The peninsula de Santa Elena is about two hours west of Guayaquil on the Ecuadoran coast. We were invited to stay at a vacation home of an Ecuadoran soccer star. While there for a few days, we walked the beach, ate the local sea food and saw the sights of the fishing town of Puerto Lopez. Without going out to see the whales it was a treat just to visit with the local people and especially the children. I asked one little girl if she had seen the green hulk rock. (a name I just made up to describe a cliff face on the beach) With some indignation she told me that that was not the green hulk rock but the king kong rock. I hadn't known that it actually had a name. Got a chuckle about that. A local celebration was going on at Puerto Lopez. A brass band was playing (about ten people, not nearly as good as the Cuenca Symphony that we had heard the week before), the fish catch was being weighed and processed at the waters edge, and the pelicans and frigate birds were diving in the water for their lunch. Not too much time to enjoy the experience because our negotiations for a whale-watching trip had been successful and we were to get aboard our little boat and head out to find the big ones. We saw several whales and got some good pictures.
The next day we went to another fishing village for dinner and saw a couple of guys in a small boat string a net in a semi-circle out from the beach. Both ends of the net were then pulled in with a few hundred pounds of a small fish we think was krill. We were told that it was to be dried and sold for pet food although other people told us that it was for human consumption.
Then back to the work at the temple. Although we had a great time with the sights, sounds and smells of the peninsula, it was good to be back.
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