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- Jan 14, 2023
- ⛅ 79 °F
- Altitude: 33 ft
- EcuadorProvincia de ManabíPuerto LópezRío Pital1°32’58” S 80°48’36” W
Puerto Lopez
January 14, 2023 in Ecuador ⋅ ⛅ 79 °F
We were in Puerto Lopez two years ago and stayed at the wonderful Hosteria Mandala again. It's a Swiss/Italian owned garden of Eden. For more than 20 years, they've maintained a garden paradise across the street from the beach, far away from the center with the food stalls and hawkers. It's reason enough to visit this little beach town. There's a great breakfast included, a large library of biology books in multple languages, a small musical instrument museum, games galore, billiards, garden paths, bird watching, and much more. Too bad the restaurant isn't open yet. Because of Covid, they're not fully staffed yet.
There's not much to say about hanging around on a beach and beach combing. It's been a wonderful week of eating great seafood, getting sun, doing yoga on the beach, and reading in hammocks. We went on a day trip to Isla de la Plata, sometimes called the "Poor Man's Galapagos." That's because for onlly $40, you can take a boat an hour and a half away to the small island and see Blue Footed Boobies, which are found also on the Galapagos. There's also crabs, sea lions, Frigate birds, Perigrine Falcons, and a few other species of Boobies. At the end of the tour, we got to snorkel for a half hour and saw lots of fish, incuding a large Puffer Fish.
The main drama this week was when Deanne got bit by a wild dog on the beach. I decided to jog home and Deanne was bitten right after that. And so was another guest at our hosteria. The same dog bit them within minutes! Georg was Edith's friend, and he took all of us to the health clinic in his car. We got right in and they fixed Deanne and Edith up and gave tetanus shots. It had been 9 years for Deanne and luckily, she's had Rabies shots. We were out of there within an hour with meds and no bill!
Apparently, tourists get free emergency medical care with the visa. On a down side, the doctor didn't ask Deanne if she was allergic to Penicillin, so we got home and realized that's the med she got. We went back and got a script since they were out of other antibiotics. So it cost us $4.50 at the pharmacy across the street. What would that have cost in the US?
We'll stay here for a total of a week and then move south down the beach to the party and surf town of Montanita. We booked a nice room with a private balcony on the beach.
More photos and videos are here. https://photos.app.goo.gl/ppe4A27QkjsrgjV28Read more
Good to see that Deanne is going to be OK. It's also amazing (I really try not to overuse that word) that you didn't have to spend anything for all of that. Like you said, God only knows what that would have cost at home. I'm going to stock up on blood pressure medication before I leave, and I'll save several hundred dollars. Our for profit system sucks. [Matt]