Tastaste is a small, small fishing community on the coast of northern Manabí Province. We have visited the 'beach' so many times now in our 6 years in Ecuador, and always have stayed on this 5 kilometre stretch of the eastern Pacific coast. Only 5 or 6 hours from Quito (actually 4hrs 30mins this time!) and with wonderful, long, tranquil, safe, sandy beaches, it is difficult not to become an addict. We have stayed several times at Samvara and Punto Prieta and always visit our Italian friend Ale at Peperoncini (see links on the side panel), but the very best destination is a small casita, hidden in a hollow in the hillside above its own beach. John is lucky to be Tutor at school to Elizabeth Cooper, whose parents Phil and Mercy, own the house. They kindly allow us to use the house almost whenever we want. No electricity, no gadgets or home comforts, just a small house with two sleeping rooms, a bathroom, a large kitchen/play/store/living room and a veranda along the front, for the hammocks.
This is the little house, above the beach. This photo was taken in November 2010. We managed to keep this bonfire going for 5 whole days!
The beach in front of the house is a wonder! Usually clean, yellow sand but, if there have been high tides, it can quickly get covered in shingle. If there has been heavy rain inland, then the beach also loads itself with logs and wood, which are washed down by the flooded rivers.
Wolberto and his brothers and family are the local fishermen in Tastaste. Wolberto and his wife look after the casita when no-one is staying there. They also have a tiny house on the beach, serving beers and snacks to visitors and, more importantly, where we eat breakfast. They are always so disappointed (and I admit it is sad!) that we will not eat what they have caught in their nets - giant crabs, prawns and a whole variety of fish, ranging even from sharks to tiny anchovies. Wolberto and Leti have two young boys, with whom Robbie and Maia often play, and a third on the way - a girl this time, they hope!
Here's Wolberto, showing us how to extract a mussel from its shell.
Sadly Wolberto's tiny piece of beach has been swallowed up by investors who have built a monstrous, open-air discotheque structure out of bamboo, in the shape of a turtle, and surrounded this with little stalls, in an effort to bring the crowds from Pedernales at weekends or holidays. This big money (the Mayor of nearby Jama!) is trying to push Wolberto out of his home. They are also planning for other beach developments and this includes putting nasty pressure on Phil Cooper in an effort perhaps to squeeze him out of his 2 lovely hectares. One is sorely tempted to put a match to the turtle one night!
Anyway, what about our latest venture to the coast? We arrived Friday evening to find the little house in a sorry state, after a torrential downpour the night before. The cooker had also vanished and Wolberto's brother, the local 'agent' for gas, had anyway not been able to get us a cylinder. The car had to be left up on the highway, because the access road was totally impassable. After several trips, struggling and sliding down the hill with all our food and clothes and water and other bags and boxes, we cleaned up the house as best we could, snacked a supper and went to sleep. Next day we breakfasted with Wolberto and then really cleaned up the casita, picking off a layer of mud inside, and drying out the bedding. The cooker was located and gas brought from Canoa. It seemed we were in business, although the beach was an uninviting mess of stones and rocks and trees.
Here's Robbie breakfasting on a typical, non-fishy coast breakfast - boiled and grilled maduros (plantain), a hard boiled egg, fresh cheese and cup of hot chocolate. He doesn't look too excited about it all, does he?
Saturday evening, a meal of macaroni, and off to bed. And then ..... the heavens opened. A thunder storm the likes of which you can only have nightmares about. Poor Toby Thomas, who was with us, was devastated and did not know where to go. The rain came in horizontally through the roof; water flooded in beneath the door from the veranda and through some very permeable, wooden window frames; water came pumping in reverse from outside, back along the drain pipes and up through the drain holes in the floors inside the house, like small fountains, bringing the flushed toilet contents with it; and finally, the worst of all, the water flooded in through the back wall - it must have been cascading down the hill outside like a full blown river. John rescued the children from their room and put them in his bed, which was more or less still dry, and then set about trying to limit the damage. Impossible! Even when the storm finished, the water continued to gush in through the back wall, until it was 8 or 9 cms deep throughout the house. There was nowhere dry to safeguard things like cameras, computers, books and clothes. Getting up to the car was out of the question - pitch dark, midnight, a steep path like a river bed. At least the rain stopped and after some hours of bucketing water away, we were ready to try to sleep, all three, on the one remaining, tiny piece of dry bedding. But then ...... the tempest returned. This time with a vengeance! This was Niagara Falls at 3-o-clock in the morning! John gave up any idea of trying to deflect the flow and joined the children on the bed, while the river flowed beneath us. Toby found a tiny corner, on top of a sack of charcoal, where he kept dry-ish, but became a temporarily black samoyed! The children got an hour or two of sleep, but John, none. When the storm passed, it was early morning. Decision made - back to Quito asap! Assuming the road was passable. We started gathering things together, cleaned up a little and walked along the beach to breakfast. At least the sun was shining now! And it was hot. Almost tempting enough to reverse the decision to leave. No way! After breakfast, we struggled up and down the path to load the car. "We" being John, of course! Maia was not in the best of moods, while Robbie was in his element - mud, dirt and water, as much as could be imagined! Robbie had brought his Tonka lorry from Quito and was as happy as could be, churning it through the deep puddles and into even deeper mud!
Robbie got through all his sets of clothes! Here he is in his last shorts and T-shirt. Two minutes later and all was covered in slime and mud and dirt again. Toby has the enviable ability to change himself back to white from whatever colour or situation, in just a few minutes. This dog had been wallowing in the mud shortly before this photo! There must be some future in commercialising whatever it is about a dog's fur and his tongue which can clean in this way!
There was some good from this trip. A lot actually! It was an adventure. Perhaps even funny, in its way. We did not actually suffer - the washing machine in Quito has already rid the clothes of the dirt; shoes and sandals are clean and dry again; we have had a long night's sleep at home; and all the cameras and computer and torches and gadgets still work OK. We did manage to get to Canoa on Saturday, really to buy gas, but it gave Maia the chance to have her trenzas (braids) done. This is a custom now, whenever we visit the coast.
Maia having her trenzas done in Canoa. The same lady each time, usually helped by her daughter. A $7 hair-do which lasts!
The trenzas should survive a couple of months and they do save a lot of time at home, combing and putting bands on Maia's hair. That is a job which John is anyway no good at, so the trenzas are a best alternative! It would be nice if Maia's missing teeth reappeared in two months as well!
Even the road home was blocked - not by rain but by cows! This is the famous Ruta del Sol, which runs from north to south of Ecuador, along the Pacific coastline. Like many of the major highways in Ecuador in the last couple of years, it has benefited from a programme of rehabilitation. It is a super-fast roadway, with almost no traffic. Just cows!
Quite the adventure at the beach!
ReplyDelete