GUAYAQUIL, ON THE WEST COAST OF ECUADOR, lies on the Pacific Ocean. Fort Lauderdale is on Florida’s Atlantic coast. So in what direction should JetBlue fly from Fort Lauderdale to Guayaquil? Wrong! Actually, Guayaquil is due south, over Cuba and the Panama Canal which, by the way, runs north-south, not east-west. Check it out the map if you don’t believe me.
Hotel Ramada
Our flight didn’t leave until seven in the evening so the four hour drive across Florida was no problemo, and saved us several hundred dollars over flying from Tampa. Despite being a “budget airline” JetBlue has more legroom than the big guys and they serve the same snacks. We actually arrived a few minutes early, collected our luggage and zipped through immigration. Hundreds of people holding flowers, balloons and signs were waiting at the exit, including our guy Boris, who drove us through the sleeping city to the Hotel Ramada on Guayaquil’s Malecon.
Downtown Guayaquil Malecon aka Simon Bolivar Boardwalk
We are on another RockJumper birding trip, 3 weeks in Ecuador and new stories may be sporadic. I can report that this morning Connie did her usual hotel room window birding and we did a bit more on the Malecon boardwalk along the Guayes River. We ran into a guy wearing a RockJumper hat, Gil from California, who will be on our trip. We will meet the others at dinner tonight.
