Don’t worry, be Ayampe!
After the Galápagos Islands, the 4 of us flew back to Guayaquil and headed up to a small town called Montañita. Jens had read that this town was a quiet fishing village, with a relaxed tone and some of the best surfing conditions in Ecuador. We couldn’t be more wrong!
Arriving into Monta, it was clear this was a total party town. It was like a Thailand full moon party on speed. The streets were full of tourists and Ecuadorians, with one street dedicated simply to cocktail stands. The town smelled like a club, there were skinny street dogs running around and the beach was full of empty beer cans and cigarette butts. Unbeknown to us, it was the Ecuadorian national holiday so it was even busier than normal.
We didn’t let our first impressions get to us and found a fantastic Italian restaurant in town where they made homemade pasta and imported risotto rice from Italy. We ate there about 6 times in 5 days.
Monta lived up to the partying ways. We had two hilarious nights out, dancing and meeting lots of locals, fuelled by multiple cocktails. On our second night out, we settled into one cocktail bar run by a guy called Tito. He made us almost every cocktail on his menu and generously topped up our drinks with more alcohol when he thought we were running low. So after two nights of 5am finishes, we needed a week or two to rest.
The four of us heard of another town about 30 minutes away called Ayampe. It was Steen and Ferran’s last day with us, so we headed for some surf and sunshine. A beautiful town with sand lined streets, the boys surfed all day while I relaxed in a hammock with a book.
Once our guest speakers left us for the fast life in New York, Jens and I decided to return for a couple of weeks of rest and solitude in Ayampe. It’s the kind of town where it’s almost expected to do nothing. Our days here were filled by spending most of our time at Otra Ola, a cafe which offered morning yoga, a few hours of Spanish lessons, delicious organic coffee and maybe an afternoon swim if the weather permitted.
Ayampe is not known for its clear skies as it’s backed by a mountain range so the clouds get trapped. We only saw two sunsets in the weeks we were there due to the grey skies. But this didn’t matter. We met a lovely group of people from all over here and they became a mini family. They consisted of Australians, one Russian, a Brit, one German and a Swiss couple. We had morning smoothie parties after yoga, had afternoon coffee and cake at Otra Ola and we even introduced them to our beloved Monta Italian restaurant and Tito. Yes we had one more big night out in Monta :)
It was this group of warm, generous and loving people that made it hard for us to leave. They opened their arms to us and we were really happy to have them in our lives.
We took a quick flight from Guayaquil to Quito and tried to get back to city life. Quito is an colonial town with a beautiful old city filled with small one way streets and vendors with every fruit imaginable. Quito also hosts the equator running through its city. When they built the original monument in the 1600's, they were only 200 metres off what the modern GPS had calibrated. So kudos to them.
From Quito we went down the mountain and stated in a small town called Mindo. It’s located in this lush green paradise which hosts more birds than the entire of Costa Rica. Here we visited a butterfly farm which had thousands of giant blue butterflies. All we had to do was take some banana on our fingers and they would be happy sitting on our hands. We decided to do a night time bush walk, which was run by a Canadian guy that LOVED reptiles and insects. He shows us lots of spiders, bugs and even glow in the dark fungi. It was very interesting to see how the jungle sounded and looked at night time.
Mindo is also known for its chocolate, so a tour of a chocolate factory was a must. Here he learnt how chocolate was created from seed to bar, trying lots of samples along the way. We left with a bar of coffee chocolate and ate it quickly.
Back to Quito for a few nights, we met another Swiss couple who we enjoyed a few meals and nights out with. Staying at the hidden garden hostel, they had a roof top balcony which gave a stunning view over the city of Quito. We decided to spend New Year’s Eve with them so stay tuned for more updates.
After a few more nights in Quito, we jumped on a day time bus into Colombian to find out what all the fuss was about. As I am currently writing this from Medellin, it’s certainly lived up to its expectations so far..stay tuned for more!
