Beach vacation....over

Dear Mom and Dad,

It was time for us to make our move South. My two week beach vacation is more or less over. :( Charlie says we can visit beach towns along the way if I start to miss the sun too much. I know he's ready for some hiking. We left Mancora at 10:00pm and arrived at Trujillo around 8:00am. This was one of our better bus rides because we slept all the way through and saved money on a hostel since we rode at night. AND nothing was stollen from us. We are getting smarter in locking everything together and too us. The bathroom was gross and kind of scary, but it was sufficient.

Our hostel here is WONDERFUL! It is twice as much as our's in Mancora, but the amenities are totally worth it. We finally can take a HOT shower. I haven't had a hot shower since our last night in Montañita over a week ago. There is actually a toliet with a toliet seat, and we can walk around our room and bathroom without wearing our flip flops. Did I mention we have HBO in English? There is also an oldschool Mac computer free for the guests. (I can't upload any photos at this time because the computer is soooo old, but they will come later tonight.) The cost is about $20 a night, so don't feel too bad for Charlie having to pay twice as much. It was much needed. We also have a great view over looking a red brick building next to us. Well, I guess you can't have everything.

The town itself is actually cheaper here, so it will probably average to be about the same. All of our meals are about a dollar to two dollars cheaper. For example, yesterday for lunch I ate a lunch special that consisted of soup, white rice, fries, chicken, broccoli and other veggie stir-fry for about $2. For dinner, we each had burgers and fries for less then $2 apiece. Yes if you are wondering, the ice cream is cheaper as well. Half as expensive. Does that mean I can eat twice as much?

A few things to wrap up Mancora:
We stayed an extra night there, not that I minded, because the power was out for over twelve hours, and the town practically shut down. Maybe two stores, the bank and grocery store, had generaters, so it was impossible to buy bus tickets. Like I said, I didn't mind because you can't power off the beach! My biggest concern was whethere all the ice cream was going to melt. Don't fret yourself, it stayed in tact with some carefully placed cardboard boxes in the cooler. (I sampled an ice cream sandwich that night.)

Our ride to Mancora from Tumbes is worth mentioning. We were in a normal size seven passenger van. Our van consisted of the driver, three people sitting in the front, four people sitting in the middle section (I sat on Charlie's lap) five people sitting in the very back, and two chickens. Now that's how you make some money my utilizing a limited amount of space. I couldn't figure out of the chickens had to pay for a fare or not. The squaking was obnoxious, but we couldn't help but laugh the entire time. It was so normal to everyone. "When in Rome...." Charlie kept saying...

Not to freak you out mom, but I did see my first gun in Mancora. Our neighbors in the hostel had one, and I saw it when I casually walked by their room, not so casually peeped in their room. It was a bit frightening, but nothing came about it. I wanted to switch hostels immediately, but Charlie has a very level head. There are people in America that carry handguns that could be our neighbors. Never growing up around them, it was a little different realization for me. I had this whole scenario worked out in my head that they were going to come and rob us of everything, and then we would be screwed. Charlie's rational was "what robber is going to rob their neighbor that could be identified." Well, my rational was if we're dead, how are we going to identify them? He did make a good point in saying we have to show identification when we checked into our hostel, so either way they would be identified. Either way, that better be the last handgun I see.

I still don't like the people in Peru although it's getting better now that we have left Mancora. In Ecuador, the people stared, but there they actually come up to you and harass you to your face. In Mancora, one guy tried taking a bottle of water out of Charlie's hands because he said he didn't have enough money to buy it. Charlie had no idea what he was saying, but he knew he wasn't about to give up a full bottle of water he just paid for. I think the people of Mancora are used to praying on the tourists because it is a tourist town.

We had one guy come up to us during dinner, grab our wrists tie on two pieces of string, then told us it was a gift for Christmas. We hesitantly said thanks because we know nothing is that easy here. He then stood there for 10 minutes demanding we give him money in return for his "gift." I was on board with giving him 50 cents because he said he had nothing and only wanted a good meal for Christmas. Charlie was hesitant to give him anything, and then he says "You're American, give me money." Fat chance. I will not give you a dime because we are Americans, and you think we owe you something. He huffed and puffed away, and I don't feel bad. At times, Charlie is way more stubborn then me, which pays off. We still have a soft spot for kids and can't help but give them a few pieces of change when they come up to us. That won't change.

The people in Trujillo aren't so bad, but the taxi drivers are so annoying it gives me a heachache. They honk all the time at us, pull over, and yell "taxi, you want taxi, here taxi." No, I don't want a taxi, I didn't flag you down,  and I'm not even looking at the street. If I am looking at the street, it's to look both ways before crossing. If I wanted a taxi, I probably would have waved one of the five taxis town ahead of you. I can't even explain how bad the honking is. I taught Charlie how to say, "I have two legs that can walk," so when it gets really bad and overwhelming...that phrase comes out. I don't like being so rude, but there is literally no other option because otherwise they will drive slow next to you for a few minutes all while honking and yelling.

One more thing to note: Toliet paper. Bring it everywhere. Not a single place here has it in their "bathroom facilities."

Today we are visiting the Chan Chan ruins. I'm excited to do something since all we did yesterday was sleep and recover from our long day of traveling. I'll post lots of pictures later today or tomorrow once I'm at a computer with the technology to do so.

Love and miss you,

Matti Jo and Charles Dale

PS. not having spell check or a grammar check is so frustrating. I hate making silly little errors. I don't want to take the time to proof read either since it takes so long to type on an unfamiliar keyboard with different key placements. Sometimes I feel like dad, pecking and pecking at the board. :)