Panama to Ecuador

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  Puerto Lopez, Ecuador
Thursday, June 8, 2006

Panama to Ecuador

Well she is with us again, none the worse for wear and seeming to bear us no grudge after being locked in a metal box for just over a week: we have our car back. More about that later. We are currently on the Ecuadorian coast near to Puerto Lopez in another "eco" resort (Hosteleria Alandaluz) but which tries much harder than the one we stayed at in Nicaragua. We have the most private little camp site just up from the surf and the waves are crashing as I write this and the pelicans are ceaselessly flying up and down the wave crests (very clever as they look sideways through the waves to spot the fish). Overhead are masses of frigate birds with their distinctive forked tails and white puffed out breasts.
We flew out of Panama on an 11.30am flight to Quito which only takes about 90mins (but could have taken much longer as they never told us that the gate had changed and we nearly missed the flight)

Dripping in gold in Quito

. Quito airport is in the heart of the city which is long and narrow and home to about 1.5m people. The town sprawls for about 40km and at its heart has the "old" town and the "new" town almost abutting each other. We took the trolley bus, which is very efficient and very cheap and packed all the time, to the old town. Problem was that Hugo Chavez (nutty - depending on your viewpoint - Prez from Venezuela) was in town and the trolley suddenly stopped well short of our destination. We were warned by an Ecuadorian that it was too dangerous to go into the old town while Chavez was there as the Presidential palace was in the old town. But apart from the trolley everything else seemed to be traveling so we walked the odd ten blocks or so until we found ourselves in a very peaceful old town and in a budget hotel (looked lovely and quiet when we checked in but by 5pm they had turned on the mammoth TV in the courtyard to full volume and a high level of various noises continued until after 11pm). By this time my head was reacting to the altitude. Sheila says I complain on the coast because it is too hot and get headaches from altitude so we are going to plan the rest of our trip at the 1,500m elevation.
Quito old town is lovely and full of fascinating antiquity (although since very little is maintained regularly even the "new" looks fairly antiquated). All steep, cobbled and very narrow streets and of course full of traffic; unlike most of the rest of Latin America that we have traveled so far Ecuadorians love to hoot mostly in frustration because the traffic does not move even though there are Transitos (transit police) everywhere blowing vigorously and very inventively on their whistles

Efficient haircutting in Panama

. In fact Quito was crawling with police and we could not have felt safer, and wandered the streets at night even though the guide book said we should not. We spent several very good days visiting pretty much everything that was recommended - which was mostly churches dripping in gold leaf; visiting very slowly as my head pounded if we moved too fast; in fact we went to a doctor to get some altitude pills but a very middle-aged, very black and delightful lady doctor pretty much told me to "suck-it-up" and not be such a wimp.
What became apparent after a while was how many children there are working the streets from shoe-shining to selling gum or direct begging; in fact it is clear that there is a huge gulf between sections of the population with so many scraping by day by day. And lots of them are very inventive especially the street theatre practitioners; we approached one crowd in a large plaza and immediately became the main focus of various comments and one extremely rude gesture after which someone came over for a large coin; all done in very good fun. But the contrast of churches dripping with gold and the poverty of the streets might explain why evangelical churches are making such inroads.
We had one day in the new town which is really not very interesting except it has a lovely little botanical garden lovingly created and maintained that is worth a visit. The only reason we went to the new town was to purchase our bus tickets for Guayaquil (the port)

New meaning to little boxes in Guayaquil

.
We had only two nights in the noisy hotel and then moved to the delightful Hostal San Blas which was on the edge of a large square and should be in the guide book; but it was also noisy but a different type of noise as you are really sharing living quarters with the staff and their children and marital problems.
So after four really full days we boarded a bus for the port and headed down the incredibly steep escarpment (it drops 3,000m in 2.5hrs); I now swapped an altitude headache for sweaty armpits. I definitely needed my travel sick pills for the hairpin bends. We arrived in Guayaquil after about 9hrs and took a bus straight to the main square and another "Page" special hotel (we nearly went in the opposite direction as our navigator got her north's and south's mixed up and for once I was right!).
Guayaquilians think Quitonians are arrogant and unable to live life to the full; all this means is that they hoot more. Although a large rather scruffy city of over 2m we rather enjoyed our two very sweaty days waiting for the port to open and release our car. They have decided to pretty-up their city and have turned the foreshore into a marvelous pedestrian precinct with parks and gardens all kept scrupulously clean and completely free of any untoward behaviour (we got ticked-off by the police twice: once for my leaning against a wall with my foot on the wall and the second time for sitting on a tiled ledge near a fish pond)

Our campsite on the coast

. In the centre of Guayaquil they have a little park that is full of huge iguanas that were there before the park was created and have simply stayed; you have to watch where you walk and especially for overhead ablutions but they are fascinatingly ugly creatures.
And of course our main reason for being here: getting the car out of clink. I will just give a very short description and Sheila will append details for other travelers with cars. We started at 9am with the shipping company where everything was very efficient (and easy to understand). We then got into a taxi where the drivers seat was missing and he had replaced it with a sort-of deck chair; he immediately went and put $1.50 of gas in the tank and then watched his fuel gauge anxiously the whole way there. I am not sure whether any of the essential systems were working and although he continually turned the steering wheel this way and that the car seemed to travel on its own route. But we got there, although Sheila had her eyes closed for most of the trip. As we arrived a little man leaped out of somewhere and said he was Antonio Ruis and we were now in his care. If anyone uses the same man you must be warned that you need to be extremely fit: for the next seven hours we were on a route march as we rushed from one wicket to the next never quite sure what we were doing as Antonio hustled and bustled and told everyone what they should do and how they should do it and greased the odd palm when it got too slow

Typical Quito stret

. Everyone seemed to know him and to like him or at least put up with him. Why it all took so long and involved so many people we never quite understood but at one point we were made temporary employees of the Port Authority so that the palm readers (very advanced) would let us in and out of the port gates. Everything is bound up in so much red tape and with such inefficiency (I have never seen so many people playing patience on their computers or continually doing their nails); the government must employ huge numbers of people and everyone backs the system of inefficiency as more people are required and a government job is a sinecure and protection for life but it is difficult to see how they will drag themselves out of such unexpected poverty given the natural resources of their country.
Anyway, this surreal activity proceeded at a continuing high pace in blistering heat until FIVE minutes to five (and the "bodega" where our car was held was going to be closed for the day at five) and we only got to this time - and not the next day - because Antonio bribed someone in the bank line-up. We then ran with our rucksacks and roll-on and got to the closed but not padlocked gates at two minutes to five where another note was palmed and our car was released. We then drove to various places to "pay" the security guards and Antonio's helpers before finally driving back into Guayaquil. Antonio stayed with us until he found just the right Hotel (even cheaper but much better) and secure parking for our car - he really was wonderful although the cost was considerably higher than we had expected. We met a Quebec couple who had been waiting for six weeks for their car to appear from Panama so our car in only a week was pretty good. What was interesting is that when we first saw our car in the container it was already open and since they had made sure we saw it sealed prior to departure it was rather odd. When they had put it in the container they said that we should have the windows open as cars explode because of the heat build-up (seemed to make sense at the time and only afterwards did my devious mind think it nonsense and a ruse so that the car contents were easily accessible - I have so little faith). All was intact.
So on Tuesday we finally left Guayaquil, once more on the road (and lost! It was interesting leaving - or not - Guayaquil as we would take instructions proceed on a definite direction, then after about 10mins further instructions would have us going in completely the opposite direction; we realize now that what you are meant to do is drive around aimlessly but with patience and then suddenly and miraculously a sign to where you want to go will appear out of the blue). Then down to Salinas (an awful coastal town) and then north along a very desolate stretch of coast with many shrimp aquaculture businesses in ruin, deforested and most of the houses with that incomplete look of unpainted breeze-blocks and reinforcing bar sticking out of the unfinished final floor. But finally the coast improves (after about 120km) and we reached where we are now where we will stay for a few days at least even though the sun does not shine (wrong season for being on the beach in Ecuador) but at least it is cool at night.
I should have mentioned in our last blog, for the benefit of Bo who has cut Sheila's hair for aeons, that a good cut in Boquete costs $3.50! And that his instructions for Chris to colour Sheila's roots have left her a violent shade of orange. (Help Bo...did we do it for too long or too short a time?????) And finally, we have devised a method for gauging Sheila's health by the colour of her tongue - the greener it is the worse she is, and most days now it is a gentle shade of pink so all is progressing reasonably well.
The detailed description of the process to ship the car will be posted shortly.

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