We headed to the main bus station in Guayaquil to find a bus to Puerto López on the coast. We found a cheap bus company that had a bus going that way in 30mins - perfect. The man in the ticket office told us it was $4 each for the 4hr journey. So we purchased our tickets and went off for a bite to eat. When we returned, the ticket guy offered to walk us to the bus (he was heading that way), but once there he demanded an extra $2 just for walking us to the bus! These South Americans will try anything to get you to hand over your cash, but we told him to 'b***** off' and jumped on the bus.

Puerto López is a sleepy little town on the west coast. Most tourists head there for the whale watching, but we arrived at the end of whale watching season so spent the next few days chilling out on the beach. This suited us because we both had stinking colds and were happy to relax for a few days reading our books and doing very little.

Montañita was the next stop for us. Another chilled out beach town, the place is full of hippies and buskers living life in the slow lane. But come night fall the town goes into party mode and comes alive with all the bars and clubs playing dance music and offering cheap two-for-one cocktails. We didn't let the opportunity of cheap drinks pass us by, so found a cool little place in the centre of town and got the drinks in!

The following day we caught a bus back to Guayaquil and on to the airport - it's time to leave Ecuador and say "hello" to Peru!