Going Galapagos... I think

So far so good for the Galapagos. I don’t think they’ve gotten our money yet, but we do have plane tickets and a ride arranged to the airport and a confirmation voucher for the boat, so things are moving along. We are on the boat June 15-22 and then return to Quito on June 23rd. Yesterday, we went and saw the new Indiana Jones movie and Chris is extra excited for the South American jungle (even though the South American jungle in that film was actually shot on the Big Island) and he’s trying to arrange a trip out of Quito right after the Galapagos. I still don’t know how much it will cost and I’m not that interested in the jungle, so I might just hang out in Quito for a few days on my own, we’ll see.

But for now, we are still in Guayaquil. Out of all of the places we have visited in the last four and a half months, this is the city with the most American restaurants and shops and stuff. We’ve been to a few malls (looking for Indiana Jones in English) and they have Nine West, Tommy Hilfiger, Sunglass Hut (even thought they spell it Sunglass Hot), Pizza Hut, Chili’s, TGI Friday’s, Taco Bell, McDonalds, Burger King, and more KFC than most places in the states. I also think that all of this fast food might contribute to the fact that the people here are the fattest we have seen in all of South America. Seriously, they are HUGE. And speaking of huge, I feel like I am on my way because in the past few days I have also had Taco Bell, nutella filled churros covered in chocolate and powdered sugar, deep fried shrimp and calamari, pina coladas, and other varieties of cheesy Mexican food. Chris and I have both lost some weight recently due to constant diarrhea and short supplies of food and no fast food, so I guess we’re just packing it back on. Hopefully I don’t get another diet of vomiting and liquid poop on the Galapagos trip, I don’t know how much more I can handle right now, but at least we’ll be far away from KFC… I hope.

As for more pleasant food related topics pan de yucca, fruit juice, and yogurt in Ecuador are all awesome. From what I’ve gathered, most of the food here consists of fried chicken or some sort of grayish meat in gravy, with white rice, French fries, and maybe some beans. This does not excite me. But, they also have great fruit and yogurt stands with these delicious bread spheres called pan de yucca. The fruit stands just blend up fresh fruit (strawberries, oranges, banana, peaches, papaya, mango, pears, whatever) for about $1 and give you a huge cup of tasty deliciousness. The yogurt is not typical condensed yogurt, but more of a liquid, blended with ice and fresh fruit so you get a milkshake with yogurt, it’s good. Then you get the pan de yucca which is a small ball of bread, and when you bite into the crusty outer layer, you are greeted by a doughy cheesy warm center. It fills you up quickly and tastes wonderful. In Paraguay, they have almost similar bread called chipa, but the pan de yucca version is better as it is lighter and generally tastier.

OK, one more food story and then I am done. At one of the malls yesterday, we went to a large grocery store to stock up on essentials for the Galapagos trip. And apparently, we are unhealthy and disgusting because here are the contents of our cart:
2 bottles of rum
1 bottle of vodka
3 boxes of Kinder Eggs special Simpson’s edition – if you don’t know what Kinder Eggs are, do yourself a favor and Google it, it’s worth it
2 bottles of Coke
4 bottles of sparkling water
4 bags of Doritos

Whoa! We’re gross. From what we’ve heard, booze is expensive on the boat, hence the stockpiling, although Chris decided to have an early birthday celebration on his own in our hotel room last night so we need to restock one of the bottles of rum.

Today, I tried to use the WiFi connection at the fancy Hampton Inn down the street but it was running too slow. Tomorrow we might return to the mall to restock our booze and Kinder Eggs and they have an internet connection there I hope to use. I really want to get our pictures from Machu Picchu and Mancora loaded before we leave on Sunday. I also want to call for Father’s Day, but if it doesn’t work out, Happy Father’s Day dad!

I have a date with myself in a couple of hours to see Sex and the City in English (Chris refuses to go) so I’m looking forward to that, hopefully it’s better than the new Indiana Jones.

Salmonella City

My friend Kelly Petska invited me over for dinner one night when we both lived in Phoenix and it was delicious, except for some freakishly dry chicken. I didn’t say anything, but Kelly was quick to point out that she always overcooks her chicken after getting hit with salmonella on a trip to Africa. Well, I have now joined the Salmonella Club, and Kelly, I totally understand your obsession over dry chicken. Holy cow, this is one brutal sickness.

As Chris mentioned in the last blog, we had to cut our four day hiking trip short halfway through day one due to my mystery illness. I was feverish, cold, shaking uncontrollably, and sooooooo tired. We got back to the hostel Friday night and on Saturday, in addition to those symptoms, I was greeted with some awesome diarrhoea and horrific stomach cramps. I didn’t want to eat, couldn’t get out of bed, and was just generally miserable. Chris was nice and stayed with me all day Saturday but I asked him to leave to go back out on the hike on Sunday because a person should only have to tolerate so much diarrhea from their girlfriend and I felt he’d more than met his quota. I finally got myself to a doctor today (after getting out the Spanish dictionary and writing out all my symptoms) and he told me I have salmonella. He prescribed me some antibiotics, pain relievers, and some sort of anti-bloating pills. The doctor visit cost less than $20US and the drugs were less than $10US. Getting sick in Peru is very economical.

Chris will get back from his hike later today and will be able to regale us with his adventures, as my adventures currently involve sweating profusely and being bloaty and sitting in an internet café listening to C&C Music Factory and Ace of Base. The biggest bummer is that we are in a truly wonderful place.

Back in 1999 (I sound old); I went to Prague and Budapest with two other Americans that I was going to school with in Northern Ireland. I loved those cities and had so much fun, but everyone kept telling us we were about five years too late. According to most people we ran into, Eastern Europe was so much better then. Everything was cheaper, cooler, and there were less tourists. When I went to Rio in 2003 and Croatia in 2005, I heard the same story. When we go down to Macchu Picchu next week, we’re picking up what the guidebooks and locals call The Gringo Trail. I always feel like I’m a few years too late. Granted, I always still have fun and I think the people that tell me I missed the good party are usually losers, but part of me still wants to be the smug person that says, “Oh, you really shouldn’t even bother with (insert new cool place here), it’s so overrun with tourists now, and it isn’t even worth it.” Then I will snort disapprovingly in their general direction.

And now that we’re in Chachapoyas, I could totally snort disapprovingly. Part of me wants to tell everyone how bad this place sucks so I can keep it to myself (then I realized only 20 people actually read this things so I think I’m safe). This is the place that rivals Macchu Picchu and no one comes here. Well, according to one of our guides, about 20 tourists per day come to the town of Chachapoyas… in the high season. When we hike to Macchu Picchu, there will be 500 people on the trail with us, in addition to the 1500 others that started the days before us.

The sites here include entire pre-Incan cities discovered only three years ago. They just got the word out about their giant waterfall two years ago. There is a perfect river for rafting, but no one has thought to use it. Currently, they are paving the only road that grants access to many of the small villages and tourist sites. I am afraid that when the road is completed, more and more people will start to come. And that’s really good for the economy but I know things will get ruined.

Before the death illness took me over, we stopped in a small village to get lunch. The local kids surrounded us and wanted us to take their pictures with out digital cameras, just to see themselves. That’s the first time I’ve seen that on this trip. When death illness did take me over, and the road was closed to get back to Chachapoyas, our taxi driver took us to his home for me to rest. He lives in a one room home with a rock floor and was nice enough to offer us food and drinks and take Chris to the fruit stand in town.

Anyway, the point is, this place is really nice and there is a lot to see and I’m too sick to see most of it! Today Chris is at Kuelap, a giant pre-Incan city built on top of a mountain. I wanted to see it so bad, but right now, I’m having issues walking up one flight of stairs. I really want to come back here soon so if this sounds like a good place to you, let’s start planning the next trip.

Don't Drink the Water

I just spent two days on the diarrhea train. I would not recommend it. Chris rode it last week and I guess my body felt like it needed to experience it too, either that or Chris poisoned me. Anyway, I was talking to an English girl from our Spanish school last night about getting stomach sickness and traveler’s diarrhea, and her tip was to drink the water everywhere you go, right when you get there. This was definitely the first time I had heard that opinion. She told me that she travels all over the world, and the first thing she does is drink the water, just to get any sickness over with. And this girl has drank some nasty water: from Sri Lanka to India to Guatemala to Mexico. She says that after all of that, she has a really strong stomach, and plus, she sucks her thumb. No joke. She’s 24 and sucks her thumb, and she said that she’s probably stuck all sorts of disgusting stuff into her mouth so that also limits the chances of food poisoning and water poisoning and whatnot. Ew.

For now, I’ll stick with bottled water and Immodium AD.