We have now been in Montanita for over a week going on almost 2 but it still feels like we only arrived yesterday as we have been so busy. Hence I have not taken many photos so all credit for the awesome pics go to Kajsa – thanks for letting me 'steel' these – all the pics can be seen
here.
Back-to-SchoolMonday week was back-to-school where the initial back to school excitement of buying new stationery and finding out who your teachers are, who your new class mates are etc wore off pretty quickly. The first day started off with us going from shop to shop playing sharades with the goal of buying pens and blank books for writing in - after our first experience of trying to buy matches by playing sharades we have learnt to first try the English word then move on to sharades. Mark prancing up and down the shop pretending to light up a cigarette provided much entertainment but only resulted in the Spanish shopkeeper responding 'ah matches'?
We have 4hrs of Spanish each day split in to 2 sessions either side of lunch – classes overlook the beach and sea, and generally compete with the back ground music of Bob Marley or some local reggaeton. Teachers are really good but class is what you make of it – if you have something better to do at the time or jut don't bother to do your homework they're not bothered and just move swiftly on.
HomeI have moved in with my local 'family' Fernando, Rosamelia and Hezus the 'perro' (dog). Rosamelia works in the office at my school and in Fernando's own words he's 'retired' but makes key rings, necklaces etc as a 'hobby'. Fernando's average day consists of surfing – while Hezus stares longingly into the ocean, mountain biking, making delicious lunches and chilling in the hammock making things to the background of Spanish/English salsa trance type music – not a hard life I'd say. The house is only 200m from the beach and about just down the road from the school and the cabanas where Ross is staying so the locale is perfect!
Montanita the townMontanita itself is pretty 'quiet' in the week (by day) so everything revolves around the fact that its a tourist/party town - the bank opens Wed to Sunday, some restaurants only open after 10pm and the street that the school is in turns in to one huge cocktail bar with vendors each competing with their own specials and pumping music. Nothing really closes until about 6am especially on weekends. No rushing out of bed to catch the bank, shop etc before its closes – the only thing you've go to rush out of bed to do is to catch the good waves or that 8am class!
Big night outFriday was our first huge night out – after a week of being back at school, learning to surf and even attending a salsa class we were pretty damn keen to hit the bar when the clock struck 5 signaling the end of our last class for the week! It had poured with rain on Thursday night so the Montanita town roads (ironically due to them ripping up the paving to install a drainage system) had turned in to one giant mud bath. Attempting to navigate the mud was a task when you were stone cold sober but by 3am it was nearly impossible to walk 2m without loosing a flip flop.
The numerous salsa/reggaeton clubs were a pretty good laugh especially since Mark was not loving the local senoras backing up into his crotch for a little bump and grind. By 5am we had pretty much given up on our slip slops which proved a bit of a hazardous choice as 'health and safety' standards haven't quite reached Montanita. Live cables lay across the mud waiting for an unsuspecting victim – so when Kajsa became the first and looked as if she had just stuck her finger in plug I could not help but breakdown in laughter(anyone that knows me will know that as along as you are not seriously injured your accidents are going to provide me with much hysterics). Fortunately Ecuador only uses 110v so Kajsa survived unscathed but was not so lucky when she later became the victim of a broken bottle.
Ridiculous cycle practiceAfter spending much of Saturday recovering on a desolate beach about 30min away by bus we decided on Sunday to cycle to Libertad (in the other direction down the coast) but soon discovered that the locales estimate of distance should be doubled! Fernando too thought it was only about 35km to Libertad so willingly agreed to join us for at least the cycle there. We left at about 8am and after cycling for about 26km we saw a sign saying 'Libertad 39km' – ha I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. About another 20km on we lost Fernando but later we bumped into him in Libertad – he had decided to stop off have a swim, a bite to eat and then join Rosamelia on the bus.
After purchasing a tent and sleeping bag and using the Internet in Libertad at a semi-modern mall for half the price of that in Montanita we decided to give the cycle back a try. Approximately 30km out of Montanita, after cycling for 2hrs in the mid afternoon sun, I took a wee break and lost Mark to the horizon so I decided to cycle along the beach from there as it was now low tide and looked far more pleasant than cycling along the searing black tar. Bad idea – this now meant that when the road went inland I no longer had the option of hopping on a bus. By now I had cycled 110km since the morning and was cycling down the beach which was not as pleasant as I thought it would be and my hands had become very numb by this stage so I tried rotating between pushing my bike and cycling then free wheeling for 2m but I soon realised that the quickest way to end the pain was to put my head down and cycle as fast as I could.
It was actually a perfect Sunday evening so everyone was out and about and in the last 5km I bumped into Johann (a very cool Swedish guy who had been here for 8 weeks and was going to say good-bye to a teacher in the next village down as he was leaving that evening) and Wayne and Saidi (too very cool and English but not a couple as most would like to presume who were going for an evening sunset run) all of whom said Mark was searching for me – if I had known them well enough I would have asked them to carry me home at that point! Eventually I rolled into Montanita along the beach where Ross was was gleefully enjoying a beer, the sunset and the company of the new Swedish ladies in town! I still haven't fully got the feeling back in my hands but fortunately no stiffness in the legs. We only plan on doing about 60km a day when we start our cycle back to Sao Paulo so at least for I now I know I'm up to it.
PeopleThe town and school in specific is full of cool people. For some odd reason Montanita seems to play host to many many Swedes – every weekend it seems like a new truck load arrives. They're all great people - all very friendly, very well educated and speak excellent English so I'm def not complaining but it must come as quite a surprise to them when they arrive here and half the people can speak Swedish – and they are welcomed by three white African's he he! Those who arrive here straight from Europe within a few days are brown, have blue eyes and blonde hair – lucky bunch – or should I say lucky us! We meet lots of different cool people though as people come and go through the week so hope to give an update about all these characters but for now cheers to Justin (Canadian) and Cam (Australian) – best of luck with your further travels till our paths cross again!
Hasta luego - until later!
