Chicken’s foot soup has got to be the most disgusting thing I have ever eaten.  Yes, I know this has nothing whatsoever to do with our trip to Intag and Junín, which is what I’m supposed to be writing about now, but I just finished lunch, and I feel the need to make this point perfectly clear.  Chicken’s foot soup is a terrible, horrible trick to pull on an unsuspecting foreigner.  There was quite literally a whole chicken’s foot in the bottom of my mug.  I was about halfway through the soup (which actually tasted like normal chicken broth) before I discovered that there was something in the bottom of my mug and decided to find out what it was.  Yuck.  That’s one recipe I won’t be trying to bring home with me.

And now, on to what I was actually going to write about.

When we got back from the Amazon, we stayed a full day in Quito to rest (more or less) and get laundry done.  We had a tour of the city, which wasn’t really very exciting.  We saw a baroque-style cathedral (far too ostentatious, if you ask me, and we weren’t allowed to take pictures), the presidential palace (complete with Buckingham Palace style guards stationed at the front door), and then ended up going shopping because the second church we were supposed to visit was closed.  Personally, I was much more interested in the church that we didn’t visit, except for a five minute photo break.  Instead of having gargoyles, it had statues of Galapagos wildlife.  Then, we had a free afternoon to pack, which I spent on a wild goose chase around the city with a few friends, looking for a sushi restaurant that someone had spotted.  We never found it, but I did get a slice of “apple pie”, which turned out to be neither pie nor apple (it was cake made from this fruit called maracuya, which I’m really hoping is spelled the way it’s pronounced, and which tastes sort of citrus-y), but was still delicious.  It was at this place called “The Regal Beagle” down the street from our hostel.  Apparently the owner, who was Chilean, really liked me, because she told me that if I was ever going to Chile, I had to go and stay with her family there, and then let a group of us stay for some family party that they had that night, when we went back for dinner.

By the way, since I’m talking about going out to eat so much, I should probably mention that I’m not spending all my money on eating out, Mom.  As Dr. Melampy puts it, trying to get our entire group in one place at one time to do anything is a lot like herding cats, so a lot of the time while we were travelling, they would just give us some money out of our food budget and turn us loose on the city.  This worked out rather well since we get $7 for one meal, more or less, and if you’re eating in the right places a decent meal isn’t ever more than $3 or $4, which means that Dr. Melampy is inadvertently giving us spending money.

While we were in Quito, one of the funniest things I’ve seen on our whole trip happened, and I can honestly say that Dr. Melampy will probably never be able to intimidate me ever again after this.  I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it before, but Dr. Melampy’s wife Nancy (who we all gave up on trying to call anything other than Nancy, because she has a different last name from him and none of us knew what it was) and her friend Suki joined us for the Amazon trip and the trips to Intag and Junín.  Well, the night we were in Quito, one of the guys in our group invited Dr. Melampy to join us for dinner, since he was just hanging out in the dining room at the hostel when we were getting ready to leave.  He declined, apparently they had eaten lunch late and he wasn’t hungry.  Well, about fifteen minutes later four of us were sitting in the Regal Beagle when who should walk in but Nancy and Suki, with Dr. Melampy in tow.  As some of you may know, I don’t know when to keep my mouth shut, so I said something jokingly to Dr. Melampy about how he wasn’t going anywhere for dinner.  And he gave us the most hilarious harassed look I have ever seen, looked at Nancy, and shook his head.  My academic adviser is completely whipped.  The four of us were sitting there cracking up (and probably making everyone else in the place wonder what on earth was wrong with these bizarre gringos).

Anyways, the next day we left for Intag.  We were going to be staying for two full days on the farm of Carlos and Sandy Zorrilla.  The reason for this part of our trip is that Intag and Junín have had problems for roughly 20 years now with mining companies trying to destroy their land in order to get at copper deposits.  If I’m remembering correctly, the first set of conflicts was in the early 90’s with Mitsubishi Mining Company, who first discovered the copper.  The last was in about 1998 with Ascension Mining, a Canadian start-up company that resorted to sending in mercenaries to terrorize Carlos, other community leaders that were standing up against mining, and the people of Junín.  Carlos actually had to go into hiding for a few months, because the mining company accused him of being involved with drugs to try to get him out of the way, and the government was trying to arrest him.  We did more hiking and research while we were staying on his farm, of course, but the most interesting parts were the talks from him, Mary Ellen Fieweger (more to come about her later), and the local women’s cooperative that formed to give people an alternative to mining – they now make tons of handicrafts to sell out of cabuya fiber.  Cabuya is a plant that’s related to agave, the plant they make tequila from – I flat out refused to try the liquor that they make from cabuya, because I’m pretty sure that’s the one they spit in to start the fermentation process.  It’s either that one or the corn liquor, I can never remember which.  But for the curious, the liquor that comes from cabuya is called mishki, which is the Kichua word for “sweet” (apparently the liquor is very sweet, but also very strong).  I guess the unfermented juice for the cabuya plant is also really good for you, because it has a lot of calcium and vitamins in it, so a lot of older people give it to their young children or grandchildren so they grow up strong and healthy.

By the way, I’m probably misspelling every Kichua word I write, so don’t take these spellings as being the right ones.  We have a rule in our Spanish class that if we can’t figure out how to spell a word, it must be Kichua.  And on top of that, Kichua was never a written language, so all of the spellings are based on Spanish interpretations based on how the words sounded, and sometimes there are a bunch of different ways to spell the same word.  (Kichua being the language of the Incas, for anyone who doesn’t know, and off the top of my head, I can think of four different, but entirely correct ways that I’ve seen the word “Kichua” spelled, if that gives you any idea of what I’m dealing with here.)

Anyways, when we left Intag, we headed out in another chiva, and it is this trip that I was referring to in my last post when I was talking about my newfound fear of chivas.  Travelling through the Andes is bad enough in a nice, enclosed coach bus.  It is infinitely worse when every time you go around a corner, you’re in immediate danger of falling out of your seat, off a cliff, and down a mountain.  But I survived.  Our next stop was in the town of Apuela, to visit an independent, organic coffee co-op (one of the other businesses that has sprung up in the area as a mining alternative), and the offices of Intag’s newspaper, which is run by Mary Ellen Fieweger.

To get an idea of what Mary Ellen looks like, first picture Professor Trelawney from the Harry Potter movies, only with shorter, blonde hair, and roughly five foot two or so.  For an idea of her personality, take a bag of Halloween candy and go visit your local preschool.  She’s very brilliant, don’t get me wrong, but about as able to focus on a topic and sit still as a four year old on a sugar rush.  Oh, and she’s incredibly stubborn.  For all of that, she’s one of the key players in the anti-mining movement in Intag, and talking with her was…an interesting experience.

Also, I swear to God she knows everything about Ecuadorian history.  I have a feeling I’m going to do quite well in Narcisa’s history class, and it’s nothing to do with Narcisa’s teaching skills.

We only stayed in Apuela for a couple of hours before it was time to move on to Junín.  Junín is a community that has borne the brunt of the anti-mining effort, to the point where they were actually attacked by soldiers from the mining company on two separate occasions.

Mom, if you’re feeling any latent (or not-so-latent) urges to lecture me, I would appreciate it if you’d just skip over the next paragraph, because I had to do something idiotic on this trip, and I’m going to chronicle it, if only to serve as a warning for future Ecuador travelers.  So I’m going to start out by observing that I was an idiot, and that if I feel the urge to be idiotic again on this trip, I’ll do it in a new, interesting way instead of the way I’ve already tried.

That night, we visited a waterfall near the cabins where we were staying.  Now, I consider myself to be fairly tolerant of cold, but the water in that river was freezing!  I had a bit of an exciting experience when I went to get closer to the waterfall.  A few other people had gone over there before me, and if you approached the waterfall in the right place, you could get swept downstream.  Well, none of us knew that if you approached it exactly the wrong way there was a current that would essentially spin you head over feet underwater, and that you could get stuck in it.  Guess who was the first person to find that out the hard way?  I was fine, but I’m thanking God I’m a pretty strong swimmer, and that I realized what was happening to me quickly enough to make a break for the surface before I got disoriented.  Unfortunately, I couldn’t get my breath quickly enough to warn the rest of the group before someone else tried the same thing I did, and we could have had some real problems if the guy who was following me wasn’t a lifeguard.  We were both fine, though, just a little out of breath and chilly.

That was the most exciting thing I have to report from our trip to Junín, fortunately.  The rest of our stay was pretty boring.  I got bitten by more bugs, and opted out of another waterfall trip in favor of walking down  from our cabins to the village of Junín with a few of the local women who cooked for us, to help with the shopping and see the town.  It was VERY small, consisting of a little general store, some houses, a church, a volleyball net, and a factory where they make flour from plantain and yuca.

And that’s about all to report for this part of the trip.  Tune in next time for our stay in Otavalo!

For more information on Intag and Junín, I recommend the following websites:

http://intagcloud9.blogspot.com/Sandy Zorrilla’s blog.  Including her delicious pancake recipe (almost as good as my father’s).

http://www.intagnewspaper.org/ The website for the newspaper Mary Ellen runs.  Includes articles of interest to the international community for free in English, Spanish, and German.

But none of that is what I actually intended to talk about.  So.  The Amazon.

We left Quito at godawfulearly-o’clock on November 10th to fly to Coca (also known as Lago Agrio – this whole “everything in Ecuador has two names” thing can get a little confusing).  In Coca, we chilled in a little café and ate bananas for about an hour.  THERE WERE MONKEYS!  It doesn’t count as our first monkey sighting, because they were pets, but they climbed all over us.  I got climbed on, but not until the return trip.  We were waiting on Juan, Narcisa’s son (who studies/studied biology, and was going with us) to come back from buying ponchos for the group.  Apparently a raincoat isn’t good enough for the jungle.  Go figure.

Once Juan got back with the ponchos, we set out on a boat down the Napo River.  And by “boat” I mean “glorified canoe with plastic lawn chairs in it,” for those of you playing along at home who have real boats.  We followed the Napo for about two hours, to a spot where it gets relatively close to the Tiputini River, which is where we wanted to be.  So, we got off the boat, and I got the surprise of my life.

Dr. Melampy explained to us later that outside of the biological reserves, oil companies basically have complete control of the Ecuadorian Amazon.  (And if the reserve is government owned, they might have a fair bit of power there too.  Just because a plot of land is protected on paper, it may or may not be really protected.)  It goes far enough that the oil companies set the speed limits on the roads, and set up security checkpoints.  We were at one of those checkpoints when we got off the boat.  At first, I thought it was a government thing, because there were armed guards in uniform with machine guns.  (Very intimidating, if you don’t know that they never shoot people because they have to pay for any ammunition they use.)  But then I saw the “Repsol” sign, and realized that this wasn’t a government thing at all.  I’m confused about the power that the oil companies have down here, when Correa is moving away from oil money (and towards mining, but that’s a whole ‘nother can of worms), and actually trying to get people to pay Ecuador not to drill any more in the Amazon.

Anyways, once we got through the oil checkpoint, we got onto a chiva.  Picture a trolley mounted on the back of a pickup truck, and you’ve got a fair idea of what a chiva is.  They are terrifying to ride on, but my fear of chivas stems from Intag, not the Amazon, so we’ll talk about that later.  The chiva ride through the Amazon was actually kind of nice, and lasted for about an hour.  (Part of the reason I enjoyed it was that almost everyone else fell asleep, so I wasn’t subjected to another game of “I’m going to the Amazon, and I’m bringing…”)  After that, it was back to the boat for two hours of riding down the Tiputini River to the Tiputini Biodiversity Station (http://192.188.53.69/tiputini/).  I don’t know why that URL is odd, but it works.

At Tiputini, we stayed in fairly rustic cabins.  It reminded me a bit of summer camp, actually, except for the humidity, lack of hot showers, and overall likelihood of  being woken up by somebody freaking out over a tarantula.  I did have to perform a tarantula extraction at one point – thank goodness I’m not afraid of things with more legs than me.  (It was actually kind of cute – I think there are pictures floating around somewhere.  And really, it wasn’t a very big tarantula.  I don’t know what they were afraid of.)

Our general schedule was breakfast, morning hike, lunch, rest for a couple of hours, afternoon hike/other activity, swim in the river, dinner, evening lecture/class, bed.  Now, this doesn’t seem too strenuous until you take into account the fact that besides being incredibly humid, the Amazon is hot. The first day we were there, somebody asked what the temperature was, and after some quick maths, the answer was 104 degrees Fahrenheit.  I was nearly dying of heat and humidity even when I wasn’t trekking through the jungle, and let me tell you, getting rained on is highly preferable to wearing a rain poncho, because you really want to be wearing the absolute minimum of clothing.  But it was amazing.

Yes, I did have a “real” monkey sighting our first day out.  Woolly monkeys, to be specific.  I also ate some ants (they tasted like lemons!), chased some Tamarins (another kind of monkey) but never saw them,  saw caimans (and probably swam with a few, but the river was so cloudy that we couldn’t see what we were swimming with – probably a good thing), failed to see any snakes/large mammals but did see a lot of cool spiders, and generally had the time of my life for our first two days.  Day three, which was the day before we left, was devoted to research projects.  AKA, bio majors had better pick REALLY interesting topics, because they’re what we have to do our papers on.  So, almost all of the bio majors had completely different ideas of what we wanted to work on, and the division of people who actually do science on a regular basis among the groups was pretty even.  Unfortunately, all of the good Spanish speakers liked my project, so we lost a few people when Dr. Melampy reconfigured the groups so that everyone had someone who could understand their guide.  My project involved looking at the effect of altitude on aquatic insects, because I win at reading the syllabus, and realized that we had to have a research project for Intag as well.  Killing two birds with one stone is a good thing.  Very, very good.  So, we waded around in a stream looking for bugs.   Well, “we” in a relative sense, because I was doing some tests on the water, to rule out water quality as a factor that would affect insect populations.  I did end up getting my boots wet in the end, though, even though I’m a highly unsuccessful bug catcher.  We also adopted another guy who was staying at Tiputini with us, since we were monopolizing the guides for the day and he was going to be left with nothing to do.  If you ever happen to stumble across this, thanks Dan!  (I’m pretty sure he and our guide found more bugs than the rest of us combined.  It was kind of embarrassing, actually.  José, our guide, would just reach into the river and pull up something new every time, where the rest of us who were doing this for a grade were floundering around in the water pulling up sieves full of nothing.)

After our research projects were over, everybody was ready to be going back to civilization.  The Amazon was lovely, but I think I would go crazy if I had to spend more than a few days without a hot shower and clean clothing to wear.

Oh, and apparently I attract bugs.  I think I got bitten by a representative of almost every six-legged species in the Amazon.  (I did, however, manage to avoid the chiggers, though some of the other people in the group weren’t as lucky.)  About the only insect I saw that didn’t try to eat me was the Conga Ant, and that’s because I have a healthy sense of self-preservation.  Conga Ant bites are nasty.

That’s all for now.  Tune in next time for Intag and Junin – probably on Monday-ish.

PS – Happy belated Turkey Day, everyone!

The celebrations really get started the week before the actual holiday.  It seems like there are parties every night of the week, and the street vendors start setting up way in advance.  I haven’t had any problems so far when I’ve gotten caught by sunset and had to finish part of my trip home in the dark, but I made a point of being home well in advance of nighttime last week, because the last thing I needed was to get caught up in anything.

I guess the partying really started in earnest on Saturday, but you’ve already heard all about what I was doing instead of roaming the city that day.  I skipped out on the celebrations on Sunday too, because I knew I had to be up and about on Monday.

For our classes at Amauta, we have a big project that’s due at the end of the week, and my class was assigned the independence celebrations.  My part of the project is the military parade.  There was one minor problem with this – one of my friends had picked up a brochure which said the parade was Monday at 10 AM, but the sign in the school detailing when everything was going on said it was Tuesday at 10 AM.  Now, being the intelligent person that I am, I realized that missing the parade I was supposed to write 5 pages about would most likely end badly, so I showed up at the right street at 10 AM Monday morning, where I discovered that the parade was indeed on Tuesday.

Finding myself with an unexpected parcel of free time, I set out to do a little exploring.  I knew that there was a little fair that had been setting up a few more blocks down the street, near a park where we had had class earlier in the week (when our profesora decided she was sick of sitting in the classroom and we were all going to go out and get some sun).  So I decided I might as well head over there and see what I could see.  Pretty much, if you could sell it on the street, you could find it at this little fair.  I had a hard time not spending any money, even though I knew I could find everything they were selling there in Otavalo for less money, but somehow I managed it.  Noah, I was sorely tempted to buy you an ugly stuffed llama (they were the creepiest things I have ever seen, and I’m going to go find one and buy it for you if you don’t tell me what you want, and you will have to love it because I’m your sister).

I did make it out of the fair without buying anything more than a bottle of water (because by that point, the sun was making its presence known and I was parched).  By that point, my legs were informing me that they were still not pleased with me over that whole Cajas thing, and that if I didn’t get them home post-haste they were going to mutiny, so I headed back to my host family’s house.

Tuesday morning, there was a strange man in the kitchen eating breakfast.  Apparently, he was a friend of my host mother’s, but I didn’t know that at the time.  I ended up having to sit down and have breakfast with him, while he lectured me about Machu Picchu.  Which, according to him, was built by the will of the Gods, and the stones weren’t carted up from the coast, they were carved while they were still buried, because everyone knows that stones are soft while they’re still underground, and only when they are brought out into the sun do they harden.  Needless to say, I was very glad that I had a parade to get to, and could escape rather quickly.

The military parade was…interesting.  Basically, it was exactly what it sounds like – all of Ecuador’s armed forces were represented.  There were a lot of soldiers with weapons marching down the street.  Rachel, you can tell your band teacher whose name I keep forgetting that military band music is apparently pretty much the same worldwide, because there were three different military bands that went by (I’m pretty sure they were Army, Navy, and Air Force), and I recognized two out of the three songs that I heard.  In case anyone cares, those would be the “Battle Hymn of the Republic” and that one that goes “From the halls of Montezuma to the shores of Tripoli” but whose name continues to escape me.

The highlight of the parade was definitely Rafael Correa Delgado, the current President of Ecuador.  Not that I actually saw him, mind you.  The only reason I knew what was going on was that I had apparently gotten pegged for a tourist because I was taking notes on the things that went past me for my paper, and some guy next to me made sure I knew that the reason a whole bunch of police were going by us was that Correa was coming.  He was in his car when he went past us, though, so about all I saw was a glimpse of some guy who I assume was Correa.  It might have been somebody else entirely, though.

The most amusing part of my day was the tourist I ran into from Rhode Island.  He too pegged me for a fellow foreigner (whether because of my note-taking or because of the fact that I had forgot to put on sunscreen that morning and as a result was turning a gorgeous shade of pink I do not know) and came up and started talking to me after the parade ended.  I ended up playing tour guide for the poor guy (who was at least old enough to be my father, and more likely old enough to be my grandfather), because it was his first day in the city and he had no idea what was going on and didn’t speak much Spanish.  So, if you’re ever confused in a foreign country, apparently the thing to do is look for someone who looks just as foreign as you do, and hope they’ve got a clue.  He had just arrived from the Galapagos, by way of Quito, and in my opinion he picked exactly the wrong day to arrive in Cuenca, because nothing was running quite the way it usually did.  I got to use a lot of the history we’ve been learning while we’re down here, though, which was nice.  It’s always a little strange to me when I know more about things than the “grown-ups” do (not being anything remotely resembling a grown-up myself, despite any evidence to the contrary).  I think Mr. Tourist (which is what I’ve been calling him in my head because, while he introduced himself, there was so much commotion going on that I couldn’t hear what his name was – I think it might have been Jay, or something like that) was a little bemused that this college student knew more than he did about almost everything Ecuador-related, but he seemed to take it well.  Mr. Tourist, whose name may or may not be Jay, if you ever stumble across this, I hope you enjoy/enjoyed your time in Cuenca.  You certainly made my day a lot more interesting.

Well, that’s my weekend in a nutshell.  On Saturday we head to Ingapirca, which is a site that has a lot of Incan ruins, and then on Sunday we fly to Quito in order to leave for the Amazon on Monday.  We spend a week in the Amazon, then another week wandering around Ecuador.  So I don’t know when I’ll post again, but when I do, there’ll be a lot of stuff to catch you all up on.

I got asked last week about the Day of the Dead.  Yes, some families down here celebrate it, but it’s mostly the indigenous families.  My host family, sadly, did not do anything special for Day of the Dead.  However, for those of you who want to know about it, one of the other Spanish classes is doing their project on it, so I’ll see what information I can mooch off of them to share with you all later this week.  The only experience I had with the celebration was getting the chance to buy “guaguas de pan”, which literally translates to “bread babies”.  They are sweet bread rolls baked in the shape of a baby (more or less, depending on the skill of the baker in question), and are absolutely delicious.  They kind of reminded me of eating a hot crossed bun without raisins when you get them fresh out of the oven.  I also learned today that apparently my host family does participate in one Day of the Dead tradition – colada morada.  This is a drink made from blackberries and pineapple.  I think there are also a bunch of spices in it, but despite having it several times, I can’t quite tell what they are.  Either way, it’s all cooked up and served hot.  Or lukewarm, depending on how late one is to the meal.  Somehow, the flavor ends up being pretty similar to a cinnamon apple.  Go figure.

I guess before I get into this, I should probably explain what’s so unique about Cajas.  Cajas is about the highest spot you can get to anywhere close to Cuenca.  It’s waaaaaaay (with a few more “a”s for good measure) up in the Andes.  I don’t think it’s the highest we’re going to get on this trip, depending on how high up Chimborazo we climb, but if it’s not the highest, it’s pretty close to.  Cajas is really important to Cuenca because it’s a year-round source of water for the city – the soil is really absorbent, I guess, so it soaks up a ton of rain and releases it slowly throughout the year.  If it weren’t for Cajas, I guess Cuenca would be in a drought right now, because it’s not raining here nearly as much as it’s supposed to at this time of year.  Cajas is also a great example of the páramo, which is a high altitude ecosystem.  I guess the best way to describe it would be “kind of like grasslands” – there are a lot of longish grasses and short flowers, with a very few low trees and shrubs that can tolerate the altitude.  There are also a lot of lakes, due to all the water.

Now that you know a little bit about where I was, here’s what I did there.

We started off the morning with a research project.  What fun.  We were comparing plant growth on east-facing mountain slopes to plant growth on west-facing mountain slopes.  It was actually more interesting than I expected it to be, not being much of a plant biologist.  Of course, part of what made it interesting was my tendency to start sliding down the mountain whenever I got distracted from keeping my grip by such things as nifty bugs, my group-mates asking me if things were actually flowers or not (“How am I supposed to know?  I haven’t taken Botany.  Does it look like a flower to you?” being my usual response), my inability to remove the protective cover from the temperature probe without fear of breaking the thing, and the fact that it started snowing.  I usually only got a few feet down the slope before I realized what was going on and had to climb back up, though.  For some reason, my group seemed to find it hilarious.

By the time we finished our research, we drove a little ways further and then it was time for lunch.  I was supremely disappointed in my host mother, who had packed me some kind of chicken and mayonnaise sandwich concoction that I refused to eat (since even if I liked mayo, it had been sitting out in my backpack in the sun all morning).  Fortunately, Antonia had two huge sandwiches in her lunch, so I was allowed to eat.  She even gave me the one that wasn’t salami.  Antonia is my favorite.

After lunch, we went on a hike.  This hike was deceptive.  I had heard one of the other girls in the group, who hadn’t been feeling well, get told that we were just going around this lake to see the forest, and that would be it.  This was a dirty rotten lie.  “Just around the lake” turned out to be a four kilometer trek up and down the mountains.  (I believe that the four kilometer figure only took into account the straight line, with no respect for the ups and downs of this trail.)  I suppose it was technically true that we did go around a lake, and there was indeed a forest, but I still feel mislead.  Despite the fact that I nearly died, it was a breathtaking hike – and I mean that both in the sense that it was beautiful, and in the sense that I literally couldn’t breathe, thanks to the altitude.  At one point, I happened to be walking next to one of the girls from my Spanish class here in Cuenca, who turned around and told me “You know, I can see God in these mountains.”  Or something to that effect, I don’t remember her exact wording.  But she was right.  It was like nothing I’d ever seen before in my life, and somehow I feel like the best way to see and understand God is to take a trip to the Andes.  I just hope the pictures I took (on my brand new, six dollar film camera) do it justice.

Probably the best and worst part of the hike was the Polilepis forest.  Polilepis are in the same family as roses, and are some of the only trees that grow at the altitude we were at.  (I am still not entirely sure whether Polilepis is the name of the species or the genus, but intend to look it up the next time I get a chance.)  It was the best part of the hike at the beginning, where we were climbing all over the trees to follow the path – much more fun than the up and down the mountainside stuff we had been doing previously.  But then we hit the river, and the mud.  Oh, the mud.  Somewhere up ahead of us, I heard the sounds of someone getting stuck in the mud – quite literally – and so by the time we got there, one of the boys had stayed behind to help us navigate the mucky, swampy bit leading up to crossing the river.  Of course, being myself, I stepped confidently out onto a branch, slipped right off it, and sunk up to my knees in this god-awful mud and decaying plant matter swamp.  I took it pretty well, though, which is a good thing since quite a few people wanted pictures of Natalie, the Thing from the Black Lagoon.  (One of our guides later decided that I loved Cajas so much that I’d brought some of it home with me.  I was not amused when he told me that.)

By the time we got back from our hike, it was time to head back to Cuenca.  I got back to my host family’s house around 4:30, and promptly fell asleep (after getting rid of my Cajas-covered clothes, of course).  I was exhausted enough that I only remember waking up once, sometime after dark.  There was what sounded suspiciously like a party going on in my house.  I vaguely remember muttering something derogatory about Cuencans and fiestas, and then going back to sleep.  At this point, I couldn’t even tell you what I said.  I was exhausted.  But I would probably do it again, because Cajas was one of the most beautiful places I have ever been.

1.)  Never tell people you’re an American if you intend to buy something from them/pay them for something.  It doesn’t matter how nice they seem.  If they know you’re American, they’ll overcharge you.  This probably applies to just about every foreign country, actually.

2.)  Always anticipate the fact that even though someone may be half as big as you, they can probably eat twice as much as you do and still have room for dessert.  This always astonishes me when I’m having lunch with my host family.  My host mother may be the size of a bird, but while I’m struggling to clear my plate, she’ll have cleared her plate, eaten a bowl of soup, and then nibbled on some popcorn while she was waiting for me to finish.  The same applies to everyone else in my host family.  I haven’t done a comparative study yet to see if it’s true everywhere.

3.)  Know where you’re going before you leave.  And I mean really know, not just a vague “Oh, I’m pretty sure we go that way.”  This one has already gotten me into trouble.  Thank goodness I can read a map.

4.)  People are always more helpful if you buy something from them.  Another one of those rules that probably applies everywhere.

5.)  Always buy your bottled water from the little old lady by the bus stop on Avenida Presidente Cordova.  Seriously, she charged me twenty cents for the bottle of water that I bought.  I was shocked.  And she was very nice about changing a dollar for me so I could take the bus.

6.)  Money belts, while a responsible thing to use in a foreign country, are completely and totally impractical when you’re using an ATM.  Unless you like being stared at while you fumble with your clothing, trying to get your money into your money belt without being obvious about the fact that you just made a withdrawal and are now carrying a ton of cash.

7.)  Never try to move while the bus is in the process of stopping, even if you do have to get to the door to get off.  That is, if you don’t want to crash into every single person within a five foot radius of you.

8.)  The only real problem with going home after dark is inability to see your bus stop.  At least, if you live in a nice neighborhood like I do.

9.)  Always make sure there’s someone around who speaks Spanish fluently if you need to call a cab.  I don’t know what it is about people who work at taxi companies, but I can’t understand them, and my Spanish is pretty good.

10.)  Be aware that everything will probably start 5-10 minutes after it’s supposed to.  Be on time anyways.

11.)  Always carry a raincoat.  At this time of year, it doesn’t matter how sunny it is in the morning, it will rain in the afternoon.

12.)  Taste the ahí before you put it all over your food.  Ahí is a spicy sauce/powder made from hot peppers, but different places will have differing strengths of ahí.  It ranges from warm all the way up to too spicy for even me to handle in any significant quantity.  I’ve already ruined a couple of perfectly good plates of rice by overdoing the ahí.

And that’s about all.  From this list, you can probably get a good idea of the adventures I’ve had over the past couple of days.

Unless something remarkable happens, this is probably the last I’ll post until next Thursday.  We leave Monday at noon for our tour of Guayaquil and Machala, and probably return at some ungodly hour of Wednesday night.  By that point, I expect to be thoroughly sick of travelling (especially since it means two more life-threatening trips through the Andes) and ready to stay put in Cuenca for a while.

¡Hasta luego!

Natalie

Today was the first day of classes at the Fundación Amauta. In the morning, Silvana tried to show me the walking route to the school. She neglected to mention that the 45 minute walk would take us an hour and a half due to construction and the fact that she got lost. Needless to say, I was late for class, and got so turned around that I’ll be taking the bus to school from now on – at least until the other Galapagos group gets back and someone who lives near me can show me how to get to the school on foot. The Fundación is a gorgeous building. When you walk in, there’s a little patio-like area to your right with lots of plants and paintings. All of the walls are painted a beige color, and the floors are stone, except in the upper levels which have some wood floors. Directly in front of you is the staircase to the second floor. If you continue through the patio area, you reach what’s essentially a café – there are a bunch of little tables and chairs, and a kitchen that always has coffee and safe drinking water. Upstairs are the classrooms, a little computer lab, another sitting area above the café, and the office. There’s a third floor, but it’s under construction. No matter where I’m studying, I can’t seem to get away from it.

Our classes begin at eight in the morning. The group is divided into two separate classes. In my class, we worked on vocabulary – specifically, Spanish verbs. I’ve become known for my familiarity with the verb “rechazar” (to reject). I don’t have any idea how I know what that word means, because nobody else in the group had a clue. Around 10-ish we took a break for coffee, bread, and (in the case of the BW students) internet. I’m beginning to suspect that Ecuadorians run almost entirely on coffee and bread, because we get a lot of that at my house too. After that, more verb practice, and a quick review of the present tense and the difference between the two verbs that mean “to be.” Apparently our classes are going to revolve around grammar, vocabulary, reading a book that I haven’t bought yet, and Ecuadorian history and culture. Classes end around noon, although we’re on tropical time down here, which means that nothing starts or ends when it’s supposed to. At that point, we return home for lunch. Today, Silvana came to the school to show me the bus route, which is fairly simple as long as I pay attention to where I am rather than the directions she gave me. She means well, but the names of the stops that the bus company uses are different from the names that she uses.

In the afternoon, we have various activities. Today, it was salsa lessons at 5 pm. I returned to the school around 2:45 for some much-needed internet time, since I spent most of my break trying to get my wireless to work. Fortunately, I didn’t have to fuss with it again this afternoon – my computer must be used to Ecuador now. The salsa class was very interesting, mostly because I could understand the teacher much better than the people who did the lesson for Salsa Night. So this time, I think I actually managed to learn some salsa. And he didn’t go into any of the fancy stuff they were trying to teach us at Salsa Night either, he was more concerned with making sure we had the basics down. I hope we have more salsa classes with him.

Due to the fact that we’re on tropical time, in which starting and ending times are absurdly flexible, class didn’t get out until almost 7, when it was supposed to end at 6. At that point, it was dark, and I was pretty sure taking the bus would be a bad life decision. So, Antonia and I called a cab, and went haring off through the streets of Cuenca. Remind me to never take a cab anywhere ever again if I can avoid it. It is a vast series of near-death experiences, made all the more horrifying by the fact that the cab driver was trying to carry on a conversation with me. He complimented my Spanish, and then overcharged me by a dollar. Of course, I didn’t find this out until I had gotten inside the house and was trying in vain to close the front gate. Fortunately, Silvana was just getting back from the spa (did I mention that she owns a spa next door to the house?) and made it work. Now, it’s off to study some Spanish verbs.

¡Hasta luego!

Natalie

Oct. 5

Today, we left Cuenca at three in the morning to start our trip to the Galapagos.  First, we had a four hour bus ride through the Andes (not a pleasant thing at all), then about an hour and a half of waiting in the airport before our hour and a half flight to the Galapagos.  We arrived on Baltra (also called South Seymour), in the strangest airport I have ever seen.  It was basically a pavilion with a few walls inside for crowd control.  We were met at the airport by Bolivar.  I never figured out whether that was his first name or his last name.  I guess I would call him our “facilitator.”  He made sure we got on the right series of busses and boats to get to Puerto Ayora, which is a city on Santa Cruz island, and paid our various fares and tolls.  The Golondrina (our boat), which is going to be our home for the next week, was moored in the harbor.  Normally we’re supposed to have all of our meals on the boat, but something was wrong with the kitchen, so Bolivar took us to a restaurant in the city.  It was open to the air, and we were seated in plastic patio furniture, which made the place seem a little sketchy, but the food was fantastic!  Lunch was some kind of beef stew with carrots, corn, and potatoes, and then a fried rice dish that was either made with chicken or beef.  (Depending on who you ask.  Personally, I think it was beef.)  To drink, we had naranjillo juice (a cousin of the tomato, but it has a tart, almost orange-like flavor).   After lunch, we walked over to the Charles Darwin Research Station, which is the home of the Galapagos Tortoise breeding program.  They have something like a zoo, where we saw a variety of iguana and tortoise species, including Lonesome George (or “the George” as Bolivar called him).  Lonesome George is the last of his species of tortoise, and scientists at the station have been trying to find him a mate so that his species won’t die out completely.  After our tour of the station, we had about an hour of free time in the town to go on the Internet before dinner, which was at the same restaurant.  We had a choice of either shrimp or fish, I opted for the shrimp.  It ended up being fried shrimp, with french-fried something (probably potato, but there are so many kinds of starchy root vegetable down here that it’s hard to tell sometimes), and a little salad.  They served us white wine with our dinner, which I passed up in favor of a Coca-Cola.  Then, I almost wished I’d had the wine, because it turns out that down here, Coke is made with real sugar instead of whatever artificial sweetener I’m used to, and it was almost disgustingly sweet.  We also got dessert, which was strawberry ice cream with sliced peaches on top.  It was delicious, despite the fact that my ice cream was melted.  After that, we returned to the boat, where everyone (except for Dr. Melampy) opted to sleep up on the top deck rather than in our cabins, which were far too small.

Oct. 6

Today, we met Fasi, who is going to be our guide for the rest of the week.  He’s about 30, and I swear he knows just about everything there is to know about the islands.  (Also, he is capable of walking everywhere in flip-flops, no matter how rugged the terrain is.)  In the morning, we took a bus about 45 minutes out of Puerto Ayora in order to hike around Los Gemelos.  Los Gemelos is a park centered around a couple of craters, which were formed by volcanic activity of some sort.  We were up in the Scalesia forest (Scalesia is a plant genus which is endemic to, or only found on the Galapagos), and it was incredibly misty the entire time, which made the going a little bit rough.  It didn’t help that I managed to break the pair of shoes I had brought to walk around in (those black flats that I will miss horribly if I can’t fix them) so I was hiking around in sandals and socks.  I was very much the stereotypical tourist today.  The mist also obscured the view a little, but it was still beautiful.  After that, we returned to Puerto Ayora for some free shopping time, at which point I discovered that I had left my wallet on the ship.  Obviously this was just not my day.  And it just kept getting worse, because in the afternoon, we had our first snorkel.  I had bought an underwater camera bag (basically a glorified Ziploc baggie) so that I could take my digital camera with me while we swam.  I’d tested it before we left, and it worked fine – I left my camera submerged in the bathtub for a good half-hour with no problems.  But somehow, between Cleveland and Ecuador, the bag decided to quit working, and my camera is now very much dead.  Fortunately, my SD card, survived, so I have all of the pictures I took, but won’t be able to take any more.  Thank goodness for Facebook, which will let me borrow pictures from everyone else.

Oct. 7

Pretty much all I remember from this day is that I swam with sea lions and sea turtles in the evening until we had to go back to the boat.  We were on Española, but I forgot to write in my journal, so I have no idea what we did.  If I’m not mistaken we saw C. palidus which is one of the two species of land iguanas in the Galapagos.

Oct. 8

Today, we were on Floreana.  In the morning, we went to Punta Cormorant (Cormorant Point).  There were no cormorants there, but there were flamingos.  Don’t ask me to make sense of that one.  After that, we went snorkeling around Devil’s Crown, which was very difficult because there are some strong currents.  We ended up having to get back onto the dinghies at one point, because the current was literally too strong to swim into.  Also, there were plenty of sharp rocks to crash into, which was exciting.  The afternoon was exciting as well, but for a different reason – we visited the Whaler’s Post Office.  The story is that whaling ships would stop at Floreana on their way out into the Pacific and leave behind letters to their families back home.  Then, whaling ships that were headed back from their trips would stop there and pick up any letters that they could deliver when they arrived at home.  The tradition has been carried on, and now tourists can leave postcards there, for other tourists to bring home with them and hand-deliver.  I was shocked that there was a letter there bound for Putney, Vermont!  I brought it along with me, even though I’m not going to be home for another nine weeks, because I figured there can’t be too many people that go to the Galapagos from Vermont.  There were also a few postcards that were bound for Cleveland, which we intend to deliver as a group when we get home (especially the one that offered a free meal to whoever delivers it!).  After the post office, we headed to a lava tunnel, which was an interesting experience since only about half of us had flashlights with us.  (Guess who was in the half that didn’t think they would need their headlamps in the Galapagos?)  We all managed to survive, though, despite the fact that about halfway through the tunnel, we hit water, which was FREEZING!  It was an adventure, and we were all very glad to hear that the afternoon snorkel was a free snorkel (read: we sat on the beach and warmed up, then went and saw some sea turtles, then sunned on the beach a little more).

Oct. 9

Today, we went to North Seymour, where we saw the other species of land iguana, C. subcristatus.  There were also tons of frigate birds, and we learned the difference between the Great Frigate Bird and the Magnificent Frigate Bird (the great has green on its back, and the magnificent has purple).  This was all very early in the morning, because the other six passengers on the boat with us were leaving, so we had to take them back to Baltra.  There, we took on new passengers, and spent a great deal of time hanging out on the beach.  In the afternoon, Fasi told us that we were going to be on the beach, so we didn’t need to bring shoes even though we’d be walking around, which was a lie.  He forgot to mention that the beach had a fair amount of large, sharp rocks that we would have to climb over.  Needless to say, I have a few battle scars from that beach, but nothing too serious.

Oct. 10

We were on Genovesa today.  In the morning, we hiked up Prince Albert’s Steps, which is incredibly steep and rocky.  It was worth it, though, because we saw the coolest prickly pear cacti ever.  There aren’t any land reptiles on Genovesa, because it’s pretty far away from the other islands, so there isn’t anything there to eat the cacti.  As a result, the spines on the prickly pears are soft – they kind of feel like the plastic whiskers on a stuffed animal.  After that, there was more snorkeling.  Fasi claims to have seen a hammerhead shark, but nobody else saw it.  I’m kind of glad I didn’t see it, because I probably would have been terrified to get back in the water.  In the afternoon, we went to Darwin Bay, and I proved yet again that Natalie and sharp rocks are fundamentally incompatible, despite the fact that this time I was wearing shoes.  At that point, I decided that I would probably fall face-first into a prickly pear on our last day, given my clumsiness.  After that, we had the chance to go snorkeling again, but most of us were freaked out by the possibility of seeing a hammerhead, and opted to return to the boat to watch the soccer game (Ecuador versus Uruguay, I think).  Unfortunately, we lost the TV signal – TV isn’t very reliable this far out, I guess – so the crew listened to the game on the radio, and informed us of the score.  Ecuador lost, sadly, 2-1.

Oct. 11

This was the day I was looking forward to the most, because we were on Bartolomé, the island where you can find penguins!  In the morning, we hiked to the top of the island, which was around 350 steps (they had to put in stairs because the island is basically a pile of volcanic ash, and tourists were causing too much erosion).  It was a chore and a half, but worth it because you could see for miles!  There were also a bunch of lava formations, which were cool, even though geology isn’t really my thing.  Afterwards, we went on our longest snorkel – around an hour and a half.  We saw several white-tipped sharks, tons of sea stars, and one lone penguin.  I was very disappointed by the overall lack of penguins, but at least we saw one.  In the afternoon, we returned to Santa Cruz, where we took a dinghy ride through what Fasi told us was called the “Black Sea Turtle Cave”.  It turned out to be a cove, rather than a cave.  Fasi occasionally has trouble with his English.  Either way, we saw tons of sea turtles and rays in this mangrove cove.  This evening, I took an inventory, and realized that the only part of my body that isn’t scraped, bruised, cut, ridiculously sunburned, or some combination of the above, is my right foot.  And yet, I’m still having the time of my life.

Oct. 12

Today, we return to Cuenca, but we made one last stop on Plazas islet.  Nothing special to report here, except that we saw the Galapagos carpetweed, which is a plant that comes in all shades of red, yellow, orange, and even pink.  It made for a really beautiful landscape.

My overall impression of the Galapagos?  I didn’t want to leave.  I think we were all a little misty-eyed as we left the Golondrina for the last time this morning.  I would love to go back sometime, since we all have a standing invitation to return to the Golondrina.  I really hope the group that is there now has as much fun as we did.  I think everyone should have a chance to go there at some point, because I really don’t have words to describe how wonderful it is.  Just go.  You’ll understand.  And despite the fact that the Golondrina was no luxury cruise ship, it was easily the best boat around.

I’m in Ecuador! I can hardly believe it.

We arrived in the airport in Guayaquil at about 10 pm on the 2nd. Of course, we weren’t “officially” in Ecuador until we had cleared Customs and left the airport. So, I officially arrived in Guayaquil, Ecuador around 11 pm. (Guayaquil is one of the bigger cities in Ecuador. It’s on the coast, and it’s where most of the export industry is located.) We went straight to the most beautiful hotel I have ever stayed in, where we sat down for a glass of passion fruit juice, and then went to bed, because we were all exhausted from travelling.

On the 3rd, we got up around 8:30 for breakfast – yogurt, granola, bananas, bread, a little bit of fried potato, and a variety of egg concoctions (which I politely tried and then left on my plate). Then, around 9:15 we boarded a coach bus to leave Guayaquil for Cuenca. Of course, this meant climbing about 11,000 feet into the Andes. I don’t think they’ve invented words to describe the fantastic views that we had for the entire trip, although “breathtaking” and “beautiful” come to mind. I wasn’t able to enjoy the view as much as I would have liked, because the sudden change in temperature and altitude gave me a migraine. Either that or it was the driving skills of our bus driver. I was afraid for my life every time the road curved. Fortunately, we arrived in Cuenca in one piece.

When we got to Cuenca, we went straight (or as straight as it is possible to go in Cuenca, which seems to be entirely made up of one-way streets) to the Fundación Amauta, where we will be taking Spanish classes. Our host families were waiting for us there. Cristobal, the youngest of my host brothers, was there to meet me, because Silvana, my host mother, and her older son Juan Pablo were both at a wedding. We drove to the house, which is about 15 minutes away by car (taking into account that Ecuadorian driving involves breakneck speeds and liberal application of the horn). There, I met Rosa and her daughter Erica, who I thought were members of the family. Later, I realized that Rosa is our maid, and Erica is her daughter. I am severely tempted to bring Rosa home with me, because she is fantastic. At that point, I went to bed.

This morning, I met Silvana. She is very sweet, and very understanding towards the poor gringa who got thrown head-first into Ecuadorian culture. She apparently has three sons, the oldest of whom is married and has two daughters (I don’t think anyone ever told me what his name was). The group met up at Amauta at 9:30 for a walking tour of Cuenca. Fortunately, it wasn’t a walking tour of all of Cuenca, which is a fairly large city, at least to the poor Vermonter. Bigger than Burlington, anyways. We saw such landmarks as the first church built in Cuenca (which is now a museum), the Cathedral that replaced it, the handicrafts market (I’m going to be going back there to buy some vegetable ivory), the 10 de Agosto market (which mostly sells food), and the Panama Hat museum. By then, it was around noon, and we returned to Amauta, and then to our homes.

Lunch was around 3 pm. Lunch is the big meal of the day, and that goes double for Sundays, when the entire family gets together to eat. I met Silvana’s brother and his wife, and her oldest son and his family. The meal itself was fantastic. We started out with a zucchini soup (Mom, you should start looking for Ecuadorian zucchini soup recipes, because I could easily eat this every day for the rest of my life). The main course was cod, with a cucumber and carrot salad, mashed yuca (which is not to be confused with yucca – it tastes like a potato), rice, and a couple of sauces – one spicy one made with chilies, and one sweet one that I think was made with raisins. It tasted like raisin, anyways. To drink, we had juice made from naranjillos, which are related to tomatoes, but the juice tastes like a less acidic version of orange juice. And for desert, canned peaches. Or at least, peaches in a sugary syrup, since they tasted nothing like canned peaches at home, and could easily have just been fresh peaches with syrup on them.

And that’s the story so far. It’s almost 6 pm, and I’ve just returned to my room, because it’s a little awkward sitting downstairs listening to the family gossip. At 3 am tomorrow, we get on the bus to head back to Guayaquil for our flight to the Galapagos. Of course, by the time you’re reading this, I’ll be back from the Galapagos, since I won’t be able to post this until then.

That’s all for now, I suppose. Now, it’s off to pack! If I never have to pack another suitcase in my life, it’ll be too soon.

I love you all!
-Natalie

Week of Sept. 27 – Leave for Ecuador on Friday.  Arrive in Guayaquil.  Travel by bus to Cuenca, meet host family.

Week of Oct. 4 – Tour Cuenca.  Return to Guayaquil in order to fly to the Galapagos.  Explore Galapagos islands by boat.

Week of Oct. 11 – Return to Cuenca Monday.  Start Spanish classes at Amauta.  Complain about how monstrously unfair having class on the weekend is.

Week of Oct. 18 – Travel to Guayaquil (again) Monday.  Tour Guayaquil and Machala.  Dr. Melampy delivers several lectures on the evils of American capitalism in Latin America.  Return to Cuenca feeling like a horrible ignorant American on Wednesday.  Spanish classes at Amauta.  Free weekend, which I would love to use for a trip to Esmeraldas if anyone else wants to go with me.

Week of Oct. 25 – Spanish Classes at Amauta.  Visit Cajas National Park on Saturday.

Week of Nov. 1 – Dia De Los Difuntos – Natalie freaks out over actually getting to spend the Day of the Dead in a Latin American country that celebrates it (to a certain extent).  Also Cuenca’s independence day this week, so classes don’t start until Wednesday.  Visit the Ingapirca ruins Saturday.

Week of Nov. 8 – Free day Sunday to prepare for traveling to the Amazon on Monday (!!!).  Leave the Amazon Saturday and head to Quito.  Possible meeting with author Abdon Ubidia.

Week of Nov. 15 – Travel to the Intag coffee co-op.  Dr. Melampy delivers many lectures on the importance of fair trade.  H-E-double-hockeysticks week for the Biology majors as we start the final projects that NO-ONE ELSE HAS TO DO (I may be slightly bitter about this).  Visit Junin and Otavalo.  Spend all of my money at the handicrafts market in Otavalo.

Week of Nov. 22 – Return to Quito, possible date of our meeting with Abdon Ubidia.  Visit several volcanoes (Chimborazo, Tungurahua), attempt to not fall down a mountain.  Travel down the Avenue of Volcanoes by train (I hope) or bus.  Return to Cuenca in time for class on Thursday.  Free weekend.

Week of Nov. 30 – Full week of Spanish classes.  Goodbye party on Saturday.

Week of Dec. 6 – Spend Sunday-Thursday vowing to change advisors from Dr. Melampy to anyone else in the Bio department as I write my final paper on our research in Intag.  Travel to Guayaquil for the last time on Thursday.  Leave for the U.S. Friday.

Sunday, December 13 – Arrive in Cleveland.  Promptly freeze to death.

And then, I’ll be on a plane, bound for Ecuador.

In this blog, you’ll be able to view my various adventures, hijinks, discoveries, and photos.  Hopefully there will be plenty of all three to keep you entertained and informed.

In a couple of days, I’ll put up an itinerary, so you’ll know what to expect out of this.