Salinas - Guayaquil: 130 km, 2.5 hours on the bus, cost: 2 pounds 70 pence. We drove through Santa Rosa near Salinas. It is a very nice city, much bigger than Salinas.
I arrived to Guayaquil at 5 pm and Christian, my Couch Surfing host, picked me up from the bus station. It was the same guy I met in Montañita!! :) I didn't recognise him when I sent a couch request. Another weird thing happened in the Guayaquil bus station, I met Boris with whom I travelled to Canoa!! He seemed to be happy to see me but I wasn't happy to see him, to be honest. There were too many lies and uncertainty surrounding him. I asked him how was his brother's birthday party (it was the reason he was travelling to Canoa) and he said he didn't go to the party. Hmmm.... Then, with no money, he travells to Guayaquil.... I wasn't very talkative so he left after a while, apparently travelling somewhere else.
We arrived in Christian's flat where I met his two lovely flatmates: an Ecuadorian guy and his Norvegian girlfriend. At night I met Washington from Couch Surfing and he showed me the city by night. I am really impressed!!! It is so beautiful !! I am going to visit it again today with Christian's friend, Luis. The city is clean and they do recycling in the centre. I was told that 15 years ago it was a completely different place, very dangerous, and the parts we visited yesterday were "favelas". You can see it yourself as there are old pictures from 15 years ago on the beautiful walls now. The weather in Guayaquil is perfect and although people tell me to be very careful because of crime in the streets, I feel good. There is a beautiful lighthouse on the top of the hill in the city centre, and the view from it is breathtaking. I haven't seen any travellers as apparently people are afraid to visit the city. It is such a shame because Guayaquil is amazing.
Christian and Washington told me a lot about the recent political crisis. It was really bad and violent, as never before. The police went on strike so people in the streets were stealing whatever was possible to steal. The same happened in Quito.
In the picture: on the top of the lighthouse. Here are my pictures from the Ecuadorian coast:
Canoa, Manta, Montañita, Salinas
