August, 2010

Back to Bahia from Canada
It started with a phone call from the car rental office, where we left the car just minutes ago, before taking a taxi to the airport. They informed us there is a damage to the front of the car, although we didn't notice anything (and why didn't we walked around the car when we dropped the keys off??) Than close to an hour wait on the runway in Washington almost had us miss the plane from Bogota to Guayaquil, where we arrived just after 1 AM. Surprise! although we expected it - no luggage - so after filling up the claim form, we hopped on the taxi that took us to our reserved hostel. Another surprise - no room free, although our reservation was in their book, printed and clear, but somehow the hostel couldn't understand 1 AM doesn't equal to 13 hrs. After a short discussion, the guy at least called around to find us another hotel, returned our deposit, but of course no courtesy of paying us another taxi to our new destination. In the morning we awoke to our bed rattling like crazy. What's going on? Earthquake! Could the building collapse on top of us? After another trip to the airport, we discovered our luggage is still sitting in Washington! (Yes, they do expect you to go and pick up your luggage at the airport.) Finally, day 3 - our luggage arrives, we hop on the bus, get comfortable, when an hour later, in the middle of nowhere, another surprise! The bus breaks down. After sweating in the standing bus for an hour, a new one arrives - get comfortable again, movie is playing – oops – a filling from my tooth falls off! What else? Nothing. All ends well, we are back in Bahia. Nikan is still where we left it, a bit dusty, but no more surprises. We are cleaning and preparing to depart August 28, with the big tide to cross the bank here, direction Chile. It's going to be a tough ride, winds and current against us, could take about three weeks, if not longer...