Ecuador's beaches Part 2: Mompiche and Canoa

Our next destination after Atacames was Canoa, described as a laid-back surfers' beach.  We really liked the sound of it so aimed to spend New Year there.  On the way, we stopped for lunch in Mompiche, an undeveloped picturesque beach with just a few buildings.  A lovely place to relax for an afternoon or surf for a few days, but maybe too quiet for much longer.

(Looks a bit cloudy and grim in the photos, but the cloud cover was pleasant and stopped it being too hot)

We got to Canoa at about 8pm on the 30th December - enough time to have some dinner and scout out somewhere to camp and party the next night.  I had a fish stew (cazuela) and Paul had seafood encocado, and we had batidos or smoothies, which are popular in this part of Ecuador.

(The battered things by the rice are patacones, or green plantain fritters - standard meal accompaniment)

Then we had a couple of cocktails before retiring to the van, which we'd managed to park near the beach.  Everything was going to plan, until about 3.30am when we got up within minutes of each other to throw up!  Something we'd consumed had made us very ill!

Paul was bed-ridden the next day, though I was well enough to move the van in to a campsite we weren't far from.  Needless to say, New Year celebrations were non-existent, but thankfully we've both recovered enough to enjoy Canoa.  Hotel Bambu, where we're camped, is right on the beach, so we can go for a dip in the warm sea very easily, and there are loads of hammocks in the shade for reading/Skyping/blogging.

We're camped under the shade of another tree here, although this one has little berries which fall out and land on the van's roof with a little thud.  It also has iguanas crawling around in the branches and pooing on the van (again with a little thud)....makes for a lovely wake-up call each morning...