Beach Buzz: Getting There

Last week marked the halfway point of this Ecuadorian extravaganza. Luckily for all of the people participating in my program, that meant an almost all expense paid trip to the beach and Ecuador´s famed, ¨Ruta del Sol¨, or ¨Route of the Sun¨.

You may remember my previous discussion about Atacames, which is a beach on the northern part of the Ecuadorian coast line. If you traveled south from Atacames, about three or four hours by bus, you would land in a town called Manta. Manta is one of Ecuador´s largest cities, and also the site for the United States military base that wheels and deals with Columbian drug lords. A decade ago Manta was a dump, but sice the US troops´placement, the city has turned a corner to become safer, nicer, and more developed. As you continue South from Manta you first hit a place called ¨Jipijapa¨(pronounced with H´s and not J´s). There´s isn´t a whole lot to do in Jipijaja, as it is pretty much a site for transferring buses, but all of your bus transfers head directly west to the coast, make a left turn, and contine almost 6 hours down the Ecuadorian coastline along the Route of the Sun: Ecuador´s version of Highway 1. Both roads provide constant beautiful scenery of the glorious Pacifc Ocean. The only difference is that whereas Highway 1 zooms through cliffs on a windy road, the Route of the Sun shoots directly south, with almost no bumps and far less man made structures.

Our trip to the Route of the Sun was less than smooth. What was listed as a 13 hour bus ride, ended up taking almost 17 hours. Yikes. The most fun highlight was a 1 hour ¨pit stop¨during which our bus driver proceeded to down about sixteen eggs and twelve pieces of bread. The best test for when a situation in Ecuador is screwed up, is to see if the Ecuadorians are freaking out. Last Wednesday night I was privy to a view of Madison Square Garden pandemonium when Johhny Chubbo forked in his 15 egg. People were the complete opposite of happy and chill, but such is the life of long bus rides. In fact, I think Forrest Gump should be re-written completely. If you open a box of chocolates your options are not unlimitied. On an Ecuadorian night bus, however, you can not only receive, but also are able to count on, absolutely anything on the great green earth happening. To be honest if aliens abducted the person sitting in the back row on next bus ride, I might blow my nose and then go back to watching White Chicks (Terrible movie by the way, though the break dancing part reminded me of my College days watching whatever that movie was called over and over in #32).

In summation, 17 hour bus rides are brutal, but I do have to share one quick observation about traveling. At least as far as traveling is concerned Machiavelli was one to something. Though the bus ride was horrible and terrible, the minute I saw the beach everything seemed to be OK. Maybe the ends really do justify the means.