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Mindo! How I love Mindo!
When I left my hostal in Quito I was a little nervous as I always am when I have to travel from one place to another. Elena (the hostal owner) arranged a taxi to pick me up and gave me a hug goodbye, she is such a lovely lady. My taxi driver was awesome, he didn't just drop me at the bus station, he carried my pack, found the right bus (which wasn't easy) and put me on it, thank you taxi driver!
On the way I sat next to Fernando, a local guy who does bird-guiding. He works two jobs at hotel type places ad a guide and has to travel between them a lot. He suggested we have dinner together which was cool because I got a night off from ordering food in Spanish.
The next day he picked me up at 5.15am to go find some birds. My hostal gate was locked so I had to crawl underneath it, luckily I'm small!
We went in a taxi then hiked for 20 minutes up a mountain. Then we sat and waited ages in this little hide thing for the cock-of-the-rock to come (and I avoided looking at the roof because I was sure there must be spiders).
The cock-of-the-rock is a crazy looking bird, there were three males that showed up and they spent ages arguing with each other and showing off in the hopes a female would appear. I was able to take photos of them through the lens of this telescope thing too which was cool and sometimes they came really close.
We also saw a quetzal (which I think was prettier), I could not see where on the tree it was sitting but Fernando lined up the telescope so I could see.
Fernando had to go off to his other job after that but gave me his email so if I need any help at any point I can get in touch.
I also went to the butterfly farm (turns out I'm scared of butterflies too!) but it was a bit of a letdown compared to butterfly creek.
Yesterday I got a taxi to the Tarabita (this cage thing that goes 150m over a foresty gully by a cable). I hiked two hours in the bush to see the waterfalls and they were awesome but I spent the whole time looking out for spiders (one crawled on me!!)
When I got back to the other side my taxi driver had gone (I'd paid in advance and he said he'd wait!) but the men there managed to phone him. Then I had to wait with the three guys there for awhile and they tried to make conversation which was difficult but they were impressed that I'd come all the way from NZ.
My taxi driver was hard case. He stopped the car to make me get out and sit in the front so he could talk to me better and insisted on having a full on conversation even though most of the time I kept saying "como?" because I couldn't understand a word! He'd just keep rephrasing though until I got it.
He wanted me to go dancing with him, then offered to drive me to Baños for free (to good to be true), then asked if he could take a photo of me (I declined). I was pretty glad to get out of that Taxi!
My hostal was lovely but a bit awkward because if I needed anything I had to go to the owners house and I didn't want to keep bothering them. The place was still under construction and the only other couple were an older, quite loud, American couple. They kept speaking to the owner in English even though he had no idea what they were saying! Poor guy. I don't think they spoke a word of Spanish.
I was quite glad to find a really nice restaurant with an American owner where I had dinner a couple if times as she was able to answer lots of my questions (like what is a dime?!). She runs a hostal and if I went back I'd definitely stay there.
Anyways I left this morning. Sat next to a French guy on the bus and then managed to get together with two other couples to share a taxi to the next bus station (an hour away). We didn't really fit but squished in anyway and it was nice to have people to talk too. At the bus station (so huge it was like an airport) I managed to buy a ticket and board my bus for the 3.5hr trip to Baños without any trouble.
So now I am in Baños for two nights then off to the sanctuary. I'm excited about the volunteering but nervous about the bug situation as I'm already finding it difficult! Anyway, we'll see!
- comments
Clint Schubert Wow! I am very proud of you Ellen. Keep it up.
Liz Schubert Great to hear you're doing so well, looking forward to hearing about the sanctuary.
Kathy Ellen I am in awe of you! You're an absolute legend and I don't believe any spider could get the better of you!
Kelly Am loving reading your blog entries! You're doing great Snaucky xx