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Hi all!
First off, Richard - I have been going on about wanting to go to a soccer game ever since we got here - Erika was the one who didn?t care too much - needless to say, I was sooooo jealous that she got to go! Nevertheless, had a fun day exploring old town Quito - fantastic architecture there, lovely old buildings. Most of the streets were closed to vehicles and open only to bicycles, as that seems to be what they do there on Sundays. It made it quite pleasant to walk around, not having to dodge traffic all the time. Definitely a slightly different atmosphere in old town than in new town - very hectic, busy, crowded - people selling everything you could possibly think of on the streets, bicycles whipping around, shoe-shine boys all over. Quite a few nice churches - I didn?t actually go in any of them, as I was dressed in a tank top and shorts, and wasn?t sure if I would offend anyone, it being Sunday and all. I did go to a neat museum,which had a great display on the history of Quito, from cave people days up to the 20th century, which was pretty cool to see.
There?s a beautiful monestary, as well, which I bought a painting of in the park the day before. And plazas everywhere! I really love the plazas here - it?s so nice to have a place with gardens, and fountains, and benches where you can sit and soak up everything that?s going on around you. Unfortunately, the whole sitting still thing was a little difficult for me - up until Quito, advances tended to be of the type where a man would say ?hola, chica?, ask my name, etc. In old town Quito, though, hissing is alive and well - I literally could not sit down without a man sitting on the other end of the bench and hissing at me until I got up and walked away (and sometimes it didn?t even end then!). So I got a lot of walking done that day. I also learned that the police don?t really cruise for crime, here, the cruise for women. The day before, Erika and I were kind of laughing as we watched a cop car full of cops slowly cruise down the street, blasting reggaeton music, checking out girls. Then, walking back to new town, a truckload of police drove past me and they all waved and started calling to me.... and then they drove around the block to do it again - crazy!
Had a lovely kebab in the park on the way home - Jeanne, the food is actually really good here, and there?s a lot of variety - we just found a place that had good pizza in Tena, and we were in the mood for pizza, so we went for it. As for the weather, it?s been cloudy in some place in the afternoon, but not cold at all - the weather?s been pretty good to us so far.
Met up with Erika back near our hotel - my cold hit me kinda hard, so went for a little lay down (seems to be clearing up now), then met Jeff for dinner and some beer.
Yesterday morning, we got up early to go up the Telefriqo - a very new cable car that goes up the side of Pichincha volcano, over Quito. Turns out we got up a little too early, as it opens late on Mondays. Still, we were in one of the first cars, so it was alright. Quito is 2850 metres, and this took us to 4100 metres - the view was spectacular. It was early enough that the entire valley was clear - Quito stretched out below us, glittering in the sun. Cotopaxi was in the distance - we could actually see the crater in it from where we were. It was absolutely stunning from up there - well worth waiting a couple hours for it to open. I really am going to sit down soon and add more photos -I promise!
The rest of the afternoon was spent runing around, tying up loose ends -sending parcels of stuff home, trying to find a place to cash traveller?s cheques (harder than you?d think!), packing, etc.
Up this morning and on a bus to Tulcan, which is the closesttown to the Colmbian border. Everything went smoothly, aside from a little scare for me - Erika went through immigration ahead of me, didn?t even say anything to the guy, and got her entry stamp quite promptly. I went through, and after a couple minutes, the guy handed my passport to a woman,who started comparing it to another passport, and then she handed it to a guy who got on the phone and started talking while examining my passport.... I have no idea what it was all about, because in the end they gave me my entry stamp and that was that - I tell you, though, 10 minutes gives you a lot of time to think about just how unpleasant a strip search could be!
So we?re in Pasto now - it?s an overnight place - we?ve been warned against nighttime trvel, so thought we?d stop here instead of continuing on. Not much to say about the city itself. The countryside on the way here was really beautiful - lots of crops, rolling hills, etc. In the morning, off to Popoyan, where I?m going to enquire about the safety of San Augustin (the archeological park that you told me about, Dad) - it sometimes sees guerilla activity, so I?ll see what the situation is before heading there. Until then, thanks for all the messages - sorry if you ask questions and I take awhile to answer them - I read them, and say to myself that I need to answer them... and then I forget! Love all the messages, though - glad you guys liked the dancing lesson -was quite fun!
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