The Beach

If Ayampe and Montañita had a baby, it would be Canoa.  Here's what Ayampe, where we spent 5 days with family from NYC, looks like:

Marilyn and Keith run a great little hotel, La Buena Vida, the perfect place to play cards, catch a breeze from the hammock, and gorge yourself on American-style breakfasts and good coffee.

The kids had some surfing lessons.

At times, it seemed the dead outnumbered the living.

If Ayampe was super chill -- empty beaches, save for small groups of surfers and locals, Montañita, where we had dinner one night, was the complete opposite.

Imagine spring break with a dose of hippies and surfers piled into a beach town in Ecuador, sprinkle in some raw sewage and street performers, and you have Montañita.  We had some delicious Mexican food and caught sunset on the beach.

Yesterday, reduced again to just our family of four, we traveled to Canoa -- the perfect mix of Ayampe and Montañita, in my opinion.  Our hotel, the Amalur, (pictured below) is just a block from the beach.

The Malecon is simply a sandy road lined with fresh seafood restaurants, juice stands, hippie stalls selling bracelets, earring, and clothes, and more hostals.  Vendors with fruits, vegetables, clothes, and fresh coconut constantly stream by.

Apparently, Canoa was packed for New Years, but now it's filled with a manageable group of surfers, Ecuadorian tourists, foreignors, and yes, those ubiquitous hippies.  Canoa is an easier place to learn how to surf.  See how well the kids are doing!

And Neil will get it one of these days.

During surfing lessons, I'm the official photographer and keeper of the cabaña.  We have only one more day in Canoa before we travel another few hours to Esmeraldas, Ecuador's northern-most coastal province.