Bass Thumping & Beach Bumming: The Coast

Being on the beach will always remind me of childhood summers spent on the maritime coast. It will remind me of being buried in the sand, of filling my plastic beach bucket with raspberry coloured jellyfish, of salty skin.

There are of course, some significant differences between the Canadian Atlantic Coast and the Ecuadorian Pacific Coast. Namely, the violence of the waves, the prevalence of tourists and goods-sellers, and the temperature (an unrelenting heat). Namely, everything.

Our coastal trip started with Montanita. Things had changed a bit since the last time I had been there. When Samir and I had been, it was during the off-season for both tourists and strong tides. This time around, prices were doubled, as were the height and strength of the waves. To save money, seven of my friends and I crammed into one room in a bargain hostel right on the main strip. Nice and central, we thought. Pleasantly active, we reasoned. Our mistake.

The first night we were there, I slept with two earplugs...IN EACH EAR! At one point in the middle of the night, I resorted to wrapping a sweater around my head, in my frustration to keep the street beat out. Multiply that by four nights.

During the day, Montanita still treated us well. We ate wholesome and deliciously at my favourite organic-vegetarian restaurant, "Cafe del Mar", run by a kind and wirey ex-Brit, Mel. The beach was wonderful and sunny, but the tides were perilously strong. Every morning a general announcement echoed across the town to beware of the undertow, and only strong swimmers were advised to go advised to go in past their knees.

Being a strong swimmer (and about a foot taller than most South Americans), I reasoned that I could go in past my knees. This was all fine and good, and I had a blast being tussled by the waves and snorting lots of sea water. On the third day (the day that I had originally planned to use my surfing lesson IOU given to me by my friends for my birthday), I went out for a morning swim as usual. As a rule, I always tried to stay close enough to the shore so that my feet could touch. However, I never realized that a strong tide could carry you far enough so as to break this rule without even realizing it.

This is what happened to me that day, and one second, I was standing with the water just reaching my shoulders, and the next second, I was over my head. Realizing this was not scary at first, and I started to paddle calmly closer to shore. All of a sudden, a huge wave came up behind me, pushed me under, and made me somersault inside the wave until my chin slammed against the ocean floor. I was totally disoriented and didn't even know which way was up, but I managed to find the ground with my feet and pushed up as hard as I could. I came up coughing water and managed to take one deep breath just as another huge wave of equal force pushed and twisted me under again. At this point I was thoroughly terrified and still had no idea how far I had gotten from the shore. I made it to the surface again, and this time had enough time to prepare for the next wave. This time, I swam as hard as I could to stay on top of the wave rather than be sucked under again, and let it help to carry me back to the shore. When the tide receded, I swam my hardest against the current so as not to be carried backwards again. I did this until I could touch the ground, and then I shakily walked back to the shore, coughing, spitting, and snorting out water.

Needless to say, the experience shook me significantly and decided against the surfing lessons. I donated my birthday money instead to a stray animal program Mel was trying to start up to have dogs neutered to prevent the excessive pregnancies and subsequent inhumane killing of unwanted litters that is so common in Ecuador.

I made myself go back in the ocean the next day so as not to perpetuate a fear of water, but if the water passed my belly button, I retreated a bit closer to the shore. With the ocean, it helps to have a little humility...

The next stop was Ayampe, mecca of perfect tranquility and heavenly food. We took a bus from Montanita and as we were getting off, Galban (the famous cook), was just getting on to do some errands in the nearby town. He recognized me immediately and was incredibly happy to hear that I was coming to stay with my friends.


We were in Ayampe for three nights, none of which I used earplugs. Ayampe is not quiet per se, as it buzzes and chirps and hums with birds and bugs and frogs, but that is just my type of lullabye... Galban, his wife Sandra Elena, and their son Kevin were all extremely sweetand welcoming, and when it was time to leave, I felt like I was leaving something behind. Ayampe is a place that will always both calm and warm my spirit.

Our last destination along the coast was Canoa, just three buses, a ferry, another bus, and a bicycle rickshaw away. Aside from being an amazing stretch of sand with lovely lukewarm water, Canoa brought the extra benefit of reuniting me with my long time best buddy, Julia Stanfield. Jules had been living in Cuba for the past couple months and had come down to Ecuador to do some travelling. It was so wonderful meeting up with her, and we spent the next couple of days catching up and catching sun. Most of my friends tried surfing in Canoa, and although I was proud of them for trying, I still wasn't ready for it.

After our weeked in Canoa, it was time to head East, away from the coast and up to the sierra to Ecuador's capital, Quito. At the end of our ten days spent in various beach towns, we were all brown-skinned, crunchy-salty-haired, and stubbornly sandy (you know, like you blow your nose and sand comes out...for days!). We had to say goodbye to both the waves and our friend Emily (who was parting ways to meet up with visiting parents), both which were hard, but we were all excited to see the capital...

...We were also excited to stop finding sand in our undies.