Finally, we're in Ecuador which is a good thing since at this point we fly out in just over a week. The flight, as far as flying goes, was fine. Smooth, no problems, good-looking man sitting beside me with a good-looking friend who kept coming over to chat with him; five hours went quickly.

We got off the plane in Guayaquil and there were photographers everywhere. I turned to Dair and said, "Hey, they must've known we were coming!". Then as we were exiting the building and remarking that it was a good thing that we'd left our firearms at home, based on the "no guns at the airport" signs, the good-looking man who'd been sitting beside me, exited with all the media cameras running after him. Hmmm, turned out he was some kind of famous football star…don't ask me, I only knew he was a Spanish man named Luis.

We headed into the city and immediately didn't like it. It had a sketchy, dodgy sort of feel that just made us feel like we didn't want to be there. We did head out to finally celebrate Dair's birthday and New Year's eve with a spectacular dinner though. We woke up in the morning, wandered around a bit and still felt the same way, so we decided to accept the loss on get out quick.

We headed to the bus station. My goodness, that place was quite an experience. Set up like a shopping mall (seriously, it had four floors and three food courts) we got in line with the chickens and dogs and waited for an hour and a half to buy our tickets to Cuenca. We spent a few hours exploring the various food courts and finally boarded our bus. Ahhhh, if I'd only known then what I know now...but I'll share that in the next entry!!