Thursday, July 31, 2014

WHY ECUADOR

Greetings from hot and humid Tucson. As I try to open my blog, experimenting with what is available, I hope I am able to convey my experiences with planning and implementing a move to Ecuador. At least that for now is my goal.To inform, share, and perhaps even vent, on this great and wonderful adventure. At least from here that is what it appears to be. Who knows what lies ahead as Sharyl and I prepare our lives foe this experience.

We have been considering a move for several years considering many different places,mostly south of the border, Mexico. We have travelled extensively throughout this wonderful and beautiful country. For over 15 years we travelled back and forth to Navajoa Mexico. as we assisted our friends Bob and Annette Mason with their orphanage operation. This experience led us to think about living somewhere in Mexico on a more permanent basis. HOWEVER, the safety situation changed over time and it became clear that we were no longer comfortable travelling in Mexico, so we set about considering other countries.

Our considerations where first and foremost medical care. We are getting older now and with some already existing conditions, this important need had to be satisfied.
Second, we want to be somewhat close to the US with some ease of transportation to enable us to return to visit family or have them visit.
Third, it must be inexpensive. Our income has been drastically reduced so we need to locate where we can live comfortably within in that income.

We narrowed our thoughts to Central and South America. Considered Panama and Costa Rica. However we had travelled to Argentina and really loved that experience, however it seemed to be a little too expensive.
Then our friends planned a 3 month vacation to Ecuador and invited us to visit for an extended period of time. We jumped at the chance in order to see if Ecuador might satisfy our special needs. WOW did it ever. It is beautiful, inexpensive, interesting and convenient.We set about researching the pros and cons.




We spent one month visiting several locations. Of course the capital,Quito, but big cities are not really our thing and it is located very high,9100 ft, and literally took our breath away. Sharyl was very uncomfortable. We travelled via bus one hour north and much lower down to Mindo,4100 ft. Very cute place, and lots of birds for me. Sharyl even enjoyed staying there even though she did not always feel good.Although I wanted to like this place because of its birding potential,it turned out we felt the town was small and did not offer enough interest to consider living there full time.

We travelled next to Cuenca, south of Quito and 8200 ft. I had expected not to like this place as I felt that everyone was going there. I was so wrong. I loved it. Again Sharyl was having some difficulty adjusting to the altitude, so I was left to explore the town and surrounding areas by my self.However, because she was not feeling so hot and we were planning to stay only a week before moving on to our next destination, Cotacachi, a smaller town, I felt we should visit the local hospital to be sure she was not seriously ill. Cuenca, I felt offered better medical care than Cotacachi might. I am not sure I was right about that, but we sure had a wonderful experience going to their emergency room, if you can call going to an emergency room a wonderful experience. It did answer the  concerns we had about being able to get affordable and excellent medical care in Ecuador.We were seen promptly,within 5 mins. Nurses and Doctors were educated,the equipment was first class and up to date, and the cost was almost cheap. Certainly affordable. This experience settled our most required element, that of good and affordable healthcare. We now knew we could live here. Where was the remaining question

Stay turned for our continuing saga.