Well I must say, life on
the beach is pretty sweet. Two weekends ago it was Carnaval across South
America, and as a result we got a couple days off from school. First, I should
start by describing what Carnaval is like in Ecuador. Carnaval is all about
play, which includes dumping buckets of water on people, spraying them with
spray guns and spray foam, and throwing water balloons. Although the city of
Cuenca has cracked down on Carnaval play over the past few years, it was still
visible everywhere you walked in the city, personally instilling in me a sense
of fear and paranoia. Fortunately, because I’m either a) lucky, b) an unknown
gringa, or c) because the city has tightened the rules about Carnaval, I mostly
got to enjoy watching the children spray and dump buckets of water on each
other, and was only “Carnavaled” twice via a squirt gun and a little bit of
foam.
So as I said, we received
two days off from school for Carnaval, and planned to take full advantage of
this time off. Traditionally, the beach is the destination for Carnaval, so we
decided to follow with tradition. I had dragged my feet for too long about
making reservations and plans, and found myself a week before Carnaval with
nothing. Luckily, a group of new teachers had plans to head to the coast, and
let me tag along with their reservations. We left Thursday night at 11pm, after
giving all of our midterms and finals. Our first bus to Guayaquil was a
harmless 4 hour ride, and once in Guayquil we were able to buy a bus ticket to Puertoviejo
that was leaving just minutes after we got to the ticket counter. 3 hours
later, we rolled into Puertoviejo, and groggily asked for a bus to Crucita, our
final destination. This ride was a quick hour, and dropped us off right in
front of our hotel for the weekend. We were staying in a house about 20 minutes
outside of the town of Crucita, a house with a pool, located on the beach, and
which had a few hotel rooms built above where the family lived. Although we
were skeptical at first (isolated is a good word for where we were staying), it
turned out to be a really great decision. We immediate put on swimsuits, and
went for a walk on the beach. I cut out early, trying to nap on the sand, and
then deciding to just head back to the room for a more comfortable nap. I fell
asleep in my swimming suit, and woke up to Maggie’s friend Jess and three of
her friends walking into the room. We came as a group of five from Cuenca, all
CEDEI teachers (Maggie, Emily, Giulia, Kyle, and myself), and were met by four
others that were working on an organic farm together (Jess, Ruby, Bridger, and
Mattie). After the weird wake up, I put on some clothes and we went for a walk
down the street to the only restaurant in our vicinity. Although everything on
the menu was seafood, I said, “I’m a vegetarian. I don’t eat fish. Here’s a
list of things I can eat. What do you say?”, and they made me a plate with an
egg, rice, and plantains! Not the best meal I’ve ever had, but I was pleased to
be eating something. After “linner” we relaxed back at the house, ending our
evening with a bonfire on the beach.
The next morning we got
up, had a nice breakfast at our hotel, and decided it was time to see the town.
We all piled on a bus heading for Crucita, paying our 35-cent fare. In town there
were way more people than we had seen so far, making us believe that maybe
Carnaval would be happening in Crucita. We walked around, walked on the beach,
ate some lunch, and then tried desperately to find enough “grocery stores” (or
small tiendas) to piece together enough food to make meals. Crucita is a tiny
town, and on our first day there we spotted no other foreigners besides
ourselves. Back at the hotel, we all ran out to the beach and enjoyed a long
afternoon of wave jumping. After showering off the day’s sand, we went back to
our same restaurant for dinner, this time asking for them to add salad to my
meal (poco a poco I was trying to create something tasty). After dinner we had
another bonfire on the beach, which was made extremely special by the purchase
of s’mores materials, something none of us had had in a while. After the
bonfire a few of us wandered down the beach, checking out the tents and cabanas
that were being set up for Carnaval festivities. It was almost eerie, because a
few houses down was a beautiful private “resort” with a pool, a dance floor,
bright lights, cabanas set up everywhere, and loud music blasting 24/7. It
would have been awesome, but the one thing it was missing was people… They had
the party ready, but nobody was there to enjoy it. After exploring the empty
party, we went back to the hotel with plans to play pool for the night.
Luckily, our night took an interesting turn for the better. Maggie and Jess had
left earlier with our hotel “security guard” (who was not watching the house…)
looking for the party. They came back a half an hour later saying they had
found a huge party happening outside of a church a few minutes away, and that
we should all join. Kyle, Emily, Jess, Maggie, and I jumped on the backs of a
few motorcycles, and off we were to experience Crucita Carnaval style. There
were hundreds and hundreds of people outside of this church, which had a giant
“bar” (a bunch of crates) of Pilsener and Pilsener Light beer, as well as
babies and small children around. The dancing was incredible, and we got down
for a little bit before our dancing space was interrupted by a parade of “Miss
Crucita Carnaval” girls, girls that looked about 13 parading in their bathing
suits. It was interesting… After the Miss Crucita parade we danced for a bit
longer, and called it a night around 2 or 3am when people were still arriving
at the party. We got a sketchy motorcycle ride home with one driver and three
passengers, walking the last bit home because we either broke the motorcycle with
our weight, or because it ran out of gas.
The next morning we were
all feeling the night before, and decided to have a lazy day filled with beach
walking, pool lying, and ocean swimming. The highlight of the day would
definitely have to be the unique “ice cream sandwich” we all ate. Although we
originally thought we were staying outside of the party, by Sunday the party
came to us; our beach was filled with people enjoying the sun with their
families. There were also food carts abundant, and plenty of ice cream for the
hot day. The ice cream sandwich that we chose was literally two scoops of ice
cream placed in an opened roll. It was delicious, and something I may have to
repeat again. Also, Sunday was both Jess and Mattie’s birthday, so to celebrate
we decided to have a nice, homemade dinner. We didn’t have access to a kitchen,
but were allowed to cook on the barbecue outside. Improvising quite a bit, we
made amazing lentil burgers, with a side of seasoned potatoes and fried
plantains. After dinner Maggie brought out the ice cream cake she had
miraculously brought back from town, and we enjoyed happy and full bellies.
Again, we made ourselves an awesome bonfire on the beach to cap off our day.
Monday was our last full
day in Crucita, and we decided to enjoy it fully. After a morning by the pool,
Kyle, Maggie and I headed into town to go paragliding. Because it was still
Carnaval, the buses weren’t running as frequently as normal, meaning we found
ourselves happily riding into town on a motorcycle converted into a small
trolley of sorts. Although it was 65-cents more than the bus ride, the open
view was totally worth it. In town we headed straight for the paragliding
location, and were told to wait a bit until the wind picked up. Once the wind
was sufficient, the wife of the instructor, and co-hostel owner, drove us up
the hill to the jump off point. We found our friend, Luis, and quickly paid and
got ourselves strapped into parachutes. Luckily it was a tandem ride, so all we
had to do was sit back and enjoy the view. We took off, and glided back and
forth over the cliff and out to the beach, getting ourselves pretty high about
the ground. We floated for about 10 minutes, and landed safely back down where
we started. It was an exhilarating experience, and such a cool place in which
to do it. We shared a beer and some chips up top, and walked ourselves down the
hill, back to the town. In town we made some grocery runs, and found another
converted motorcycle to take us back home. At that point only Kyle, Maggie, Jess
and myself were left, and we planned to make the most of it. We enjoyed more
time in the pool, and that evening we had our last bonfire on the beach. For
dinner all we had left were cans of black beans, so we made the most of it by
filling them up with spices and some onions, and setting them in the fire to
cook. Although I’ve never eaten a whole can of black beans in one sitting
before, I must say it was quite good. It was the perfect end to a perfect
vacation.
On Tuesday our morning
started early at 5am, when we attempted to catch a bus out of Crucita.
Unfortunately, the buses were still on Carnaval time, and didn’t come until
closer to 6am, leaving us a in small panic as to whether we’d be able to leave
Crucita or not. The bus ride to Puertoviejo took an hour again, and from there
we quickly caught our bus to Guayaquil. The ride to Guayquil unfortunately took
an hour longer than on the way there, but that also meant more sleeping time
for me. Once in Guayaquil we found the Cuenca counter, and bought our bus
tickets for 40 minutes later, actually thankful for the little break to eat and
go to the bathroom. We had been warned over and over again that trying to get a
bus home from the beach during Carnaval would be impossible, but all the
warnings seemed untrue after our flawless travel experience. The bus ride to
Cuenca was another short four hours (somehow not a long time on a bus to me
anymore). Once back in Cuenca, we were greeted again by the rain we had had a
break from for four days. Although it is nice to be back home, I definitely
still miss that warm weather and even more carefree life. It was a great
trip.
