A-House-and-a-Lot

September 9, 2011

Courtesy of guests
Alex and Katie

During this time of year along our area of the Ecuador coast, you are more likely to see whales than the sun right now. From June through September the humpback whales (ballenas jorbadas) pass along near our coastline on their annual migration to mate and calve. They are breathtaking to watch as they leap, and frolic, and spout, and we can watch them from our shoreline. The whales have been plentiful this season, but for whatever reason, Todd and I have missed seeing them until a week ago, when we were treated to a thrilling show while sipping late-afternoon mojitos at one of our favorite beachside Montanita “Bar Alley” stands.

Courtesy of Alex and Katie

One of the best opportunities to view the whales close up is to take one of the Isla de la Plata boat tours that depart daily from Puerto Lopez (about an hour north of us). *  The adjoining pictures were taken by recent guests Alex and Katie (U.K. citizens currently working in Quito this year) during their Isla de la Plata expedition.

I miss this
Palm Springs pool

It is our winter now and it’s generally hazy, overcast (and at times drizzly) from July through the end of November, though we do get some glorious sunny days in the meantime…That is if you call 65-75 degrees “winter”, and most folks around here enjoy this weather. But keep in mind that I am most recently from seven years in Palm Springs, where summer temperatures hover somewhere between 110 and 120 degrees, and we shivered getting out of the pool after a midnight skinny dip while the thermometer was pegged at 112°, and (as I’ve mentioned before) we enthusiastically threw on our leather jackets in September when temps dipped below 95 degrees and called it “autumn”. 

I know that many of you in the States are enduring an insufferably hot season right now, and I understand your pain – but boy – I am missing that heat and that pool right now! I’m in long pants and shirt/sweatshirt combo…but most people here are splashing around in the ocean and there are still plenty of nubile young gals walking around in bikinis and getting sunburned.

As compensation, the beachcombing is great now, and Todd and I have been finding sand-dollars larger than my hand, and I found my first washed up starfish the other day. Part of the reason is that the tides are coming in higher this month (a phenomenon we noticed in March around the spring equinox, when the tides came as high as the beachside cabanitas and nipped at the edges of our neighbors’ beachfront properties).  The fall equinox is nearing, and we understand the “king tides” (or something like that – I need to research a little more before writing on this subject) are almost upon us again.

It was four years ago this month (2007) that I first visited Ecuador with my brother Jack, and Doug & Pam to see the beachfront house they bought. Jack & I stood on the Equator line (Museo de Sitio Inti-Nan) the day after the fall equinox and experienced a virtually “no shadow” occurrence and other Equator anomalies.  I came down here with no intention of buying property. Todd and I had been together for several years at that point and had already been exploring buying a second piece of investment property when we thought the U.S. housing market hit bottom (HA HA HA HA HA)……I fell in love with Ecuador, and moved impulsively fast to make an offer on the house and lot we now own in Jardines de Olon. I would not recommend this method for most people considering buying property here, but I had the advantage of my brother’s and his partners’ real-estate savvy Ecuadorian explorations and homework (all of whom have extensive real-estate backgrounds in the States). To this day, none of us have any regrets.

Think I`ll just stand here for awhile

Jack, trying out his blow gun skills

The trick was explaining this to Todd when I got home from that trip. Jack and I had devised a rather elaborate and detailed plan to explain why this was such a great idea over the following week, but – of course – I spilled the beans as soon as I walked in the door….Something like: “say, did you get the ceramics I had Fed Ex’d from Cuenca from Eduardo Vega’s studio, and I bought some great paintings, some jewelry, and -oh- a-house-and-a-lot, and some really cool metal-works and leather...”.  Fortunately, Todd has been on board from the beginning, and if anything is more passionate about living here than I am.

To this I want to add my congratulations to several folks who have recently made this leap too, and have closed on Ecuadorian coastal properties (especially to those planning on moving here permanently).  Among them, Barb & Robert Strauss (Curia), Texans Leigh & Neville Hudson, and their son Kyle (Ballenita), Davida Julian (Montanita hills), Karl Neumann (a lot in Jardines de Olon, and possibly other nearby Olon properties) and to Judy N. & Richard P. from Washington State who bought property in nearby San Jose (and getting ready to commit to several other acreages in our area). **

I have spent the last week cleaning houses in anticipation of a slew of arriving guests. In particular, I’ve been busy doing “spring” cleaning at our house, which we do 2-3 times a year ***

I have someone to help, but right now the ceilings-to-floor cleaning has not been a lot of fun. I wrenched my knee the other day while cleaning, and my lack of mobility this week has put me in sort of a grumpy frame of mind, and I am in no mood to write anything publishable. I’ve procrastinated about the cleaning and been balky about writing.

But it is amazing when faced with either cleaning toilets with muriatic acid, or bleaching 18 some pillows, or cleaning the dried up pancake mix off the sides of my stove that prodded the latent Ernest Hemingway to be unleashed in me….and it’s been a nice break to write this.

I recently read an article in the Miami Herald (International version) that scientists have come to some sort of agreement that has determined our planet now has officially 8.7 million species existing on earth.  I believe that I have either identified or newly discovered 1675 of those that were living behind or underneath my stove/oven.

*    Some time ago, I wrote in more detail about these tours in “Call Him Tong”

**  Judy, if you are reading this, I tried to call you several times after our fun evening together, but you had already left and I have misplaced your email address. Please contact me at leigh@ecuafriendly.com

***  See “Well, Sugar my Fish” for more on this.