hola familia y amigos! i really hope people are tuning in to read my blog, but i also hope the attachment is not so strong that since i haven't posted in 2 weeks you think i am dead. i've just been busy, busy, busy doing crazy cool things...
so last weekend it was two of my friends' birthdays and we took out first trip to la costa (the coast)! i am the daughter of connie and brian, so you probably can guess i was super excited to go to the beach. thursday night at midnight, five other friends and i got on the overnight bus en route to tonsupa en las esmeraldas, but we are in ecuador so of course there was some transportation craziness. well it turns out that my super smart friends bought us the wrong tickets so please picture 6 gringos running back and forth between two buses trying to explain in spanish that we know our ticket says one place but we really want to go to the other place. we literally put our packs under and boarded each bus three times, all the while being laughed at by the ecuadorians, until finallyyyyy we made it onto a bus that was going in the direction of tonsupa. after 5 hours on the night bus, one of those hours being spent sleeping and the other four being spent trying to get comfortable in the hotter than hell bus, we were dropped off in the middle of a cornfield. yes, this is real life. thankfully my friend aliceann was not still in a sleep-coma like the rest of us and figured out which bus we needed to get on. so once again, us gringos put on a show for the ecuadorians as we sprinted across a cornfield/parking lot with all of our stuff to hop on a bus just as it was driving away. so the next bus was a quick 30 minutes, and by 7am friday morning, we were in our bathing suits and drinking mimosas in an apartment on the beach! the apartment belongs to my friend's family so they let us stay in it... unfortunately there were no pillows, no sheets on the bed, no towels, no toilet paper, no soap, no bowls, no gasoline for the stove, and no running water on the first day. and it cost us each $10 a night. i guess i shouldn't be complaining because we did have a roof over our heads... and a pool!
friday was pretty rainy, but we rented a cute little tent on the beach for $1 for the whole day and when it would stop sprinkling we would head to the ocean! ah i love the ocean and it was surprisingly warm. of course not caswell beach warm, but a very enjoyable temperature. and oh my goodness the sunset was to die for! please see pictures below. anyway, friday was spent walking back and forth from the beach, eating delicious foods in the cute little beachfront restaurants, playing in the pool, and celebrating the birthdays of course! saturday was extreme beach day... blue skies, shining sun, warm water... so great! until 5pm rolled around and i realized my spf 70 and irish skin are no match for the ecuadorian sun. yep, a week later and i still have a pink chest, sensitive shoulders, and a peeling nose. typical. thennn naturally, sunday was a day of rest. after two days of beaching and sun and celebrations, i took the most wonderful 4 hour nap ever! then the crew and i headed down to a beachfront restaurant and convinced the owner to let us change the tv from the futbol game to the superbowl. I WATCHED THE SUPERBOWL ON THE BEACH IN ECUADOR... how cool is that?! and the packers (or los paquedores if you will) win made it that much better. so then we just cleaned the up the mess we had made of the apartment and boarded the midnight bus back to quito. it was a little rough arriving in quito at 7am after a night on a bus and then having to go to class but the weekend was so fun and so worth it!
this week was swell as well. tuesday night, my friends and i hung out in la ronda - a quaint cobblestone area in old town quito that has cute restaurants and my new obsession: canelazo. its a hot drink made of sugarcane liquor and water but tastes like hot cider oh man so delish. wednesday night, i dont really want to talk about... it might have something to do with the outcome of a certain basketball game between unc and a certain school that i dont like (cough cough dOOk). thursday night, my friend lauren had all the cool extranjeros over to her house for a dinner party! tacos and guac and chocolate cake and good friends... what more could ya want? and friday, i spent the day in quito walking around mercado artesenal and getting harassed by little old women selling gum. but again, thats pretty typical.
friends!
watching the game! GO UNC :)
hasta luego caiman (see you later alligator just doesnt have the same ring as it does in english)
-shannon
so last weekend it was two of my friends' birthdays and we took out first trip to la costa (the coast)! i am the daughter of connie and brian, so you probably can guess i was super excited to go to the beach. thursday night at midnight, five other friends and i got on the overnight bus en route to tonsupa en las esmeraldas, but we are in ecuador so of course there was some transportation craziness. well it turns out that my super smart friends bought us the wrong tickets so please picture 6 gringos running back and forth between two buses trying to explain in spanish that we know our ticket says one place but we really want to go to the other place. we literally put our packs under and boarded each bus three times, all the while being laughed at by the ecuadorians, until finallyyyyy we made it onto a bus that was going in the direction of tonsupa. after 5 hours on the night bus, one of those hours being spent sleeping and the other four being spent trying to get comfortable in the hotter than hell bus, we were dropped off in the middle of a cornfield. yes, this is real life. thankfully my friend aliceann was not still in a sleep-coma like the rest of us and figured out which bus we needed to get on. so once again, us gringos put on a show for the ecuadorians as we sprinted across a cornfield/parking lot with all of our stuff to hop on a bus just as it was driving away. so the next bus was a quick 30 minutes, and by 7am friday morning, we were in our bathing suits and drinking mimosas in an apartment on the beach! the apartment belongs to my friend's family so they let us stay in it... unfortunately there were no pillows, no sheets on the bed, no towels, no toilet paper, no soap, no bowls, no gasoline for the stove, and no running water on the first day. and it cost us each $10 a night. i guess i shouldn't be complaining because we did have a roof over our heads... and a pool!
friday was pretty rainy, but we rented a cute little tent on the beach for $1 for the whole day and when it would stop sprinkling we would head to the ocean! ah i love the ocean and it was surprisingly warm. of course not caswell beach warm, but a very enjoyable temperature. and oh my goodness the sunset was to die for! please see pictures below. anyway, friday was spent walking back and forth from the beach, eating delicious foods in the cute little beachfront restaurants, playing in the pool, and celebrating the birthdays of course! saturday was extreme beach day... blue skies, shining sun, warm water... so great! until 5pm rolled around and i realized my spf 70 and irish skin are no match for the ecuadorian sun. yep, a week later and i still have a pink chest, sensitive shoulders, and a peeling nose. typical. thennn naturally, sunday was a day of rest. after two days of beaching and sun and celebrations, i took the most wonderful 4 hour nap ever! then the crew and i headed down to a beachfront restaurant and convinced the owner to let us change the tv from the futbol game to the superbowl. I WATCHED THE SUPERBOWL ON THE BEACH IN ECUADOR... how cool is that?! and the packers (or los paquedores if you will) win made it that much better. so then we just cleaned the up the mess we had made of the apartment and boarded the midnight bus back to quito. it was a little rough arriving in quito at 7am after a night on a bus and then having to go to class but the weekend was so fun and so worth it!
this week was swell as well. tuesday night, my friends and i hung out in la ronda - a quaint cobblestone area in old town quito that has cute restaurants and my new obsession: canelazo. its a hot drink made of sugarcane liquor and water but tastes like hot cider oh man so delish. wednesday night, i dont really want to talk about... it might have something to do with the outcome of a certain basketball game between unc and a certain school that i dont like (cough cough dOOk). thursday night, my friend lauren had all the cool extranjeros over to her house for a dinner party! tacos and guac and chocolate cake and good friends... what more could ya want? and friday, i spent the day in quito walking around mercado artesenal and getting harassed by little old women selling gum. but again, thats pretty typical.
hasta luego caiman (see you later alligator just doesnt have the same ring as it does in english)
-shannon
No comments:
Post a Comment