And now...From Salinas...

After the English Convention, the party Sunday night and then Monday in Guayaquil, we finally headed toward Salinas, a beach town where a friend of ours had offered her house to us for the week. While the the girls drove straight to Salinas, the two boys and I had to take a bus, as there wasn´t room for all in the car. So instead of an air conditioned 45 minute drive, we took the hot and sticky 2 hour route, which proved to be a bit more exciting than i thought it would be.

About an hour into the bus ride, around 11:00 pm, our bus was stopped along the side the highway and a group of camoflouged men boarded the bus with semi automatics and yelled for everyone to put their hands on their heads. My friends told me not to worry, because they were police. I personally don´t know how they can tell the difference between police and terrorists, but the fact that they weren´t worried kept me from freaking out. They said to just do what they say and don´t move. So there we stayed with our hands on our heads for about 20 minutes, while the police argued with the bus driver about something and the men walked up and down the aisle yelling at people. Evidentally the driver was not cooperating with them and that made them angry. They yelled for all the women to get off the bus with all their things, and so reluctantly i did so with all the others. The men weren´t allowed to move.

So i deboarded the bus and all us women were put up against the bus and searched for weapons. quite thoroughly i might add... anyway, i asked the women next to me what was going on and she said they sometimes do routine security stops since the night bus system is dangerous, but she´d never seen this. So after they were done searching us and examing our documents (i´m very glad i remembered my documents. images of me in an ecuadorian prison cell for not having proper identification, with rats and cockroaches, not being permitted my phone call flashed before my eyes.), anyway, we were moved to another area and told to wait. They then unloaded some of the men and searched them one by one and questioned them. When they were satisfied with the search, they then questioned certain people one by one about some of th other passengers. By this time, we´d been stopped for over an hour without explanation. It was now midnight and people were getting angry.

Finally the police called every one together and explained what was going on. Apparently, there had been 2 suspects on the bus who were planning on robbing it, but got wind of the police raid and got off on the previous stop. One of the men was sitting right next to me the whole time. SO the reason the police were so forceful is they thought the 2 men were among the people on the bus, so we were all suspects. Talk about scary! But let this story not show the dangers of our current location, but the protection that Jehovah gave us. Everything was fine, although that is the last night bus I will take. Well, actually that´s not true; we took another one back to Quito (10 hours) but that one was a straight drive, no stops.

Anywho, the 2 pictures below are not the real thing. Although I did get video of Danny and Fausto being put against the bus and searched, but on my cell phone. Pretty exciting huh?

After all that excitement was over, we spent 3 lovely days in Salinas, enjoying the peaceful, waveless waters of the beach and eating as much fresh, cheap seafood we could. We rented kayaks and jet skis and had a grand old time.
Enjoy the photos.



This is my beach dog Chifle. We met him the first night and became friends. Then i spent the next two days looking for him. Well, finally the last day, here he was on the beach waiting for us.


hmmm....


This is after 4 people eating off this ceviche. It was so loaded with fresh crab, lobster, octopus and shrimp, we couldn´t even finish it.
Man, this hurts...








And now, The band that Salinas just can´t forget...
THE TOTALLY UNBELIEVABLE COCKROACH!!!