Domestic Bliss

During our visit with her in Peru, my aunt Elena, in a good-hearted effort to encourage us to quit our ramblin´ways and settle down, threatened to buy us that paragon of stable domesticity, the blender cozy. We resisted strenuously, but it turns out that the joke is on us, because here we are, mere weeks later, settled down in Canoa, Ecuador, renting a furnished apartment and wishing we had an embroidered cozy to cover our unsightly blender.

Regardless, we are very psyched to be settled for a while, after nearly a month of steady travel. First a quick update on our path to Canoa, then a bit more about the lovely village itself as well as our present attitude and station. (I have been reading Dickens as of late, patient reader, and I fear it has influenced my writing style in an adverse manner)

Anyhow, we moved north from Mancora (the site of Rose´s sunburn which is healing nicely, no scars) on an epic bus ride, aided by a friendly Argentine fellow traveler, to Montanita, which was still bustling at 2 AM when we arrived. Convenient, as we could grab a hamburger to curb our hunger at that ghastly hour, but not great for sleeping as we were soon to find. Montanita has a nice righthand point break, and a restaraunt that serves terrific coffee and huge Ecuadorian breakfasts (The Happy Donkey), but was just a bit too wild for us. All night parties every night, 2 for 1 drinks from 6:30 til close (6AM) at all the bars, blaring music competing for dominance over the natural silence of the night... Anyhow, after a few days we headed north again to Puerto Lopez, where we did some kayaking (we saw humpback whales, a sea turtle, and swamped on every single surf landing!) and a bike tour. Then north again to Canoa, where we now reside, via yet another epic bus ride. This one was supposed to take 5 hours, but ended up lasting 8. In fact, we have yet to take a bus ride that didn´t take hours longer than the advertised length. Luckily this one passed quickly, entertained as we were by some wonderful kung fu movies, played at maximum volume. Though my spanish comprehension is still lagging, I could follow these pretty well, and cheered loudly with everyone else as the protagonist delivered his trademark death blow, a sequential chest-pounding which leaves his victim apparently unscathed until his head explodes nearly a minute later!

After a few days in Canoa, we decided it met our criteria for a longer stay, tranquility, warm water, waves, trails and dirt roads to run on, a spanish school, and good fruit smoothies. We lucked out and quickly found the perfect little rental, a 2-story brick place (we are hoping for a seismically inactive stay, as the town was levelled in 1941 and 1998 - ironically the patron saint of the town is San Andreas). We have a dining room table made from a huge log round, fully stocked kitchen with fridge and stove/oven and a USA style bathroom downstairs, and two bedrooms and a balcony upstairs.

I won´t bore you with scenes of recent domestic tranquility but here is a taste: preparing fresh dorado ceviche, playing some tunes on the three (yes readers, three) stringed instruments we brought, pan-roasting green coffee beans for the morning´s coffee, trips to market, trying to teach the neighborhood kids how to play the mandolin and fiddle, Rose baking terriffic bread, endless blender-loads of fresh fruit smoothies (including my new favorite flavor, avocado, try it!). Plus we bought an 8 foot funboard (after a brutal haggling session to bring down the price, which ballooned with our interest) so we have been surfing a bunch.

Anyhow, loyal readers, some photos eventually I promise, as well as a tale of getting lost in the jungle with nothing but the roars of howler monkeys ringing in our ears...