ECUADOR

From: tyson1 <tyson1@****.net.uk>
To: Steve England <steve@orcasurf.co.uk>
Date: Tuesday, September 24, 2002 4:19 pm
Subject: Its better now...ish

Flat, humid and miserable
Ecuador in February seemed like such a brilliant idea; sunny weather, ludicrous amounts of overhead surf and water capable of melting the wax off your board. It was as good as a sure thing. We were even going to be met at the airport by Ecuadorian ripper and our guide for the trip, Eduardo Salazar. Once and for all my surf-trip jinx will be banished forever. We could not fail.

I disembarked from the plane and was greeted with the words that will surely be engraved into my headstone – 'You should have been here yesterday'. Worse still, El Nino, with all the associated dampness, was coming around 3 years early, and it was flat.

Ace
My fellow surfers David Foster, Sam Boex, Steve England and Alex Williams immediately blamed me and as punishment forced me to make the following six hour journey in our Toyota pick-up with a handbrake up my backside (hideously painful), my neck at 90 degrees to my spine (very painful) and a gear-stick vibrating against my plums (quite nice actually). Fortunately we only off-roaded for three hours.

Our base camp was in the hippy colony town of Montanita. A party town with plenty of bars to drown away any flat day misery. However, the town's drainage was not quite good enough to cope with the millions of gallons of rainwater that were deposited every night. Subsequently any walk around town involved trudging through cholera-filled mud. This forced us to stick to the hotel bar where our every whim was catered for by a team of fantastically good-looking Argentinean women (are Argie women the best looking on earth? – answers on a brick hurled at your nearest Toyota showroom please). Montanita is also home to a perfect right point that needs a fairly decent swell to work. So obviously we never got to surf there.

Most days started with an hour-long drive to a beach that picked up more swell. To be honest it wouldn't have mattered if it were flat when we got to the beach; after an hour of feeling that I had only just survived a pool party at Michael Barrymore's I needed to get in the sea just to soothe my travel wounds.

After a shaky start the surf did begin to pick up. One session that sticks in my mind was at La Chocolatera, a mind bendingly long righthand point that breaks in an Army camp. The wave is normally off-limits to surfers, especially foreign ones, but a few words from the silver-tongued Eddie and we were out there. Four foot rights hurtled down the point with only us and approximately one billion vultures there to witness it. My curse had seemingly left us and as a reward I was even allowed to sit in the boot while covered in heavy camera equipment and fetid boardshorts.

Another great surf was had about one hour north of Montanita at an amazingly whackable beachbreak. Again it was only head high, but what a surf. Waves would horseshoe around the sandbar and insist on being given a sound thrashing. A request that we could not refuse. What we really wanted, however, was to surf the coral reefs of the far north, but they are totally dependant on large north swells. Basically, if Waimea Bay is just starting to break then this is the time to go.

What with El Nino coming round again we could be forgiven thinking that the surf would be permanently off its grid, but what Ecuador lacked in sizable surf it more than made up for with mud. After each rainfall roads everywhere would fall prey to monstrous mudslides. Even on tarmac roads we still needed a 4x4 to get around. On one particularly moist excursion a combination of Eddie's shambolic driving skills and mud deeper than a Camborne girl's foundation resulted in us sliding to a halt. Not such a problem on a busy highway but as this road had yet to be built, traffic was a little lighter than we would have hoped for. At least we would never die of thirst. Fortunately, about half an hour behind us was a bulldozer that was preparing the road. As our prostrate vehicle was taking up the entire road he had no choice but to push us out of the mire and back on the way to the surf.

After another fun surf at a punchy, uncrowded beachbreak Eddie suggested that we take in some of the local culture. A smile broke across the little Ecuadorian's face as he drove us into a compound that surrounded one of the only concrete buildings we had seen. Barbed wire gun-towers perched atop each corner of the surrounding wall gave the place an unsettling 'Stalag 9' feel.

'This', exclaimed Eddie proudly, pausing slightly to give extra weight to his words, 'is Ecuador's finest pole-dancing club. Go inside, but be careful…'

Reluctantly, we ran inside. We only broke our sprint when confronted by an enormous, primitive-looking cloakroom attendant, who looked a little underdressed in figure hugging 'Tommy Carroll' shorts and multicoloured wife-beater vest, complete with gravy (or South American equivalent) stain. Our immediate reaction was to snigger, but the chuckles turned to pant-loading fear when we saw that his ape-like hands were gently caressing a loaded shotgun. Even more worrying was the sign above his head that read, 'Will our customers please leave their guns and ammunition at the door'. Initially, the cloakroom jobsworth turned us away as it appeared that we were all smuggling guns in our pockets. After explaining that we were just very pleased to be there he let us in. It immediately became clear to me that 'Ecuador's finest pole-dancing club' is a euphemism for 'a bar full of cracked up, gun-toting, moustachioed maniacs salivating and snarling like enraged wildebeest, fiendishly athletic dancers and wanton whores ranging from $2 to $20'. The $2 hooker wouldn't have looked out of place on a rugby pitch but you could contemplate doing business with Miss $20. Even the bar was covered by a metal cage and chicken wire with only enough space left for a bottle to be passed through.

We had a swift one and left
It was also time to leave Montanita for the waveless town of Canoa. Not one of the obvious destinations on a surf trip but our minds were occupied with thoughts of Carnival – seven days of dancing and bongos. While not as large as its Brazilian counterpart the overriding ethos of drinking rum, dancing and public nudity were still strictly adhered to. All walks of life gather in the bars and on the beach in a joyous union: from children to grandparents, shady drug dealers to the pious modern day missionaries that insist on prattling on about how good and well travelled they were. A heart-warming tribute to the gift of alcohol.

A quick word of warning to those who like a few cubes of ice in their turps, make sure the bar uses boiled water to make it. Otherwise you may get in the same state as photographer Alex Williams. What seemed like a shocking hangover at first took a serious turn for the worse in the evening. With unspeakable fluid firing out of all orifices it was clear that he would need a doctor. Like most developing countries, top-notch medical facilities are few and far between. Luckily Eddie's numerous connections included Ecuador's Minister for Health who casually drove Alex to a derelict looking hospital, opened it, put him in his own personal room and prescribed him a night with a drip in his arm, morphine and the steady stream of the soft porn that flows from every South American TV set. Eddie was a little concerned that Alex would not be okay to take any photos the next morning and voiced his worries to the compassionate politician. Our Rt. Hon. Friend nodded sagely and began to fill the now comatose lensman with all manner of medical concoctions. Alex was discharged at 4am the next morning.

Classic
Sadly this was to be our last day anyway. Alex had to take photos in some sun soaked corner of the Caribbean during the following week while the rest of us had work commitments. Can't complain though, while none of us got to dust off our guns we did surf every day and got a welcome break from the mid-winter blues.

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