Belinda and I arrived in Guayaquil Friday at 2 PM on Copa Airlines in this port
city, the gateway to the Galapagos Islands, and the largest city in Ecuador (the
capital in Quito, at 9000'). We were met at the airport by Raul Guerra,
organizer of the Canoa Open, and also organizer of the local press events that
we are participating in the next few days here in Guayaquil. The Ministry of
Tourismo, which is located a couple of blocks from our four star hotel, is a
major sponsor (along with the television network), and it appears as though we
will have extensive press coverage of the opening of the new landing zone for
the local launch (just a few minutes out of town).
The head of the Ministry of Tourism will be out for the ribbon cutting, there is
a Red Bull tent already set up, and the local Toyota dealer will have a booth in
this huge new LZ. There will be food and beer for all assembled.
The city itself seems pleasant enough, with some beautiful parks and plazas, and
esplanade along the river. I'm no big fan of big cities, but I am given to
understand that the city itself has undertaken a decade long revival effort to
spruce itself up and is in much better shape than it was. It does have a bit of
that third world feel to it, with too many cars overwhelming the streets, which
apparently represents too much wealth. There appear to be shopping malls every
where.
Our hotel, where all the US pilots are staying, is small and has wireless in all
the rooms. We'll have our pilot meeting in a few minutes at 8:30 AM as we
prepare ourselves for many interviews with the press today. We'll be here for a
few days before we head to Canoa.
The press officer at the US Embassy in Quito has contacted us regarding Jeff's
video (see above) and our local efforts here to provide some assistance to the
very poor. Your contributions have helped greatly and Ricker says that we have
raised $4,000 so far. The Embassy wants to interview Jeff and Ricker for about
half an hour regarding our people to people efforts.
Jeff had originally thought to get his sponsors to provide the financial support
for this effort and produced the video, but then ran out of time to get
sponsorship on board. Ricker saw the video, thought that we could raise the
funds and at the last minute got this effort underway. The response has been
amazing to him, but I know how generous hang glider pilots are.
