Reunited on the Coastal Plain

I spent Tuesday thru Friday in Guayaquil, seeing some sights and hanging out. On Wednesday I got some extra pages in my passport at the US Consulate in Guayaquil...I got this idea from Gabe K. who did this in New Zealand. In Ecuador it might not have been quite as easy, but the whole process only took about 3 hours so I suppose it wasn´t too bad. And it was free! After this I found Naomi and Tamie (who had been waiting for me) and we headed to the Malecón...it was hot out, I had a delicious batido de frutilla y guineo, then we eventually met up with two Guayaquileños (Jose and Diana) for lunch....we ate at a big mall food court where I had a delicious cuban sandwich and a guava juice and several panes de yuca and also a small coffee. Tamie and Naomi had met a guy who knew Jose through Couchsurfers (a website that lets you stay with people all over the world, like Global Freeloaders and Hospitality.com). Anyway, Jose and his girlfriend Diana were cool, and we ended up meeting up with them and some of their friends later on for some drinks at a bar in Urdesa. Before that though we headed to the plaza in Guayaquil that has all the iguanas and checked them out, then walked through the mall section of the Malecón and then through a crazy marletplace where I bought a bathing suit for 5 dollars. Then we went home and had dinner (we made chicken fajitas with guacamole) and then headed to Urdesa where we had Pilsener and some patacones (fried green plantains).

On Thursday we slept late, then had a delicious brunch of pancakes (thanks to Aunt Jemima) and eggs and fruit. In the afternoon we headed into Urdesa (which by the way is a ritzyish northern section of the city of Guayaquil) where Tamie and Naomi got haircuts and I used internet. We also did a bit more shopping for food and walked around a bunch. Then we headed home again, made yet another great dinner (a pizza loaded with sauce, cheese, peppers, onions, garlic, salami and tomato) and a garden salad. Brownies for dessert. We watched TV and eventually went to bed. Then on Friday morning we headed to the bus station...they headed south to Peru and I headed north toward Santo Domingo.

I wasn´t sure when I boarded the bus if I´d do it or not, but at some point I decided that I was going to get off the bus near Babahoyo to visit the banana plantation that I visited 3 years ago. This turned out to be really fun. Just before noon, I hopped off the bus in the middle of bananalandia, in front of Hacienda La Dianita, a Dole banana plantation. I had pictures with me from 3 years ago, and one woman I took a picture of was still there! The bosses there were happy to show me around and glad to look at my pictures...since I never really got a chance to 3 years ago, I asked for a tour of the plantation. My tour ended up being a 30 minute hike to the very back of the plantation, passing thousands of banana trees and crossing over gullies on very shaky bamboo pole bridges. My guide had to hold my hand for two of them since I nervous about losing my balance. Inside the plantation it´s really quiet...you just hear the rustling of the leaves in the breeze and the shuffling of lizards on the dried out, fallen leaves. In the back of the plantation they were picking bananas, and I got to see this process which was cool. I took a video. Then it was time to walk back to the hacienda, where I saw how they cut, cleaned and packed the bananas. All of the people were super nice and want me to send more pictures (or bring them when I come back in another 3 years). Hopefully I can. Sadly, this morning I stupidly transferred all my pictures to my ipod and then erased them...which means I can´t post any on my blog. But I´ll be posting them hopefully in June.

In the early afternoon I left Hacienda La Dianita and caught a bus on it´s way to Quito (via Santo Domingo). The ride to Santo Domingo was hot and sticky, with lots of banana and palm plantations. I got to Santo Domingo at 4:30, and my friend Jackie (one of the ´girls from Santo Domingo´ - see February) was supposed to send me a text message with the name of a hotel I should stay at. She didn´t, and also didn´t respond to my text messages, so I ended up going to a place that was mentioned in the Rough Guide, called Hotel Jennefer. It´s pretty nice, especially for 7 dollars, but I think there might be bed bugs. Or else I was just bitten today, which is also very possible.

The center of Santo Domingo, where my hotel is located, is super busy with tons of stores, stalls and people selling everything. This, combined with the heat and last night´s rain, reminded me of India. Today I slept late (9 am is late now apparantly) and had breakfast at a place near the market...good eggs and bread and juice and bad instant coffee. Then I went to the University where my friends had classes (even though it´s Saturday) and met up with some of them. Jackie had eventually called the night before to give me directions. During their break I had a special empanada (I forget the name) made with plantains and peanuts and filled with chicken (a specialty of Manabí on the coast) while Andrea, Aracely and Jackie had cheese empanadas (also made with plantain dough). Very tasty. After their classes were over, I went with Jackie back to her house (her parents have a restaurant) where we had lunch...I´m meeting up with Jackie and several others again tonight, not sure where yet, but now that I have a cell phone, things like that are much easier!

That´s about all for now, I´m staying in Santo Domingo for one more day, then on Monday heading for the beach in Canoa! Sorry there are no pictures this time, I will try hard to post some on my next blog post...hasta luego

Glorious Guayaquil

On Tuesday morning I woke up early and got my bag packed for my trip to the coast. I called Naomi one more time and got some vague directions to her uncle´s house in Guayaquil…these directions ended up being almost useless, but that part of the story comes later. I ended up leaving Riobamba on an 8:30 AM bus…I had a nice window seat, very spacious. The bus wasn´t crowded at all. The 5 hour bus ride to Guayaquil is quite beautiful. After passing through Cajabamba, we climbed high up onto the páramo before descending down toward the coastal plain. As we went down, paramo changed to green farmland, which in turn changed to cloud forest, which became more and more jungle-like the lower we got. As we arrived in the Andean foothills, I saw more and more banana trees next to houses and farms. After about 3 hours, we reached the coastal plain and the air became very warm. We passed by dozens of banana plantations, with the occasional sugar cane or palm plantation mixed in. Before long, we were crossing the long bridge into the city of Guayaquil, and I was getting off the bus in the hot, dirty bus terminal.

I headed to the line of taxis outside the terminal and stupidly chose the oldest taxi there….this taxi didn´t even make it outside of the parking lot before stalling just before a speed bump. The taxi driver advised me to find a different taxi, which I did right away. My new taxi driver asked me the direction I wanted to go to, and I showed him the paper on which I had written Naomi´s directions. All I knew was that I needed to go to a gated community in a place called Los Cedros, and that the number of the house was 163. My taxi driver quickly figured out that these directions weren´t good enough, and was happy to hear that I had Naomi´s cell phone number. He was less happy to hear that I didn´t have a phone. He said I could use his. Excellent.

We tried calling Naomi´s number and she didn´t pick up. I accidentally hung up the phone too late, so my taxi driver was charged for the call. He started getting very upset (all while driving on a four lane road, full of traffic) until I assured him that I would pay him for the phone call. The taxi driver pulled over, and we tried calling Tamie (who also didn´t answer) and then Naomi again. The taxi driver already suspected that Naomi´s uncle lived in Los Ceibos, not Los Cedros, and when we got through to Naomi the second time, this was confirmed. The taxi driver got all stressed out again, and explained to me that Los Ceibos was ¨muy lejos¨ and that it would cost me 10 dollars to get there, including all the phone calls. Bueno.

Once in Los Ceibos, we still had no clue where we were going. The taxi driver called Naomi´s cell phone again, and he talked to Jose, the security guard at the house. We pulled over on the corner and two minutes later Jose, Naomi and Tamie arrived in a big, black pickup to rescue me! Despite the complications, I made pretty good time, and very soon I was taking a tour of Naomi´s uncle´s house.

The house is pretty large. There are at least 6 bathrooms, a tennis court, indoor pool, huge television, exercise room,…Naomi´s uncle is not there right now though, so it´s just been the 3 of us (Naomi, Tamie and me). I met Naomi and Tamie four weeks ago when they came to Black Sheep Inn, and when they told me they´d be in Guayaquil, I decided to join them.

After I got settled in, we went swimming for a while (yes, I´ll put it on my chart) and then eventually got a ride from Jose to the big mall which is just a 10 minute walk away. At the mall we used internet for a bit, walked around, ate some delicious ice cream, and then shopped for groceries for our dinner. For dinner we made Italian pasta with sausage, spinach and beans and some caramelized onion pizza (but without the cheese and tomato sauce). We also bought a bottle of cachaca and a ton of limes for caipiriñas. Limes are super cheap here…we got about 20 for 26 cents! On Tuesday night we just chilled at the house, watched TV and had an excellent meal. I slept very well and was ready for a busy Wednesday in the city.

Bye Bye Black Sheep

I´m back in Riobamba now after a busy last 10 days at the Black Sheep Inn. We had lots of tourists for the Easter Weekend, and since the local staff had time off for the holiday, there was plenty to do...I did all sorts of things, ranging from preparing cheese sandwiches to chasing down loose llamas. The craziness continued on Monday as Andres celebrated his 40th birthday. The festivities included volleyball in the rain, lots of fireworks, rum & coke, a piñata, homemade kettle corn, bobbing for apples, the slaughtering of 5 chickens for chicken soup and BBQ and 50 guests from the village (in addition to the 25 tourists who were there that night). Everyone had a very good time, although some of us were a bit chuchaqui the next morning.

In addition to being chuchaqui, I also ended up getting sick with a bad cold on Wednesday...this continued for a while, but I was mostly better by Saturday, my last full day at Black Sheep Inn. Saying goodbye on Sunday was sad, but I am happy that I´ll be visiting again with Mike when he comes in May! Mike comes on May 19th, and until then I´ll be traveling, visiting friends all over Ecuador and beginning the process of looking for jobs for next year! I begin my traveling tomorrow as I´ll be off to Guayaquil...since I´m back near cities now I´ll have more internet access and I should be posting on my blog more often. Check back soon to see more updates...adios for now




Andres (covered in cake) and Michelle at the birthday party.


Sparklers!


Loubna and Shelley at Andres´ birthday party


A baby black sheep, born just 5 days ago!

Passover in the Andes

After returning to the Black Sheep Inn two weeks ago, I spent all of Wednesday preparing for our Passover Seder. We had expected only 4 tourists for the Seder, but a bunch of people came at the last minute, so all of a sudden we were preparing a Seder for 23 people! On Tuesday night Andres made gefilte fish...I helped a bit making the balls of fish. He used three different types of fish (some of which probably weren´t kosher, but they were a good combination). On Wednesday morning, I made haroset (using the almonds I bought in Quito) and it came out very good. I put in LOTS of wine (we were using CLOS boxed wine - Concha y Toro - which is very nice but definitely not sweet like Manischewitz). In the afternoon I made hard boiled eggs, picked parsley from the garden in the bathroom, prepared the seder plate, set the table, etc....then there was still somehow time for a volleyball game!




We started the Seder at 6:45ish, using a Hagaddah that Andres and Michelle had used before (they hadn´t done a Seder at BSI for a few years). It was nice and short and explained things well...I led the Seder, but we went around in a circle for most of the readings. There was a large Danish family visiting the Black Sheep Inn, and even though the youngest girl barely spoke English, she agreed to read the 4 questions which was nice. At first I was nervous about the Seder, but it went really well. Everyone participated and seemed to enjoy trying the new foods and reading the story. It was almost everyone´s first seder. Between the 23 of us we represented 6 countries: USA, Ecuador, Germany, Denmark, Holland and Colombia.




I couldn´t find any horseradish in Quito, but we used wasabi instead which was almost as good. Definitely the same idea. Instead of a lamb shank we used a beet root...although we actually had killed one of the sheep the day before (he was sick and suffering) so we probably could have found a lamb shank pretty easily. I tasted a bit of the sheep, he wasn´t too tasty. They had eaten most of it when I was in Quito. Pretty greasy. The beet root represented the lamb shank though...after the parsley, haroset, matzoh, bitter herbs and hard boiled eggs we had matzoh ball soup. At first making the matzoh balls was challenging, but we figured it out and it came out well. Main course was vegetarian shepherds pie (a BSI staple) and tarragon tomatoes and gefilte fish. Very good. I mainly ate haroset.



We ended up making one long table in the lodge for the seder which was nice but a bit crowded. It was good that there weren´t any more people. We hid the afikomen upstairs in the lodge but the Danish kids found it really quickly...it was really hot upstairs though due to the fire in the woodstove (heat rises..) so the afikomen was pretty stale by the time we ate it. There was no other dessert since I decided in Quito not to buy macaroons....one container cost 6 dollars! Matzoh wasn´t too cheap either, at 3 dollars a box.





So overall Passover was a big success...after the seder there was lots of cleaning up to do, and then it was time to prepare for a busy Easter weekend!

Mike Turns Twenty

Since it´s kind of hard to describe all the things I do and have done at the Black Sheep Inn, I decided on March 29th to make a list of everything I did. There are probably several things I forgot to write down, but this gives an idea of an average day for me at Black Sheep Inn (if that exists). The list of activities is more or less in chronological order, but not necessarily. Here we go:

Filled coffee maker and made coffee

Set breakfast table

Boiled water for tea

Took lunch orders for tourists

Re-filled and cleaned purified water jug

Cooked scrambled eggs for Santiago and myself

Ate breakfast

Planted two trees

Spread fertilizer (from composting toilets) on newly planted trees

Discussed the US-Ecuador Free Trade Agreement with an Ecuadoran Spanish Teacher

Cut and laminated signs for cabins and bathrooms

Hung up signs with tape in the bunkhouse and bathrooms

Sorted through the recycling and helped load truck to bring recycling to Latacunga

Weighed metal, glass and plastic recycling before loading on truck

Practiced juggling

Called my brother on the telephone (he turned twenty)

Ate soup and rice for lunch

Helped Janeth chase down a loose sheep in the field next to Black Sheep Inn

Wrote in my journal

Read my book (at that point, Fast Food Nation)

Carried in firewood

Changed gas tank in the kitchen

Kept fire going in lodge

Programmed lodge music on my ipod

Ate a cookie or two

Chatted with Santiago and Karen

Helped measure Black Sheep Inn water consumption using meters next to water valves

Showed maps to new tourists

Waited for the incoming bus (and incoming tourists) from the treehouse

Asked Sylvia if she´d marry me (she said no)

Ate raw bread dough

Played volleyball

Ran inside from the volleyball court when it started to rain

Ate dinner

Played euchre with 3 tourists

Tidied up bunkhouse

Closed up and swept the lodge

Showered

Turned off lights

Went to bed



Yeah, so that was March 29th....days are sometimes less busy than this, but this list is accurate and shows how I do lots of different things at the Black Sheep Inn. Word.

That´s all for this post...
Dave

Green Reflections

I took this picture looking into the mirror of the bunkhouse bathroom at Black Sheep Inn. It´s great to wake up every morning and see the view in the mirror.


This picture is taken from the plateau near the Black Sheep Inn. The hike from Quilotoa to the Black Sheep Inn involves climbing down into and then up out of this canyon.


Behind me in this picture is the plateau and the canyon.


This is a picture of some orchids in the cloud forest. I went to the cloud forest on a horseback riding trip from the Black Sheep Inn

Sunset in Chugchilán

Here are some more photos from Black Sheep Inn and Chugchilán


The main plaza in Chugchilán on a Sunday


Rainbow and Sunset view from Black Sheep Inn


View from Black Sheep Inn


Another view from Black Sheep Inn

Vistas y Lagunas

Here are some pictures from the Black Sheep Inn and the surrounding area.


The Black Sheep Inn and the surrounding hillside, taken from the hill just to the south.




This picture is of Laguna Quilotoa, a volcanic crater lake. I did this hike back in mid-March.



Me at Laguna Quilotoa

Have You Any Wool?

Hello from Quito...I`m here for 2 days, heading tomorrow morning (Monday) to renew my visa (hopefully this goes okay). Then it`s back to the Black Sheep Inn for two more weeks. I came to Quito today with Santiago and Karen, two managers at the Black Sheep Inn...Karen also has to renew her visa tomorrow. We were lucky enough to get a ride to Quito in a private car belonging to two tourists...so the trip was fast and pretty easy. I have been at the Black Sheep Inn for a month, so today was the first time in over 4 weeks that I`d seen a stoplight! After I checked in to my hostal (called L`Auberge Inn), I went with Santiago and Karen to eat pizza. It was very tasty. After that, I headed to the mall (talk about culture shock) where I did some shopping for next week´s Passover Seder, bought some socks, a yogurt drink and some pan de yuca, and a new journal. This evening I´ve been chillin at the hostal with friends from Black Sheep Inn (tourists who came here too) and some new people I met here.

Black Sheep Inn is a really cool place and working there has been very good. Chugchilán, which is about a 5 minute walk from Black Sheep Inn, is a very small town (two streets) with a couple of very small stores, a police station, a phone place, a school, a high school and a market. The market and the whole town are quite busy on Sundays, when there are often hundreds of people in the plaza and marketplace. On quiet days, however, I have walked through town and seen literally 5 people. You can often hear a pin drop in the main plaza. There are often women with small carts in the town selling french fries and empanadas (more like fried dough with a bite size piece of cheese) and grilled or pan fried meat. One day I was treated to some grilled tripe, which surprisingly was very good. I normally don´t like tripe but the grilled stuff was tender and salty and flavorful. It only gave me a very minor stomach ache.

Meanwhile, food at the Black Sheep Inn is awesome. They have 3 types of homemade desserts always available. The brownies are pretty good, and the banana bread is very good, but the oatmeal cookies are amazing. I eat too many. When they are freshly baked I eat even more. Between March 23 and April 8 I ate at least 30 cookies, probably more). The other food at Black Sheep Inn is awesome too....breakfasts of homemade muesli or eggs any style, lunches of soup, rice and leftovers, and dinner feasts with different soups and excellent vegetarian main courses. Highlights: Stuffed eggplant, Moussaka, Lasagna, Shepherd´s Pie, Chinese Stir Fry, Chili, Veggie Burgers, Pesto Pasta. All awesome.

The Black Sheep Inn is in a beautiful setting. There are amazing views from all of the bathrooms and from many of the rooms. I sleep in the bunkhouse, which I often share with other people, but I also get to have all to myself pretty frequently. It has three floors, so I´ve only had other people on my floor two times. Pretty good deal. For my first 2 1/2 weeks at Black Sheep Inn, I was working with Andres and Michelle, the owners of the place. Karen and Santiago were on vacation, and when they came back, Michelle and Andres left for a few days. Last Saturday (April 1), Michelle and Andres came back and two new managers also arrived to begin their training....Buff and Claudine. Buff and Claudine are from California and they´re gonna be here until September. Since there are 4 managers now (plus Andres and Michelle) I am going to be the last volunteer for at least a while). I´ll be at Black Sheep Inn until April 23rd. I do all sorts of things at the Black Sheep Inn as a volunteer, and in my next post I hope to provide a sample day in my life at the Black Sheep Inn...that will happen tomorrow though, since it`s time to go to bed now. Tomorrow I´ll be posting more, including some pictures I hope!

Hasta Luego....