Monday 20 March 2012 -that's Ecuador for you

Had breakfast with Ramona and Dan in a lovely old hotel on the waterfront: we wandered came in from the street walking through the dining area with old-fashioned décor and knick-knacks to the breakfast room overlooking the sea.

After breakfast, we investigated ways of getting to either a dry mangrove forest or to Isla Corazon for a wildlife board walk and canoe trip, but within Ramona and Dan's budget; however, it didn't was too much and we went to a hostel that they had seen offer tours. There, we met a Spanish guy (randomly passing by or some acquaintance of the guy currently looking after the hostel) who tried to get hold of a guide, Francisco, directly. We eventually got his number through a friend of his, and rang Francisco up to query how much it would cost, including any national park fees.

Francisco said he had a few things to sort out and that he would be in town, when we could then discuss whether to go ahead or not. In the meantime, a Canadian guy had said that if we wanted to, he knew a pastor who had previously taken him around in his car for $30 for the day, and that we could enquire with him. However, the pastor said that he also might not be available as he also might need to do some errands - in any event, he didn't seem that keen, and certainly the Canadian guy was disappointed that he wanted more than he had paid although he thought he could persuade him to charge the same amount (since it was the same amount of time) if we wanted.

After dealing with Francisco, we then went to see the pastor, who wanted $60 between the three of us, including waiting for us whilst we did any hikes that the Canadian said we wanted to do wherever we ended up going. However, I was still in favour of having a qualified and knowledgeable guide so we waited for Francisco to make it to Bahia whilst we had a very interesting (and intense) discussion (though it was more a monologue, really) with the Canadian about his treatment protocols, medicine, doctors, nutrition, cancer, God and evolution: he had a very interesting life as a medic and researcher, dealing with land mines, having been shot and tortured). Eventually, though, we had to go and get lunch (it was 1:30 pm at this point, we were starving and Francisco hadn't returned at 1 pm, as he had told us - the board walk would have taken only about 2 hours, and would have included transport there and national fees).

We then spent a further 30 minutes trying to find a restaurant open for lunch! Apparently, Mondays they don't seem to be open: weird! We eventually found one who offered us the standard fixed lunch of almuerzo on the beach front before we then headed back to the hostel, where we had a short "recess" (nap) before meeting up for a lovely healthy salad dinner (in my case, followed by a lovely unhealthy chocolate torte!). Just as we finished paying, the heavens opened and it rained really heavily, so much so that we moved from our outdoor table to inside where we explored the interior décor and wall hangings and world map. After about an hour, though, when the rain had lessened, we eventually braved the rain back to our hostel, weaving in and out of covered doorways and trying to avoid the flooded ones.

Back at the hostel, we then watched a documentary (prompted by our morning's discussion of God and evolution with the Canadian) by Bill Majer where he went around America questioning people's beliefs: it was very good and funny in places. It was especially funny when a senator suddenly realised what he'd said, when Bill Majer said that he was worried that someone who was running the country believed in a talking snake 2000 years ago, and the senator replied with: well, you don't have to pass an IQ test to be in the Senate (!!!).

I was also intrigued to see that Orlando had a Holy Land experience resort (a sort of Christian's Disney World) and that there is a Genesis museum being built (already has been?) in Kentucky, where they aim to show (with science) that genesis in the Bible is true, featuring humans coexisting at the same time with dinosaurs. If I ever get to Kentucky, I'd quite like to visit that museum to see what they say!

Anyway, I was pretty whacked out after that - although it was a very interesting documentary, I did struggle to keep awake towards the end! Tomorrow, I move on to Puerto Lopez, I think I've had enough of Bahia: it's more sleepy than I had imagined from the description in the guidebook (perhaps I'm in the wrong bit, although I appreciate that it is the low season), and not even a great beach, which I had at least known about.