Thursday, September 27, 2007
Very slow internet connection
I´m going to post first and then try to add pictures in another post, just to make sure that I get something up.
So last we chatted Clay and I were in Bahia. Since then we´ve taken a little ferry ride across an inlet to find ourselves in Canoa, which is definetly a ´Fin de Semana´place, packed to the brim with party people on the weekends but pretty quiet the rest of the time. We´re staying right on the beach in a hotel called Hotel Bamboo... they are sufficiently famous to show up on google, I think. Apparently the town didn´t really exist until this hotel showed up and attempted to make paradise. Honestly, it looks like something out of a Hep A awareness commercial, you know the one where everything is beautiful and lovely except for the ice, only they use purified water here.
We only stayed one night here last weekend (in my excitement at a good bar and lots of people I drank far too many cocktails and had a rough morning) before heading off to a place called Rio Muchacho, which is also googleable. It´s an eco-tourism organic farm, on which they attempt to set an example for visitors and students (they have agriculture classes) for eco friendly living in general. They grow/raise all of their own food and really have had a community flourish around them by instituting or pushing the government for a great eco-friendly school, a good road, power, etc. They also use composting toilets, and it was quite impressive to see how cleanly and really not gross this process could be. As clayton says, it´s an idiotic method we use, flushing down gallons of purified water with our excrement, seems a little counter-productive.
We paid $100 each (plus $20 tip each) for 3 days at this place and we had a guide the entire time. We made chocolate and coffee from the bean, tried our hand at jewlery and bowls from palm tree pods, went for a great horse-back trip for a day to a waterfall and looking for howler monkeys (no luck, unfortunately, though still good fun) and saw a great coming of age cerimony at the school. It was a really cool verimony, with the elementary school graduates having to kiss the flag to show allegiance. We also came across a Boa constrictor, to make up for not seeing the monkeys. The food was amazing, all vegitarian while we were there, though they do raise pigs. And the cook´s family came visiting on our second night, which gave us lots of opportunity to try and chat. They´ve invited us to dinner in Bahia this weekend. Quite an amazing place, lots of hammocks and relaxation time as well. I came across a harry potter book and devoured it while I was there. Great times, swinging over a river made the book even better, if you can believe it possible.
Oh yeah, they have trouble saying my name here (I guess they don´t want to say something that sounds so much like ´Don´, meaning sir). So I went by my middle name, Alanna, which they couldn´t quite say either, so I´ve been Elaina... add an ita to make it Elainita (little Elaina) and you can imagine that there was some confusion. None the less, I´ve found a name that they can say here and that I slightly recognise as my own.
So we´re back in Canoa. Last night saw our first hot shower in ages, though we´ve been thrown back into the tent tonight due to all those smart people who make reservations in advance. You can´t complain about tenting on the beach, though! Lots of love to everyone, we miss you lots and wish that you could be here with us.
So last we chatted Clay and I were in Bahia. Since then we´ve taken a little ferry ride across an inlet to find ourselves in Canoa, which is definetly a ´Fin de Semana´place, packed to the brim with party people on the weekends but pretty quiet the rest of the time. We´re staying right on the beach in a hotel called Hotel Bamboo... they are sufficiently famous to show up on google, I think. Apparently the town didn´t really exist until this hotel showed up and attempted to make paradise. Honestly, it looks like something out of a Hep A awareness commercial, you know the one where everything is beautiful and lovely except for the ice, only they use purified water here.
We only stayed one night here last weekend (in my excitement at a good bar and lots of people I drank far too many cocktails and had a rough morning) before heading off to a place called Rio Muchacho, which is also googleable. It´s an eco-tourism organic farm, on which they attempt to set an example for visitors and students (they have agriculture classes) for eco friendly living in general. They grow/raise all of their own food and really have had a community flourish around them by instituting or pushing the government for a great eco-friendly school, a good road, power, etc. They also use composting toilets, and it was quite impressive to see how cleanly and really not gross this process could be. As clayton says, it´s an idiotic method we use, flushing down gallons of purified water with our excrement, seems a little counter-productive.
We paid $100 each (plus $20 tip each) for 3 days at this place and we had a guide the entire time. We made chocolate and coffee from the bean, tried our hand at jewlery and bowls from palm tree pods, went for a great horse-back trip for a day to a waterfall and looking for howler monkeys (no luck, unfortunately, though still good fun) and saw a great coming of age cerimony at the school. It was a really cool verimony, with the elementary school graduates having to kiss the flag to show allegiance. We also came across a Boa constrictor, to make up for not seeing the monkeys. The food was amazing, all vegitarian while we were there, though they do raise pigs. And the cook´s family came visiting on our second night, which gave us lots of opportunity to try and chat. They´ve invited us to dinner in Bahia this weekend. Quite an amazing place, lots of hammocks and relaxation time as well. I came across a harry potter book and devoured it while I was there. Great times, swinging over a river made the book even better, if you can believe it possible.
Oh yeah, they have trouble saying my name here (I guess they don´t want to say something that sounds so much like ´Don´, meaning sir). So I went by my middle name, Alanna, which they couldn´t quite say either, so I´ve been Elaina... add an ita to make it Elainita (little Elaina) and you can imagine that there was some confusion. None the less, I´ve found a name that they can say here and that I slightly recognise as my own.
So we´re back in Canoa. Last night saw our first hot shower in ages, though we´ve been thrown back into the tent tonight due to all those smart people who make reservations in advance. You can´t complain about tenting on the beach, though! Lots of love to everyone, we miss you lots and wish that you could be here with us.
Saturday, September 22, 2007
Dawn searches for treasures on the streets of Otavalo.
The waterfall an hours hike outside of Otavalo.
Our banbu lodge in Mindo (the hammocks are upstairs).
Look I caught a butterfly (well maybe it just landed to eat), but I think it likes me, I like him anyway.
Dawn enjoys the beach in Bahai. A one night stop over has turned into three days in this sleepy little coastal town.
The waterfall an hours hike outside of Otavalo.
Our banbu lodge in Mindo (the hammocks are upstairs).
Look I caught a butterfly (well maybe it just landed to eat), but I think it likes me, I like him anyway.
Dawn enjoys the beach in Bahai. A one night stop over has turned into three days in this sleepy little coastal town.
Mas pictures
Above; the view from our room in Mindo. It was quite a beautiful place... the hut in the distance is where the family lived and ran their restaurant.
Clayton caught a butterfly! Now it looks like he´s trying to talk to it.
Me on the beach in Bahia de Caraques... how I love it!
More beach at Bahia
The view from the side door of our hotel in Bahia. Turns out it´s the second ritzyest hotel in Bahia, we´re feeling a bit out of our element and poor students, but definetly enjoying it.
Picture update
Random appearance of Bender from Futurama at our hostel in Otavalo... it was so unexpected we needed a picture. Naomi, a lovely girl from the UK is in there as well.
One of the many packed streets in Otovalo
The waterfall outside of Otavalo
So we were trying to get back to the city after Mitad del Mundo, and we hoped on a bus that went to Quito only it sorta went the wrong way around this mountain (well, the wrong way for us) and then went up to the top of this big hill in Quito which is the location of the ´Virgen on the Hill´. It´s supposed to be a statue of the Virgin Mary as an angel. It´s hard to show properly how huge it is, but you can see it from everywhere in the city. This is a major tourist stop but we hadn´t planned on bothering with it... it´s amazing what happens when you randomly hop on busses.
We arrived in Mindo! And I look drunk... which I very well could be.
One of the many packed streets in Otovalo
The waterfall outside of Otavalo
So we were trying to get back to the city after Mitad del Mundo, and we hoped on a bus that went to Quito only it sorta went the wrong way around this mountain (well, the wrong way for us) and then went up to the top of this big hill in Quito which is the location of the ´Virgen on the Hill´. It´s supposed to be a statue of the Virgin Mary as an angel. It´s hard to show properly how huge it is, but you can see it from everywhere in the city. This is a major tourist stop but we hadn´t planned on bothering with it... it´s amazing what happens when you randomly hop on busses.
We arrived in Mindo! And I look drunk... which I very well could be.
Friday, September 21, 2007
Long time no blog
Well, not THAT long, but we´ve done a lot in a little time.
Last friday we took off with our spanish school to a town called Otavalo (I can´t remember if I´ve already blogged this, but this internet is too slow for me to waste time checking). We spent the night there and had a great dinner... there were 14 of us from the school and, though we were from all corners of the world, we all stood out as Gringos (latin american term for white foreigners). It gave some insight into the hordes of asian tourists that clump together in downtown Victoria. Even though you want to experience the local culture to the fullest, it´s just so easy to travel in groups of english-speakers. I´ve also come to greatly appreciate the language skills of so many european travellers. So many people we have met have a native language like french or german, and then they learn english, and THEN they try to learn spanish. It´s very impressive, there was one fellow we really liked who was from France, would speak to us in fluent english, and was quite good with spanish. Whereas I have done my best to forget the little bit of french I know so as not to confuse it with spanish. Very impressive.
Alright, back to Otavalo. It was amazing to wander around the empty streets on friday night and then at 8am the next morning the whole town was absolutely PACKED with venders of all varieties. The indigenous people (who often speak Quechua... probably spelled wrong... as opposed to spanish) come out of the mountains into this town with all their goods on their backs. This can be huge sacks of potatoes, dead (or sometimes still living) pigs, vast quantities of hand-made clothes and linens, or sometimes fashionable clothes imported from China. It was amazing, and I spent all the money I had for the whole day within the first 2 hours, it was impossible to resist. Clay and I both got great alpaca sweaters, plus a few other little things. Most of us took the afternoon to go on a hike to a nearby waterfall. It was great, we had to hike through the outer edges of Otavalo and into a neighbooring indigenous community. It was our first real look at the poor indigenous people, and despite their poverty obviously being quite extreme, they were incredibly pleasant. Everyone wanted to say hello and ask where we were from (which is a complicated answer when you´re travelling with people from so many different places). The waterfall tourists were obviously the only form of income for the community, aside from the market which occurs 2 times a week. It´s quite a culture shock, to say the least.
Sunday we went to Mitad del Mundo, which is a town on the equator. Apparently there was this french convention ages ago that wanted to study effects at the equator, and they divided the world into four quarters. At each 90 degrees there was water, except for in ecuador. So there´s a big monument where the French put the equator. However, they were a little bit off (like 200m) so there´s a tiny little tourist trap at the real equator, where they do demonstrations. The water truly does swirl a different direction when it´s a meter left or right of the line. And it doesn´t swirl at all when it´s right on top, it just goes straight down. There was another wierd effect where it was harder to resist someone pulling down your arms or pulling your fingers apart when you were on the line, and the effect definetly exists, but neither clay nor I can explain it... it´s actually been bothering us for a while.
We then had THE WORST meal of my entire life. I swear to you, I could think of nothing but the fact that every other meal I had ever had was better than this one. It was a soup of chicken organs, I kid you not, it was revolting. I swear there was the inside of a stomach in there. Even though it´s interesting anatomically, I didn´t want that in my freaking soup. Oh and there was this blood pudding on the side that you were supposed to add. Needless to say, I went a little hungry that day. In general the food has been pretty good, but that was terrifying. I´ve now learned to only order things if I know what they mean, or at least can make an educated guess.
Then we went to Mindo, which is a town in the middle of the cloud forest (it´s what I picture when I think of the amazon jungle, with huge palms everywhere, bamboo, BIG spiders, etc... but I guess I still have to learn what the amazon jungle truly is, as this is on the westerly side of the mountains). I had a bit of a breakdown on the bus... as hard as I try to speak spanish correctly, there are some sounds I may never be able to make correctly, and some people are very rude about this. However, there was a great guy sitting behind us who explained to me at which random dirt road I wanted to get off, and helped us hitch a ride into town. We stayed at his family´s hotel, which was very remote but still en route to most important attractions. It was a beautiful place with little ponds, hammocks, many many different palm trees, and we celebrated clay´s birthday with a bottle of wine, a couple beers, and a good dinner. The next day we went for a huge walk to butterfly gardens (which was a bit expensive for what it was, but it was neat to see all the local butterflys, which can get really huge, in one place). We also spent a fair bit of time on the river, swimming and hiking. Though the greenery was different, the river was about the size of the Cowichan and it made me feel a bit at home. We had a very relaxing time in the evening, lazing about in hammocks and reading our books (ah! Where will we find more english books?)
Clay had a really terrible stomach flu that night and had to get up about every hour during the night. He said it ran a close second to the Norwalk virus. In any case, we laid low the next morning and went up to the canopy for a few zip lines through the trees in the afternoon. This wasn´t great for the stomach, but we had to do them before we left. In any case, he was all better by the evening. The next day (yesterday) we hopped a bus to Santo Domingo, which is an ugly city with (in my extremely limited opinion) rude and lazy people, that is only visited by anyone for it´s bus depot. Within a couple hours we caught another bus to Bahia de Caraquez, where we are now. A grand total of 10 hours on a bus, for $10 each. Bahia is beautiful, it´s on the ocean, it´s quiet, it´s wonderfully underdeveloped, and I love it. There´s so much to be said for the ocean, I had no idea how wonderful I would feel, how much it would seem like home, when I saw it again. It´s really like the language doesn´t matter at all now, because there´s one big thing that really feels like home. I think there needs to be some stability in a traveller, something that makes them feel comfortable even when they´re in the most bizarre places. I have so much respect now for people who travel alone, I don´t know how they do it, but I´m sure there must be some very difficult days.
Last night a bilingual guy we met on the bus chatted with our biker (think kabuki cab... a guy bikes you around on a little platform) and sent us to his family´s hotel even though I asked the biker to take us to a recommended hostel. It was a really nice ride, you could just make out the waves in the dark, but the hotel was too swanky for us. We walked a little ways but didn´t want to go too far with our big packs on (though it seems to be a safe little place) so we ended up with a quasi nice place for $10 each, which is pretty expensive, but it´s enjoyable with a nice restaurant and it´s right on the beach. We´ve decided to be a little fancy for 2 days (though a little fancy doesn´t include hot water... oh well, it´s not a necessity). I love it here so, even though there´s not a lot to do, we´re going to stay put for a day, sit on the beach, study our spanish, and chill out. And update the blog like mad.
So I´m sorry there´s no pictures, I´m in a little internet store so we don´t have our camera cord with us. As soon as we get to a hostel with internet I´ll put a bunch of good pictures up. And sorry about the long blog! It´s HUGE! But those of you who are reading from work will appreciate it.
Lots of hugs to all, thanks for checking the blog, we miss everyone. Pictures soon, I promise!
-Dawn
Last friday we took off with our spanish school to a town called Otavalo (I can´t remember if I´ve already blogged this, but this internet is too slow for me to waste time checking). We spent the night there and had a great dinner... there were 14 of us from the school and, though we were from all corners of the world, we all stood out as Gringos (latin american term for white foreigners). It gave some insight into the hordes of asian tourists that clump together in downtown Victoria. Even though you want to experience the local culture to the fullest, it´s just so easy to travel in groups of english-speakers. I´ve also come to greatly appreciate the language skills of so many european travellers. So many people we have met have a native language like french or german, and then they learn english, and THEN they try to learn spanish. It´s very impressive, there was one fellow we really liked who was from France, would speak to us in fluent english, and was quite good with spanish. Whereas I have done my best to forget the little bit of french I know so as not to confuse it with spanish. Very impressive.
Alright, back to Otavalo. It was amazing to wander around the empty streets on friday night and then at 8am the next morning the whole town was absolutely PACKED with venders of all varieties. The indigenous people (who often speak Quechua... probably spelled wrong... as opposed to spanish) come out of the mountains into this town with all their goods on their backs. This can be huge sacks of potatoes, dead (or sometimes still living) pigs, vast quantities of hand-made clothes and linens, or sometimes fashionable clothes imported from China. It was amazing, and I spent all the money I had for the whole day within the first 2 hours, it was impossible to resist. Clay and I both got great alpaca sweaters, plus a few other little things. Most of us took the afternoon to go on a hike to a nearby waterfall. It was great, we had to hike through the outer edges of Otavalo and into a neighbooring indigenous community. It was our first real look at the poor indigenous people, and despite their poverty obviously being quite extreme, they were incredibly pleasant. Everyone wanted to say hello and ask where we were from (which is a complicated answer when you´re travelling with people from so many different places). The waterfall tourists were obviously the only form of income for the community, aside from the market which occurs 2 times a week. It´s quite a culture shock, to say the least.
Sunday we went to Mitad del Mundo, which is a town on the equator. Apparently there was this french convention ages ago that wanted to study effects at the equator, and they divided the world into four quarters. At each 90 degrees there was water, except for in ecuador. So there´s a big monument where the French put the equator. However, they were a little bit off (like 200m) so there´s a tiny little tourist trap at the real equator, where they do demonstrations. The water truly does swirl a different direction when it´s a meter left or right of the line. And it doesn´t swirl at all when it´s right on top, it just goes straight down. There was another wierd effect where it was harder to resist someone pulling down your arms or pulling your fingers apart when you were on the line, and the effect definetly exists, but neither clay nor I can explain it... it´s actually been bothering us for a while.
We then had THE WORST meal of my entire life. I swear to you, I could think of nothing but the fact that every other meal I had ever had was better than this one. It was a soup of chicken organs, I kid you not, it was revolting. I swear there was the inside of a stomach in there. Even though it´s interesting anatomically, I didn´t want that in my freaking soup. Oh and there was this blood pudding on the side that you were supposed to add. Needless to say, I went a little hungry that day. In general the food has been pretty good, but that was terrifying. I´ve now learned to only order things if I know what they mean, or at least can make an educated guess.
Then we went to Mindo, which is a town in the middle of the cloud forest (it´s what I picture when I think of the amazon jungle, with huge palms everywhere, bamboo, BIG spiders, etc... but I guess I still have to learn what the amazon jungle truly is, as this is on the westerly side of the mountains). I had a bit of a breakdown on the bus... as hard as I try to speak spanish correctly, there are some sounds I may never be able to make correctly, and some people are very rude about this. However, there was a great guy sitting behind us who explained to me at which random dirt road I wanted to get off, and helped us hitch a ride into town. We stayed at his family´s hotel, which was very remote but still en route to most important attractions. It was a beautiful place with little ponds, hammocks, many many different palm trees, and we celebrated clay´s birthday with a bottle of wine, a couple beers, and a good dinner. The next day we went for a huge walk to butterfly gardens (which was a bit expensive for what it was, but it was neat to see all the local butterflys, which can get really huge, in one place). We also spent a fair bit of time on the river, swimming and hiking. Though the greenery was different, the river was about the size of the Cowichan and it made me feel a bit at home. We had a very relaxing time in the evening, lazing about in hammocks and reading our books (ah! Where will we find more english books?)
Clay had a really terrible stomach flu that night and had to get up about every hour during the night. He said it ran a close second to the Norwalk virus. In any case, we laid low the next morning and went up to the canopy for a few zip lines through the trees in the afternoon. This wasn´t great for the stomach, but we had to do them before we left. In any case, he was all better by the evening. The next day (yesterday) we hopped a bus to Santo Domingo, which is an ugly city with (in my extremely limited opinion) rude and lazy people, that is only visited by anyone for it´s bus depot. Within a couple hours we caught another bus to Bahia de Caraquez, where we are now. A grand total of 10 hours on a bus, for $10 each. Bahia is beautiful, it´s on the ocean, it´s quiet, it´s wonderfully underdeveloped, and I love it. There´s so much to be said for the ocean, I had no idea how wonderful I would feel, how much it would seem like home, when I saw it again. It´s really like the language doesn´t matter at all now, because there´s one big thing that really feels like home. I think there needs to be some stability in a traveller, something that makes them feel comfortable even when they´re in the most bizarre places. I have so much respect now for people who travel alone, I don´t know how they do it, but I´m sure there must be some very difficult days.
Last night a bilingual guy we met on the bus chatted with our biker (think kabuki cab... a guy bikes you around on a little platform) and sent us to his family´s hotel even though I asked the biker to take us to a recommended hostel. It was a really nice ride, you could just make out the waves in the dark, but the hotel was too swanky for us. We walked a little ways but didn´t want to go too far with our big packs on (though it seems to be a safe little place) so we ended up with a quasi nice place for $10 each, which is pretty expensive, but it´s enjoyable with a nice restaurant and it´s right on the beach. We´ve decided to be a little fancy for 2 days (though a little fancy doesn´t include hot water... oh well, it´s not a necessity). I love it here so, even though there´s not a lot to do, we´re going to stay put for a day, sit on the beach, study our spanish, and chill out. And update the blog like mad.
So I´m sorry there´s no pictures, I´m in a little internet store so we don´t have our camera cord with us. As soon as we get to a hostel with internet I´ll put a bunch of good pictures up. And sorry about the long blog! It´s HUGE! But those of you who are reading from work will appreciate it.
Lots of hugs to all, thanks for checking the blog, we miss everyone. Pictures soon, I promise!
-Dawn
Friday, September 14, 2007
We are fluent in Spanish!
Well that not really true, nnot really even a little bit, but we are done classes. In a couple hours we catch a bus with 14 other gringos to the rural town of Otavalo. Its bound to be a party tonight. Every Saturday people from all over the country side pour into Otavalo for a market of mamoth perportions, and we are going to witness the spectacle and maybe pick up a few souveniers. We we be leaving Quito (for good?) in a couple days here. We will visit Mitad del Mundo (centre of the earth, the REAL equator line) and after head to a place called Mindo. Mindo is supposed to be one of the best places in ecuador to experience the natural cloud forrest. Hiking and mountain biking is very popular there.
The last couple days has been marred by a slight stomach illness but we have managed to get out and see several churches, museums and we even took a salsa class ( the whole R&R thing hasn´t really materialized yet, there are too many exciting things to do). I am hoping to spend my B-day relaxing in Mindo. I am really looking forward to the possibility of hiking.
Sorry, no pictures today. Maybe I´ll upload some from this weekend next time I get on a computer. Anyway, thats all for now, we´ve got to catch a bus.
Cheers,
Clay
The last couple days has been marred by a slight stomach illness but we have managed to get out and see several churches, museums and we even took a salsa class ( the whole R&R thing hasn´t really materialized yet, there are too many exciting things to do). I am hoping to spend my B-day relaxing in Mindo. I am really looking forward to the possibility of hiking.
Sorry, no pictures today. Maybe I´ll upload some from this weekend next time I get on a computer. Anyway, thats all for now, we´ve got to catch a bus.
Cheers,
Clay
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Just a quick update before salsa classes...
Hello all!
Unfortunately no pictures this time as we´ve been mainly visiting churches/museums that don´t allow them. However, I´ll try to describe the best bits quickly. So the first church we went to was La iglesia de la compania de jesus, which was pretty much made of gold. No joke, it kinda hurt the eyes, you can´t imagine the vast amounts of gold that went into this place... like most important/impressive things here, it´s extremely grandoise. It was absolutely amazing though, it helped to understand the extreme importance of churches in Ecuador (especially when you consider how many people would be fed and housed if that church was sold off).
The other major church was de Santo Fransisco, which was the first church in Quito (catholic). It´s a museum-church, though it still houses 42 monks. It´s quite amazing, the combination of Incan and Catholic religion... they put a big window at the back of the main church area so that the sun shone on the altar at certain points. Thus it showed that the Incan sun god worshiped christ. Anyways, salsa classes start! Lots of love!
-Dawn
Unfortunately no pictures this time as we´ve been mainly visiting churches/museums that don´t allow them. However, I´ll try to describe the best bits quickly. So the first church we went to was La iglesia de la compania de jesus, which was pretty much made of gold. No joke, it kinda hurt the eyes, you can´t imagine the vast amounts of gold that went into this place... like most important/impressive things here, it´s extremely grandoise. It was absolutely amazing though, it helped to understand the extreme importance of churches in Ecuador (especially when you consider how many people would be fed and housed if that church was sold off).
The other major church was de Santo Fransisco, which was the first church in Quito (catholic). It´s a museum-church, though it still houses 42 monks. It´s quite amazing, the combination of Incan and Catholic religion... they put a big window at the back of the main church area so that the sun shone on the altar at certain points. Thus it showed that the Incan sun god worshiped christ. Anyways, salsa classes start! Lots of love!
-Dawn
Monday, September 10, 2007
Getting to know Quito...
The river feeding the baths (not hot, I think it´s mixer)
The basic idea... there was another picture of clay but it isn´t showing up
RooftopHello all
Just a quick update of the last few days. We´ve been busy with Spanish but took Sunday off from classes and went to Pucallapta with some other students, which are hot springs about 2 hours outside of Quito. They were absolutely fabulous, the country was beautiful (not marred by large hotels or other concrete structures) but the pools were developed enough that they were very comfortable. The bus ride back was an eye-opener... 2 hours standing up on a very crowded bus on pretty crazy roads. But definetly a great day on the whole.
I woke up a little sick today, unfortunately, and have spent most of the day resting. Right now Terminator 2 in spanish is on TV and has become a hostel-wide affaire. Even though being sick sucks, it´s nice to be able to take TIME to get better.
Above are a few pictures of the baths, and one of the rooftop of our hostel
Friday, September 7, 2007
Learning the lingo
Hola chichos
So we´ve just started spanish lessons and we´re getting better in any case just with buying things and figuring out where things are. It´s going well, the plan is to take lessons (4hr per day, ah!) until next thursday and then do a few trips. We have saturday off and are going to nearby hotsprings with our school. Today we went up the TeleferiQo, which is a gondala up a certain mountain next to the city, leading to a trail that goes to Pinchicha, a volcano. There´s some beautiful pictures but you know, the camera is up in the room, and I don´t feel like getting it right now. El vaso de vino is calling. Lots of love! I´ll post again soon,
-Dawn
So we´ve just started spanish lessons and we´re getting better in any case just with buying things and figuring out where things are. It´s going well, the plan is to take lessons (4hr per day, ah!) until next thursday and then do a few trips. We have saturday off and are going to nearby hotsprings with our school. Today we went up the TeleferiQo, which is a gondala up a certain mountain next to the city, leading to a trail that goes to Pinchicha, a volcano. There´s some beautiful pictures but you know, the camera is up in the room, and I don´t feel like getting it right now. El vaso de vino is calling. Lots of love! I´ll post again soon,
-Dawn
Wednesday, September 5, 2007
Pictures
A partial picture of the church we went to... very ornate architechture. In ecuador they take like a centure to build a church. This one was begun in 1926 and still isn´t finished.
We´re Here!
Hello all my lovely friends and family!
We arrived last night without too many hitches, checked bags in tow (yay!) , and a man with a sign at the aiport with a sign saying Clayton Hiles. Our hostel is wonderful once you´re inside, though everything from outside looks a little odd... the buildings all run together and doors sort of appear at random with no external differentiation between while home or store is which. The room is great, we have an ensuite bathroom and a big clean room. There´s a lovely view from the patio where we had breakfast, the terrain is very interesting here, I´ll try to upload pictures. Weather has been nice thus far, though the clouds are rolling in now.
There have been minor, expected problems. Firstly, altitude sickness is an odd feeling. We slept about 9 hours last night, spent about 3 hours walking about (saw a very cool church) and then came back exhausted. Totally beat, we were walking sllooooowwww by the end. So we had about a 3 hour nap and now we´re going again. It´s craziness, there´s a constant tightness behind the eyes that really encourages the closing of them. And a bit of cottonmouth, which is no big deal, we just need to find a nearby helado vendor (icecream, super popular here). Anyways, these symptoms will go away within a few days. Lots of water and lots of sleep will help. And the odd rum and coke can´t hurt too much.
The real issue is the language, the accent is off the map! We are so lucky to have a bit of a base understanding... we can bumble along a bit, I don´t know why we´d do without that. Today we were sitting in this little park outside a church on a bench and a woman came up and started speaking very quickly and pointing to her bum. At first we thought she wanted to sit, but eventually (with lots of hand gestures) we figured out she thought we should sit on the ground because the bench was too hard on the bum, it was very cute. Anyways, lessons are NEEDED, the accent is so far off of what we learned. We could perhaps get through our trip the language we have, getting where we need to be, but it will be much more fun if we get a better grasp of the language. We can get lessons through our hostel.
Quick summary for those unwilling to read it all: the people are nice, the hostel is great, the language is hard, and the rum is yummy. Lots of love to everyone! Thanks for checking our blog!
-Dawn & Clayton
We arrived last night without too many hitches, checked bags in tow (yay!) , and a man with a sign at the aiport with a sign saying Clayton Hiles. Our hostel is wonderful once you´re inside, though everything from outside looks a little odd... the buildings all run together and doors sort of appear at random with no external differentiation between while home or store is which. The room is great, we have an ensuite bathroom and a big clean room. There´s a lovely view from the patio where we had breakfast, the terrain is very interesting here, I´ll try to upload pictures. Weather has been nice thus far, though the clouds are rolling in now.
There have been minor, expected problems. Firstly, altitude sickness is an odd feeling. We slept about 9 hours last night, spent about 3 hours walking about (saw a very cool church) and then came back exhausted. Totally beat, we were walking sllooooowwww by the end. So we had about a 3 hour nap and now we´re going again. It´s craziness, there´s a constant tightness behind the eyes that really encourages the closing of them. And a bit of cottonmouth, which is no big deal, we just need to find a nearby helado vendor (icecream, super popular here). Anyways, these symptoms will go away within a few days. Lots of water and lots of sleep will help. And the odd rum and coke can´t hurt too much.
The real issue is the language, the accent is off the map! We are so lucky to have a bit of a base understanding... we can bumble along a bit, I don´t know why we´d do without that. Today we were sitting in this little park outside a church on a bench and a woman came up and started speaking very quickly and pointing to her bum. At first we thought she wanted to sit, but eventually (with lots of hand gestures) we figured out she thought we should sit on the ground because the bench was too hard on the bum, it was very cute. Anyways, lessons are NEEDED, the accent is so far off of what we learned. We could perhaps get through our trip the language we have, getting where we need to be, but it will be much more fun if we get a better grasp of the language. We can get lessons through our hostel.
Quick summary for those unwilling to read it all: the people are nice, the hostel is great, the language is hard, and the rum is yummy. Lots of love to everyone! Thanks for checking our blog!
-Dawn & Clayton
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