At this point, not gonna lie, it was worth every penny and I needed it. This weekend I took a trip with Pete, Gwen, Tristan, and Cait and Devan (from our Baños trip- they go to the other university in Quito) to Guayaquil and the Southern coast to Puerto Lopez and Montanita. We took a night bus to Guayaquil at 10:20 Thursday night that lasted about 8 or 8 ½ hours and arrived early in the morning and found ourselves a hostal for $8 a night. The girls took a nice nap since the bus was less than comfortable (and less comfortable than the night in Mindo) so we were a little tired. We woke up about 10 o’clock and left Devan and Tristan to go to a casino while the rest of us went back to the airport to buy our plane tickets back for Monday. $67 later, Pete, Gwen, and I had tickets back to Quito for 4:00 pm on Monday. (The rest were going to take the bus back.) We returned to meet up with the other boys and walked down to the Malecon 2000 which is basically Guayaquil’s waterfront along the river. The holiday in Guayaquil had been the day before so not too much was going on but we had a nice walk, the boys got in trouble for playing on playground equipment, and the girls got harassed by every man we passed (it’s incredible, it was way worse than Quito). After finding a bit of lunch- which was a bit of a struggle because almost every place had stopped serving lunch and started serving only beer by 3:00 when we went to eat (this coming from a country where it’s normal to eat lunch at 2 in the afternoon)- we went back to the hostal and watched the Sandlot 3 (with the same guy who played Squints, but all grown up) 
and rested a little bit before the girls again went back out for ice cream. (We ate a lot this trip just to warn you…) That night we played some games and spent quality time together in our hostal before going out in search of clubs or someplace to dance and drink. The taxi driver we had from the airport told us the party that night was at a place called Kennedy Mall so we told our taxi driver that night to take us there, he did so willingly but when we got out of the taxi we discovered that all the clubs here were in fact, “alternative” clubs… that means gay. Haha! What a bastard of a taxi driver. But we met a very chill chick who got us another taxi for only $1.50 and actually ended up at a club called the Fizz that Marco had recommended if we ever went to Guayaquil. There we proceeded to have an awesome night which exhausted us all sufficiently and we woke up at about 10:30 the next morning, ate, and caught a bus to Puerto Lopez.
We got into Puerto Lopez about 5 in the afternoon and found another hostal to drop our stuff off in before going to find more food. Thanks to or Lonely Planet Guide we found a place that served seafood (and although mine and Cait’s shrimp was really pretty blan, Devan’s was very delicious and we got to share a little bit of that. After dinner we walked around the town a little and chilled on the beach next to a man-made fire pit thing behind one of the on-beach bars and talked and told jokes and played more games. We found another little club but rather quickly lost interest with the far over-population of guys in the room so we decided it was a much better idea to go skinny dipping in the ocean (although the girls did keep on their bottoms because we felt a little safer…er something) :p but nonetheless we had a good time in the cold, but not quite as cold as northern Pacific ocean water. Completely soaked with nothing else to do we went back up to the terrace of our hostal and played card games. I called it an early night at 2 am and the rest joined crashed a bit later. We had hoped to go to the Isla de Plata the next morning- it is said to be a mini Galapagos with Boobies, Frigate birds, snorkeling and some sea lions, but some people struggled to get up early enough so after our breakfast of pancakes we instead took a $15 boat ride out to go whale watching. The majority of the persons on the boat got a little sea-sick (and I’m sure in some cases the hung-overness didn’t help much), but Devan and I, at the bow of the boat, with two extremely cute and enthusiastic little boys, had a great time without any sickness watching the whales. We saw three, a mama, daddy, and baby (who sadly was caught in a net and one of the guides said would probably die.) 
They were incredible! At one point one of them was swimming under the water maybe two yards away from our boat. They jumped in the air and flapped their tails and we were able to watch them for a good 30 minutes. Devan got some good footage on his video camera and we all told him he had no choice but to make us copies. After some time we discovered that we were going to be heading back because (to mine and Devan’s blissful oblivion) while we were having a great time three or four people had thrown up over the edge of the boat. Oh. Well at least we had a blast. We also snorkeled for a little bit which by no means compared to the Galapagos, but was still fun to do. Once we got back onto land we immediately went to catch a bus to Montanita where we arrived again probably sometime around 4 or 5 and were led by a little boy to a hostal called Montezuma. None of these hostals of course were very high class, but I guess you get what you pay for for $8 a night. After dropping off out stuff we went out again to explore a little bit of the town where we ran into Jipijapa. Here is where I need to take a slight break to explain what exactly I just said.
On the bus to Puerto Lopez we met a guy in board shorts with long hair heading to Montanita who lived in a city called Jipijapa through which we passed on bus. [[Side note: I have decided that Jipijapa has got to be one of the coolest names for a town I have ever heard.]] Anyway, he told us that Montanita was much better than Puerto Lopez and we needed to go there the next day. Now, he explained to us later that in Montanita no one uses first names and everyone had a nickname and although his name was Xavier, everyone new him as Jipijapa because that was where he was from- therefore, we called him Jipijapa, or Jipi for short, as well.
So we did- head to Montanita the next day, and as we were walking out of our hostal he just happened to be riding by on his bike. Nice coincidence. Very excited to see us all (and very happy that Devan was wearing a Barcelona jersey- the soccer team from Guayaquil), he quickly became our tour guide for the rest of the day. We met his friend who owned a bar just down the road whose real name was Henry although I can’t remember his nickname and he invited us to come to happy hour 2 for $4 drinks. After walking a little around the town and on the beach and through the markets, and smelling a sufficient amount of weed, and having a good meal (mine was pasta with chicken and white sauce) and watching the soccer game between Ecuador and Chile (Ecuador won surprisingly 1-0), we did end up going to the bar and proceeded to have a very good time playing cards (we taught Jipi the game and he played with us), catching with Henry, and laughing at a ridiculously drunk woman and her efforts to steel Devan away to her bead and “romper su coco” (to break his coconut- which you can probably figure out what means). Also, I had conveniently worn my Superman t-shirt that day and made a ridiculous number of friends just because of that, along with being called all sorts of names varied from Superman, such as: Superman, Superwoman, Super girl, Super chica (which stuck for the night), and even Super hermana which I have to admit won the most creative vote in my book. In any case, it worked out fine for me. After chilling at the bar and chatting (very well I might add) in Spanish with those around us we all left (including Henry who closed his bar at about 12:30) to go hang out more and dance with the locals, who were all very friendly I might add. By far the best night for practicing Spanish. Devan also found his true love in the form of a guy who could play the entire song of Stairway to Heaven on the guitar (sans words, but all the music). Just as a note, we (Cait and I) decided that there were a much greater percentage of good looking men on the coast compared to in the cities, although in all fairness it may have just been a few that we met that really stood out to us, but I really don’t think so. Again, being the party pooper that I am 
I called it an early night again and went back with Pete to our hostal at about 2:30 in the morning after being exhausted from all the excitement. I slept like a rock and apparently didn’t even feel when Cait fell on me when she and Gwen came in later in the morning. I woke up at 6:58 the next morning to a phone call from my host father because there was some confusion to the time when I was getting back home- apparently everyone except for him thought I was getting back Monday morning about 7 am, but in fact he did expect me back that evening. Anyway, that was figured out and 2 min later my alarm went off for me to get up and go on a run on the beach. After a weekend of eating and drinking I was feeling bastante fat and ended up running for about 40 min, which was better than nothing. If my legs had not been so tight from probably dehydration I probably could have gone for longer, but it was still a nice short run (and the fact that I can call 40 min short is saying something in itself.) 
I took a shower because I was soaked in what was probably a 30-70% ratio of sweat to humidity in the air and then Gwen and I tried (also with Jipijapa’s help) to call the airlines to change our flight to a later time for a good 20 minutes- without luck because no one felt it was important to answer the phone. Oh well. We had our hostal-included breakfast of coffee, strawberry juice, and toast and then said goodbye to Jipi as he had to return to Jipijapa to do some homework for classes that afternoon. (He turns 24 this Sunday and will actually be celebrating it in Quito so we are all supposed to hang out again.) We took another short stroll along the beach before Pete and Gwen and I had to catch a bus at 11 to Santa Elena and then transfer to another to Guayaquil in order to catch our 4 o’clock flight (this was a much better option than taking a direct bus to Guayaquil at 5:00 in the morning). Tristan was going to take the bus back to Quito later that afternoon and Cait and Devan, because they only have Spanish classes they could afford to miss, were going to travel for a little bit longer. The three of us though got to the airport in great time at about 2:40 maybe and had time to eat a nice burger before proceeding through security with no one in front or behind us to get on our 45 minute plane ride back to Quito, where we were met by plenty of rain- of course. Ate a little and chatted a little with my host parents before calling it an early night (for real this time- about 10:00) after watching Pride and Prejudice in Spanish with Spanish subtitles (only because on my version it was the only option.)
Tuesday morning I woke up at 7 again and went for about a 53 or so minute run which was a little more difficult and slower than before, but still reassuring for not having run for about four days. Still on my high from the weekend I managed through classes pretty easily and did well on my art class midterm which was drawing trees…like we did the last two classes Checked my email for the first time in about 5 days to find 76 new messages (although some were junk mail admittedly- I’m not that popular) and finished up the night with a short chat to my good friend Ando with whom I haven’t spoken to really since he graduated in May, and then a chat with the padres whom I haven’t talked to in about 3 weeks- which in comparison is still kind of a long time. And now feeling like I’m really starting the week on Wednesday I have no doubt that the “natural” high from this weekend will give me a boost of enthusiasm for at least the next few days…
