A day at the beach

Today our big activity was time on the beach. We started the day with breakfast at the hostel. We walked into town and I got my 25 cent bag of papaya, delicious. After quite a bit of walking around, we had our lunch from a local vendor. She was very nice and her her two kids with her at her food stand. I asked her if I could take a picture of her, and she held up the fresh fish she was preparing for us, fresh off the boat this morning. We’ve had no problem with the food, it is always delicious and doesn’t cause us any digestive problems. Lunch was a seafood soup, followed by the huge plate of fried whole fish with rice and beans. The soup alone was a meal, as it had cabbage, corn, yucca (maybe that was plantains, I’m not sure), cilantro, carrots, and a chunk of fish (which had bones and skin, but they were easily removed). That’s a tablespoon in the bowl and half of a lime to spice it up beside the bowl.  The fried fish was served with the ever-present rice and the red onion salsa. This time the saucy looking stuff contained lentils, We mixed it with the rice to eat. We had orange soda to drink, and the lady running the stand apologized for not having juice. All this food for $2 each.

After lunch, we went back to the hostel and changed to go to the beach. After gathering out towels and hammocks, we walked about 50 yards across the road to the open air cabana that the hostel built for the hammocks. Phillip listened to his MP3 player and I read a book for awhile, until we were sure it was low tide.

The hostel has about 8 of the cabanas, but only 3 were occupied, so we left our towels and hammocks and walked north along the beach. Phillip collected colorful  seashells for me, but since I didn’t want to carry them home, we just took a picture of them. After walking about a mile, we came to the end of the beach and another rocky area. Since I slipped on the rocks yesterday, I stayed on the sand and let Phillip take the camera to investigate the other side of the rocks. Here are some of the pictures from this area of the beach:

The rock outcropping as we approached

Crabs, about 4 inches long, that were on the rocks, another reason I didn’t want to climb over the rocks. They move quickly sideways, and this guy almost made it out of the picture!

Several of the rocks had these black critters on the underside where it was shaded from the some. I touched them, and they weren’t hard or shell-like, but rubbery. I think I saw Andrew Zimmern eat these, but since I wasn’t sure, we didn’t try this particular “sushi” today.

This is a sand dollar that Phillip picked up. When we put it back down, it slowly burrowed into the sand. I had never seen a live sand dollar before, only the dried ones used as decoration with seashells. Another thing we saw, but the pictures didn’t come out well , was the crabs that live in the sand at the water edge. Hundreds of them along that stretch of the beach, each about 1 to 3 inches long. They ran up the hill away from us as we approached, fast critters that were close in color to the sand which is why the pictures didn’t come out well.

That’s Phillip, beginning the walk back to the cabana, leaving me behind! You can’t even see the Hostel and cabanas in the distance. I did get a bit sunburned, but not enough to peel. Phillip got a little red too, but its already turning to tan on him.

After our beach excursion, we walked back into town and had dinner with Bill and Margaret (grilled pork chops with the usual Ecuadorian fixings), then sat around the town cabana and had a beer with them, a man from Canada, and Juan Carlos, an Ecuadorian tour operator who kept practicing his “Howdy pardner” for us. An enjoyable evening. We’re actually sorry to be leaving this town tomorrow, as we really like it, but who knows what we will find at our next stops!