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I´ve been in Ecuador since the beginning of May, and have had another action packed couple of weeks. Landing in Quito was interesting, as it looked like we were going to take out a few of the high rise blocks of flats along the way, but thankfully we made it down without ado, and I survived another flight. Arriving in the airport, I felt like I had walked into the set of Outbreak. I was accosted by scary looking officials dressed from head to toe in surgical gear, asking in Spanish if I had any signs of the `Gripe Porcine´. Thankfully I managed not to sneeze whilst walking through immigration and made it out into the big sprawling urban mass that is Quito.
My first week in Ecuador was spent in the Guayasamin Spanish school, where I took classes every morning, and then had the afternoon free to explore the city and surrounding areas. After a month in laid back Peru, Quito felt much more hostile, and the tales I heard from other travellers of muggings, bag slashings and people being held at knife and gun point put me on my guard. The school was a thirty minute walk from Vicentina Alta, the residential area set high up on a hill where I was staying. The walk took me down busy main roads, through a little park where street vendors sell food on the roadside from morning til night, and into the Mariscal area where the school was based. Lessons were more structured than in Peru, and we had mucho tarrea (homework!) which kept me busy in the evenings when I wasn´t out sampling the nightlife and Ecuadorian cocktails. My Spanish is definitely coming on, and I can understand most of what is being said now, but speaking it is another matter. I can get my point across, but it probably sounds terrible still.
My afternoons were filled with visits to the Old Town, Mittel Mundo (the Equator), the Guayasamin gallery, cookery and Salsa classes and Teleferico. The Old Town was full over colonial style spanish architecture, combined with moorish influences such as domed rooves and paint work. It was interesting to see the difference between the church for the upper and middle classes, coated with gold on every possible surface, with opulently designed alters and oil paintings adorning the walls, as opposed to basic church for the poor and indigenous people, which offered plain wooden pews, gory statues of the crucifixion and little else.
The journey up to Pichinca, the active volcano which looms over Quito, started at a little ghost town of a cable car station which was built a few years ago and was supposed to be the new big thing for Quito. Sadly, the shops sit vacant, the restaurants closed, and the only sign of life was the empty theme park whose rides blared out music destroying the peace and tranquillity. The cable car slowly made it´s way up the mountain side, through the clouds and mist, high above the trees, through changing vegetation, before depositing us at the top of the mountain, a short walk away from Pichinca. When the clouds cleared, the views over Quito were amazing. The city sits in a basin at surrounded by mountains, sprawling for miles in each direction.
Salsa classed were hilarious again, and this time I was paired with someone whose `left footedness´ equalled my own. Cookery classes began with a visit to the central market to purchase Tomatoes de Arbol, Platanos, Aji and peas (for which I have forgotten the Spanish). The Empenadas, made from a green banana dough and stuffed with fried vegetables and egg, were delicious, especially when paired with the picante salsa which I couldn`t get enough of, despite the fact it made my nose run and eyes water.
School on Thursday morning was amusing, after three hours sleep and Ladies night at Bungalow 6. Men are banned until 10pm, and prior to that the so called ladies are served as many of the most disgustingly potent free cocktails that they can drink (or think they can drink), while the men queue up and look longingly through the window. The night passed with much dancing to terrible music, and some of us (proudly) made it home and into school the next day. Unfortunately there wasn´t any chips and mayonnaise in sight, so I had to make do with a packet of banana chips, which might be the way forward, as I escaped a hangover. After a late start to the lessons, the teacher gave up on getting any decent Spanish out of us and decided to teach us Cuarenta, an Ecuadorian card game, instead, so long as we spoke in Spanish. We then in turn taught her how to play `Bulls***´ and `s*** Head´ (Mierd de Caveza), which she loved, so much in fact that she cheated at every possible opportunity, even when she didn´t need to, just because she could.
A visit to the Guayasamin gallery was the highlight of my week. I didn´t know the artist previously, and spent a wonderful couple of hours wandering around the gallery and listening to the Spanish lectures about the paintings (most of which I actually understood). The paintings, portraying the suffering of the indigenous people of South America, reminiscent of both Picasso and Van Gogh in his Blue period, were hauntingly familiar, and the huge cubist style eyes of the women gazed out in acceptance and despair. The visit made me even more determined to do an art degree at some point in the future, when I can fit it in with the many other plans I am busily making, such as studying international development, garden design, opening an eco retreat B&B etc etc. I just need to find me a rich man now to sustain this fabulous lifestyle of studying and travelling. Maybe I should recap on feminism on some point too...!
Friday afternoon took me to Mittel Mundo, the Ecuator line. The grand monument erected by the government on the line that french scientists decreed the equator to be is actually 100 metres or so off from where GPS satellite showed the equator to actually be, and a little museum, which is less grand but much more fun has been built around the actual line. The museum has all sorts of activities showing the effects of the forces at work, such as water swirling anti-clockwise north of the equator, and clockwise south, which were pretty amazing to watch. Due to the equal forces at work, it is possible (though very tricky) to balance an egg on a nail, which I proudly managed.
Saturday and Sunday took me away from the bustle of Quito into the Cotocachi reserve, where after a long and bumpy drive through the Andes in the back of a pick-up truck I stayed in a beautiful little lodge next to a crystal clear river in the Ecuadorian Cloud Forest. After the traffic, noise and dirt of the city, it was lovely to be away from roads and people, and to hear nothing more than the sound of the river, the birds and the insects. After a delicious cocktail of iced coffee with condensed milk and cocao (which I will definitely be making at home, probably with the addition of vodka or baileys), and a scrumptious lunch, I spent the afternoon trekking through the jungle, crossing rivers, getting stuck in the mud, picking fresh bananas off the trees and swimming in the freezing but beautifully refreshing pools at the bottom of gushing waterfalls. I´m not sure that the look will catch on, but I quite liked my wellies and bikini! The evening was spent playing cards, salsa dancing and eating way too many peanuts.
After waking up to the sound of cicadas on Sunday morning, and ignoring my good sense of reason, I found myself in a tyre floating down the river, navigating rapids, and generally trying not to drown. All good fun. While the other fools went back for more, I spent a wonderfully peaceful afternoon on my own at the reserve, before going to chat in Spanish with the lovely owners, Hector and Isabella.
On Monday morning, after a long drive back to Quito, I took the bus to Pichinca, where the Cloud Forest reserve La Hesperia is based. The drive took me through winding mountain roads, where I was rewarded with amazing views of the Andes when I was brave enough to open my eyes. Equadorian bus drivers appear to have no fear, and think nothing of overtaking on blind bends where there are no crash barriers and drops of thousands of feet beyond. (Don´t panic mum, I survived, the crystal is working!). The bus dropped us in a little valley, next to a river. Despite having scaled 4600 metre peaks in Peru, the walk up to the cloud forest with a full back pàck nearly killed me! Arriving at the wooden volunteer house, perched on a hill with amazing views of the surrounding cloud forest, I must have looked a beautiful sight, bright red and dripping with sweat. Despite my ungainly entrance, I had an amazing week, met some wonderful people, and have decided that I want to own my own little eco lodge at some point in the future.
The days at La Hesperia began under a mosquito net, watching the sun rise through the net covered walls of the lodge with the sounds of the forest surrounding me. After a cold shower, with sun poring over the open walls, I walked up the lane to breakfast, spotting humming birds, toucans and brightly coloured butterflies along the way. Time seemed to take on a different tempo, and the days passed slowly and peacefully whilst I hiked in the forest looking for saplings, worked in the medicinal garden, and planted trees. I planted peanuts, weilded a machete and cut back weeds to allow sunlight through to the protected trees La Hesperia are trying to conserve, made rooves out of palm leaves (whilst making javelins out of the stalks!), played with the adorable puppies and spotted huge snakes in the jungle. Weeding in the vegetable garden, I felt like I was back at home working away on my allotment, but rather than beans and potatoes, I was tending coffee beans, cacoa and peanuts. After an early dinner and a walk back down the often muddy lane, with fire flies lighting the way, evenings passed with more card and dice games whilst getting to know the other volunteers, scaring ourselves silly with ghost stories, and talking about our travels and where to go next.
The bus drive back to Quito was hilliarious. A packed bus greeted us, so the conductor made space for us in the drivers cabin. Perched behind the driver, with his children dozing sprawled halfway across my lap, the one little boys head hitting the window as the bus lurched to to right, then my shoulder as we swirved to the left at every curve in the road, we sang our hearts out to classic rock songs, as the conductor looked on in amusement.
Back in Quito, playing dot to dot with my mosquito bites, I am making the most of civiliazation (how we take hot showers for granted!) for a couple of days before heading into the jungle to spend a week on another conservation project. I`ve spent the morning wandering around Quito, looking at the artists work spead out alongside the main park, shopping in the artisinal markets and lunching in the Magic Bean cafe. A ten hour bus journey awaits me at the crack of dawn, so my bag is packed full of snacks while I prepare to gaze at the changing landscape whilst my knuckles get whiter with every curve in the mountain roads.
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