What a Pisser!

Montanita, Ecuador

February 1, 2007
S 01.49.546
W 080.45.252

We woke up fairly early today, 8:45a, knowing it was a travel day. Travel days are always hard since things are out of our control. Our plan was to make it from Quito to Montanita, a little beach town approximately 200 km from Guayquil. To make this trip possible in a day, we opted for the 45 minute flight from Quito to Guayquil (instead of the eight hour bus ride), and planned to take buses the rest of the way to Monteñita. This is really the only way to get there with the exception of hiring a private taxi.

I was the first to wake up when the alarm went off at 8:45a, I slowly made my way to the shower, having slept very little. I was convinced the anti-malaria drugs we are taking were messing with my mind, and, therefore, my sleep. Each night before we went to bed we took one of the little pink pills in preparation for our trip to the beach. After my shower, I decided I wouldn’t take the pink pill at night anymore, but instead I would take the pill in the morning. So, after my shower, and before breakfast, I popped my daily anti-malaria pill and started packing my bag in preparation for the day. Ten minutes into packing, Marc now in the shower, I started sweating profusely. I sat down on the bed for a few minutes and finished my book, “Running with Scissors.” I sipped on some Gatorade, fruit punch flavor, hoping the sugar would make me feel better. No such luck, I ran into the bathroom and refunded all of the Gatorade I just drank.

Marc stepped out of the shower at about this time. He too took a little pink pill at my suggestion. I convinced him to eat a Clif Bar before he got sick too. I should mention he made the same suggestion to me, which I promptly ignored thinking Gatorade was my best option, thinking of the breakfast we would have at our little B&B.

We made it through breakfast, no puking from Marc, and headed to the airport. I was feeling much better, since the pink pill was probably completely exhumed at this point. We boarded our flight promptly at 1p and made it to the other end with luggage in hand by 2p.

Our day, and the fun, was just beginning when we landed in Guayquil. We left the airport terminal, got in a cab to the bus terminal 1.2 km away to catch a bus to Monteñita, snaked our way through the terminal to the ticket booth, and got to our bus with about 10 minutes to spare. We were very lucky to catch the next bus, or we would need to wait two more hours in the heat. The temperature when we landed in Guayquil was 28C, or close to 88F, and the humidity was upwards of 80%. We were drenched by the time we got on the bus, and I suggested to Marc we grab a few waters before our departure—thank goodness we did.

Bus rides in other countries are always an experience, similar to the Stockton 30, but different. Our bus had a drape between the driver and the rest of the bus. This was a good thing because it prevented me from seeing the seemingly suicidal movements the driver was making. The passengers had another distraction, a movie. The movie for the trip was called DOA, Dead or Alive. I had never heard of it before this trip. Marc only knew about it because Jamie Presley was featured in Playboy, and they had a great article on the movie. Marc summed up the article for me—the chicks in the movie are hot, but the movie itself sucks. I have to agree with Playboy on this one. Thank goodness they have those great articles.

The bus made a few stops along the road between Guayquil and Salinas, our transfer point to Monteñita, but the purpose of the stops was to let food vendors on board. They sold anything from ice cream to chicken and meat kabobs to deep fried surprises. The aroma from the food was wonderful, a lot better than the stinky, sweaty passengers, but we opted out due to that damn pink pill we took early in the morning. We still had at least 2 hours on the bus and we didn’t want to risk anything.

We finally got to the transfer point to Monteñitas. The only indication was the porter, or ticket taker, yelling at us in Spanish. Luckily, we figured it out, and got off the bus with four young ladies with the same destination. We waited at a corner, in some village in the middle of the dessert, after purchasing another ticket for the remainder of the way, and waited for a bus to show up.

The bus finally arrived 40 mins later, completely packed, and we picked two seats in the last row of the bus, the only two seats together. However, when we boarded, instead of there being food vendors, there was a traveling drama team already in mid-performance. We were probably on the bus for two minutes when a man in front of us started yelling and chastising the act. One of the “actors” told the guy to listen, but at the time we didn’t know he was part of the crew. In the end, the drama team passed out candy bars to the bus, and then came back and collected the $.50 from each person. We opted out of the charade by feigning to not understand what was going on... which was true.

After the performance was over, the entire crew departed the bus and I moved over one seat to give Marc a little more room. The windows on the back of the bus didn’t open and it is hotter than Hades. I had the day pack between my legs, resting on the floor, and Marc was balancing our packs on his knees.

It is at this point I felt a drop of liquid on my foot. Immediately suspicious, I looked at the guy in front of me through the reflection in the window. Remember, he was the same one having a fit over the drama performance. I see something spouting up between his legs, I shit you not! I immediately pull up the day pack and turn to Marc and say, “I think he's pissing.” Marc peeks over the seat and confirms my suspicion. I pull my legs completely up, Marc takes the day pack in his lap, and I tell the guy sitting next to Marc. The guy instantly goes to the front of the bus to report the findings to the porter. The porter comes to the back of the bus and confronts the pisser. The pisser tries to blame the incident on the delay due to the drama team and, specifically, the guy who told him to be quiet and listen; at least we think this is what happened. I could only understand every few words, making the complete translation difficult. The porter wasn't making much progress with the pisser and headed back to the front of the bus for reinforcement.

It was at this time the guy sitting (and sleeping) next to the pisser realized what happened, he repositioned himself on the armrest, bought some popcorn from a food vendor on board and got caught up on the entertainment.

The bus continues for a few more stops before the porter and his reinforcement come back to confront the pisser, who is now standing up in the aisle. I think he got tired of sitting in his own urine. Then another guy joins the reinforcements and they all have a discussion with the pisser, to no avail.

Then, the two larger guys get behind the pisser and begin pushing him to a waiting police officer at the front of the bus. After the pisser was escorted from the bus the porter came back with a spray bottle of 'something' and few paper towels and did a half-assed clean up of the mess.

The pisser was gone and we were back on our way. This whole incident with the pisser took about 20 mins and during that time the bus was stopped and it kept getting hotter and hotter. The air circulation in the back of the bus was poor, and Marc still had the day pack on his lap to avoid the piss on the floor of the bus. Our water was long gone and, in retrospect, we probably should have bought a few more, but we thought we were almost there.

Marc started getting very anxious like when he has motion sickness. The back of the bus is not the best place to be since you feel every single bump in the road. Marc placed the day pack in the aisle within in reach, and stood up to get a little air. It was a little too late. Marc sat back down and asked me for his emergency bag. We were 5K away from our destination at this point. Marc spent the last 5K dry heaving into a gallon Ziploc bag thankful he didn’t eat any of the deep fried surprises along the way.

When we arrived, Marc took his zipped up Ziploc with him; we got our bags, and made our way into the town of Monteñita. The entry into Monteñita will get its own story later. We found a cute little place to stay, right on the beach, put our stuff away just in time to see the sun starting to set out our window.

We dropped everything and ran closer to the water, about 100m. The beautiful reddish, orange globe was right in front of us prepared to dive into the water for the night. It was the most spectacular sunset either one of us have ever seen.

I guess the sunset made the rest of the miserable day worth it.

First few days...Quito, Ecuador

Quito, Ecuador

January 31, 2007

S 00°00.000

W 078°.27.361

Today we took a trip 22 km outside of the city to see La Mitad de Mundo. The middle of the world is its own little city outside of Quito. There are several restaurants, parks, souvenir shops, with the highlight being in the middle of the “City.” There in the middle is a massive monument recognizing the spot on the equator when the latitude reaches 00.000.000. We headed directly towards the monument when we arrived.

Marc, with GPS in hand, was determined to verify the accuracy of the monument. The closest he got was 00.000.112 near the monument. He did find a spot with a reading of 00.000.049 closer to the fence of the city.

The highlight of the day, at least for me, was recording Marc standing on the big “O” for Oeste, or West, with the line dividing the two hemispheres below him. It was here that he let one rip, as he did in the Four Corners several years ago while traveling cross country with Mike T.; I know this because I have seen the tape highlights of that journey with Mike.

Tomorrow we will head to Guayquil, Quito and then over to the beach. The weather should be perfect—in the 80s almost all the time. We will relax on the beach for several days prior to returning to Guayquil. We hope to have internet access during that time, so keep looking for blog updates.

January 30, 2007
S 00°12.169
W 078°.29.830

We had a fantastic day exploring Quito. The town is broken up into three sections—Old Town, New Town and Mariscal Sucre. We hit all of them. As we walked from Mariscal Sucre through New Town, we got to the main park, Parque El Ejido, and continued through to Parque de Alameda.

We heard some noise in the distance, but decided to turn down a street and move away from the noise. Large crowds are not always the best places to be in foreign countries.

At the North corner of Parque de Alameda, there was a little monument that looked like a good lookout point. We climbed to the top, huffing and puffing a little since we are almost at 10,000 feet. We made it to the top and took a seat—we were the only people on top. This wasn’t a big monument; maybe 20 feet high with a weather vain on the top, but it was the perfect place for us to be at this point in time.

The same time we got to the top of the monument, we heard some yelling in the distance, and then we heard a few sirens. We looked out from the point we were sitting and saw some people running in the distance. A few seconds later the sirens drew closer, and we saw officers fully suited in riot gear. People were frantically spilling into Parque de Alameda, the look of fear in their eyes even though they are part of the protest.

Marc pulls out his camera to take a video of the protest and the people trying to escape the police in the riot gear. Next, the riot police unleashed the tear gas, as Marc captured the mayhem on his camera. The situation couldn’t have been too bad since the guy manning the hot dog cart was running with the protestors.

The tear gas cleared and we decided to depart from the top of the monument to complete our tour of Quito. We noticed a church from the top of the monument, Church of La Basillica, and decided to weave our way towards the historical monument. We did our best to avoid the protesters rest of the day, and it wasn’t too difficult since every where we went was heavily secured with police.

We ended the afternoon at the local British Pub having a few pints. Yes, this is kind of cheating since they speak English in the British pub, but it was day one—give us a little time.

I have to say our first day in Quito made us feel like home—those people in San Francisco protest everything too!

Bon Voyage

We are literally hours away from our big trip that has been 26 months in the making. We are currently camped out at the Hyatt Hotel near SFO (Priceline special!) and will board our plane at approximately 6:30 AM tomorrow morning, 1/29.

Everything up to this point has been well planned and completely under our control. Now, as we are about to board the plane, we are venturing into the unknown territory where things WILL be out of our control regardless of our meticulous planning. We are officially in the execution phase of the project, and it will take the team (Marc and I) to pull together to ensure as close to perfect execution as possible. I think we are ready for the challenge--I guess we better be at this point!

We know there will be challenges along the way--illness, missed flights, canceled flights, lost luggage, etc.--but each challenge will result in a story we can share with our friends and family along the way.

The emotions have been intense the past couple of weeks saying "see you soon" to all of our friends and family, some who made excuses to see us just one more time. After we went through the packing list one last time today, did some final touch-up cleaning, we placed our packs in Mike Swartz's rental car, and set out for the airport with red eyes (Thanks again Mike). We couldn't really describe how we were feeling--it wasn't sad, or scared--maybe it was good old fashioned anxiety.

We both know we are about to embark on something very special. We believe the anxiety that is running on high today will slowly dissipate when we land in Quito, Ecuador, and continue to diminish as we reach the coast of Ecuador for 7 days of complete relaxation on the beach.

We will miss everyone, including our City. We heard a new lady at Cafe Trieste yesterday say, "I moved hear from Cleveland, OH just a few weeks ago. I really like it because I feel like I am on the same wavelength as everyone else here. I was really tired of being perceived as a freak in Cleveland." Her new friend responded, "Well, it is San Francisco."

We don't think we will find a City we love as much as San Francisco, but that is part of our quest. That and a cup of coffee that can stand up to Cafe Trieste.

Please feel free to email us at mjheckman@yahoo.com or lssassafras@yahoo.com.