determine guilt or innocence. Civil law though is basically a written collection of laws that judges can't interpret much at all; they're pretty much required to follow them. Juries are not much used in civil law countries either. The upshot of this is that laws on the books determine guilt or innocence, not the circumstances of an event. So if the law here says it's incumbent on the pedestrian to watch his step, that's it.  No arguing who's guilty because it's already been spelled out.  

At least that's my take on the issue. And it turns out to my surprise that our revered "rule of law" and common law approach is used only in Anglo-type countries:  USA, Canada, UK and Australia. The rest of the planet seems to follow one form or another of civil law.


Enough for now. Time for dinner! More pics at http://goo.gl/ngZcF