Dec 16, 2004
If you ever decide to raise your hand in Ecuador, make sure there is not a fast moving electric ceiling fan above you. There was in my hotel room. After they cut off the nail and put three stitches in my thumb, laughing at the noises I made because the anaesthetic didn´t quite work, the doctors attended to the screaming drunk woman who'd been shot in the leg. It was quite a night. I went back this morning for an X-ray and found out the last bone in my thumb has a compound fracture. The X ray was $4, and they let me keep it as a ssouvenir. The doctor this morning put a big metal brace around my thumb and taped it to my wrist. I cut a hole in my glove and we left Santo Domingo in a slight rain, my thumb sticking out above the hand grip. About 75 miles down the road, I started deciding that this was uncomfortable, so I went to yet another pharmacy, removed the brace, and gauze and taped the affected digit, then set it back out in the wind, this time properly wrapped around the handlebar. We covered about 250 miles and I came to one very interesting realization, they grow a whole bunch of bananas in Ecuador. Machala is the port from whence most of the bananas leave, and the banana fields stretch forever back the way we came. Which of course means banana trucks heavy on their way to port and driven like there´s no tomorrow back for the next load. And the occasional bunch or entire tree littering the road. Makes for some very interesting riding.
I like the fact that all the medical care in Ecuador has been free, other than Mark having to go out to the pharmacy to buy sutures, guaze, syringes and painkillers, but I don´t like the fact that I´ve needed it. He´s starting to call the trip George´s Tour of South American Hospitals and Pharmacies.
I have heard often about the South American town drunk, but hadn´t had a chance to film one in action until now. They are in a league of their own, and I got some really nice footage of the best one I´ve encountered.
If you ever decide to raise your hand in Ecuador, make sure there is not a fast moving electric ceiling fan above you. There was in my hotel room. After they cut off the nail and put three stitches in my thumb, laughing at the noises I made because the anaesthetic didn´t quite work, the doctors attended to the screaming drunk woman who'd been shot in the leg. It was quite a night. I went back this morning for an X-ray and found out the last bone in my thumb has a compound fracture. The X ray was $4, and they let me keep it as a ssouvenir. The doctor this morning put a big metal brace around my thumb and taped it to my wrist. I cut a hole in my glove and we left Santo Domingo in a slight rain, my thumb sticking out above the hand grip. About 75 miles down the road, I started deciding that this was uncomfortable, so I went to yet another pharmacy, removed the brace, and gauze and taped the affected digit, then set it back out in the wind, this time properly wrapped around the handlebar. We covered about 250 miles and I came to one very interesting realization, they grow a whole bunch of bananas in Ecuador. Machala is the port from whence most of the bananas leave, and the banana fields stretch forever back the way we came. Which of course means banana trucks heavy on their way to port and driven like there´s no tomorrow back for the next load. And the occasional bunch or entire tree littering the road. Makes for some very interesting riding.
I like the fact that all the medical care in Ecuador has been free, other than Mark having to go out to the pharmacy to buy sutures, guaze, syringes and painkillers, but I don´t like the fact that I´ve needed it. He´s starting to call the trip George´s Tour of South American Hospitals and Pharmacies.
I have heard often about the South American town drunk, but hadn´t had a chance to film one in action until now. They are in a league of their own, and I got some really nice footage of the best one I´ve encountered.
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