Jan 12/12: Guayaquil, Equador

January 12/ 2012 - Guayaquil, Ecuador

 

It was an overcast day and drizzled-rained off and on.  We arrived late because there was a cargo boat of bananas ahead of it, and it had priority over the cruise ship. What a reality check!

 

Dad decided to take the shuttle bus downtown and walked around a little bit. He went to the `Iguana park` which had a big statue of Simon Bolivar and a bunch of iguanas & pigeons sitting up in the tree branches pooping on the touristas! Bought another postcard and mailed it.

 

I went on a tour to a coco plantation, which was almost a 2 hour drive to get there. At the plantation they also grow mangoes and passion fruit. I learned a lot and took a zillion pictures which I will show you when I get back. I will use that to make a presentation to the "Master Gardeners" when I get back. When we arrived at the plantation we were greeted by a glass of pure coco juice. it was sweet, but not overly so, and smelled faintly of coco. Then we toured the plantation - it was very muddy and my hiking boots were pretty dirty when we were done! The tour took about 2 hours. learned a lot. Then we went into the coco factory where they make the pure organic chocolate, and got to taste some. It was so delicious that I bought some to bring home. Returned to the hacienda for lunch, which was chicken with rice & veggies, and then for dessert cake with, you guessed it, chocolate sauce.

 

After lunch we had a bit of free time, then we returned and had a short bus tour of the central part of the town on our way back. I did not know the city had burned in 1910 and had been rebuilt. It is also the only city with the buildings built in such as way that you can walk under the "awnings" so that you are kept cool in the summer and protected during the rainy season. Returned to the ship just in time to get ready for supper. That night it was Panama hat night, so we wore our hats to dinner.  Relaxed in the library afterwards, did some downloading of email, (On my g-d- it took 2 hours to download the mail as the satellite was sooooo slow) but it took so long that I could not send anything afterwards, thus you will get this today.