Streets & people

As stated before this city is one of the most beautiful located we have ever come across, and volcanoes within spitting distance. As long as the closest, Pichincha, stays dormant for a while the beauty remains unspoiled.

The streets of Quito from above

City street down in the valley

It's a lot steeper than it looks

Life is not easy for everyone here. Although people living on the street are few and far between, there are definitely people trying to make ends meet in a hard way.
Beggars are non-existing in the street picture, but the things that are peddled at the downtown intersections can be almost anything from fruits, to electronic accessories, smokes and all kinds and sizes of artworks. Never pressure to buy though, when you say non gracias, they move on down the line of cars at the red light.




      

lottery tickets, etc.

Oranges, 1$ a bundle 





The last supper, 2' x 4', just what you were hoping for waiting for the green light

 



And then the people, the kids who seems to  be spoiled and pampered by parents and relative., always playing always having fun

 



    

 People relaxing on the numerous squares,  a bench  and  shade, or a shared umbrella, and watching life go by

This society is also very artsy, there are sculpturs and "street-art" everywhere, often with a local theme

 



cloud forest

An orchid - even though it is not yet orchid season

Wild Bananas



Chirimoya (Custard Apple) - it is bizarre how
this fruit grows directly out of the tree trunk

Poinsettas - growing in the wild




The river that runs through the eco-lodge we
stayed at.

As if doing yoga in this jungle paradise was not enough stimulus for the body, the paths through the cloud forest offered sights and sounds to awaken the soul. The forest is incredily LOUD with cicadas, frogs, insects, birds, water  flowing, etc. If you stand still, you become aware of the flitting of birds throughout the foliage. Mindo is renowned for its hummingbirds, other birds and butterflies. I did lose focus during a yoga posture when a fluorescent blue hummingbird, with a white stomach flitted back and forth around the bush in front of the lodge.There is a hummingbird here that is as big as a cardinal. It is not red, though. It is grey.

Yoga Retreat at El Monte in Mindo

This weekend I joined 10 other women on a yoga retreat in Mindo, 2 hours from Quito in the cloud forest.



Getting to El Monte where we had a yoga retreat

Cabin for 4 (I shared it with Rachel)



We rearranged the furniture to make room for our yoga mats

Main Lodge where we spread our yoga mats

Dining area of main lodge - viewed from outside
 

One of things that appeals most to us about living overseas is the opportunity to meet many people with fascinating stories. The 10 women at the yoga retreat are good example of the many different stories.

Jenny (1) -  a grade 8 language arts and social studies teacher, is a yoga instructor. She offers classes every Thurs. after school. She and her husband (a grade 7 math and science teacher) are from Alaska. They taught for two years in Nicaragua before coming here last year with their 2 children (6 and 9 yrs old)
Jenny (2) - an ESL teacher for grades 4-8, is in her 5th year here. Unfortunately, this is her last year as she and her husband (the HS principal) will move on, with their 3 yr old and 5 year old, to another posting, or maybe back to the US. Jenny grew up overseas as her parents were Peace Corps and development workers. She and Eddie came here after having spent 2-3 years at an int'l school in Nepal.
Rachel - a grade 2 teacher, single, 2nd yr at Academia Cotopaxi (AC). She came to Ecuador in her junior year at college (that's American for 3rd year university) for 1 year, and then came back after college for 2.5 years as a Peace Corps volunteer in a small village in Chimborazo province.
Judy - new like me, from Nova Scotia. She teaches gr.4. Her husband, Tim, is our new elementary school principal. They taught in Kuwait for 3 years. They were in Sri Lanka and got caught in tsunami in 2004.
Margo - is here with her husband who works with the American Embassy. I realize now that I didn't get her story.
Melissa - a teacher at Alberto Einstein Int'l School (a Jewish Int'l school). She is in her 2nd year teaching grade 1. She is here with her husband, who is writing his PhD dissertation on Architectural History, and 3 kids (between 7 and 13). They are from Ithaca, NY. They were looking for an adventure and the timing was good. He already had his research done and he could write his thesis anywhere.
Marji - same story - looking for an adventure. Took a job teaching ESL at a small private school outside of Quito. Came with her 2 children (under 10) last year. Now her husband has quit his job as a banker in Maryland and has joined them.
Lacey - Marji's friend, who left Silicon Valley with her husband and two kids (7 and 11) about a year ago in a truck converted into a home on wheels. Their website is tip-2-tip.com. They drove all the way to the tip of South America and are now on their way back to the States. However, they stopped to visit a friend here in Ecuador and decided to stay for a while. They have registered the kids in a Marji's school. Their plan is to also drive to the northern tip of North America? I didn't quite get what they meant by that, but there was also talk of Alaska.
Andrea - married to an Ecuadorian. She works with a bank here with micro-financing. Her husband is also a banker. They met when she came here after college to have an adventure teaching ESL. They have two kids under 9. Her husband climbed to the summit of Cotopaxi, while she was with us.
Kerri - another American who met her Ecuadorian husband at college in the states. They have 3 kids under 10. She works at AC pre-school. I need to learn more about her story, too.

And me....

Being together with this group, I am reminded of Chimamanda Adichie's TED talk on the "danger of a single story". Google it - it is a very poignant reminder of how we often form our opinions and actions based on one story. I learned about Adichie's "Danger of a Single Story" TED talk when Sarah's friend, Miriam, went to Ghana to work with Engineers without Borders earlier this year. Miriam started a blog called "Unfinished Stories" inspired by Adichie's message to listen for and hear more than one story.
I am rambling now... but the connection is that next week I am hosting a book club meeting and the book is Adichie's "The Thing Around Your Neck", a collection of short stories. Excellent reading! Rich prose, very personal accounts and character sketches! Many stories.

Anyway, I enjoyed the stories of the women I met at the yoga retreat. I look forward to the next retreat in March, and to other occasions to share stories with friends and colleagues.

Nothing to do with Ecuador...

While we are exploring the sights and sounds of Ecuador, life goes on in Canada. Leaves turn colour and fall, and need to be raked up. Frost has arrived, and in Entwistle they have even had snow. Amelia (7 months old now) seems to be loving the change of seasons. Thank God for Skype, we get to watch her grow and learn and laugh and cry. Soon, she will be here with us, so we can kiss those fat little cheeks and squeeze her.

Wait...don't rake up this leaf!



Well, that's one way to deal with the fall leaves. Just eat them.

Road trip to the beach

On the good advice of a colleague, we left Wednesday right after school to get the first two hours of the 5 1/2 hour drive to the closest beach out of the way. We spent Wed. night in the town (village?) of Mindo. We did not take any pictures during the drive down to the beach, so I will try to paint the scenery picture with words.
Quito is dry and brown (at least at this time of year). The drive north of Quito, past the airport, through the industrial suburbs, to get around Pichincha volcano is ... not very charming. The mountain sides have little, or no vegetation. The colour is predominantly sere. Then the road turns west and so begins the long descent from 2800 meters down to sea level. Almost immediately, everything is green. The vegetation on the west side of the mountain range is described as cloud forest vegetation. It is lush, green and dense. Tall trees are covered in lianas, orchids and epiphytes (plants that grow on other plants in a non-parasitic relationship - this is possible because of the continuous moisture in the fog or clouds). Mindo is renowned for its cloud forest and we will return there to explore more closely the abundant bird life and orchids.

Morning view from Dragonfly Inn, Mindo 


We left Mindo early on Thursday morning to continue the journey to Same (pronounced sawmay) beach. Once we descended from the cloudforest, we came upon an area rich with bamboo groves. In places the bamboo arched over the road. It was very picturesque, and although the road is in excellent condition all the way, it is very narrow, with no shoulders to pull over onto to take pictures. All along the way there are many small-holder farms with mixed crops. They seem to all have a couple of cows grazing on the margins of fields, or on the hillsides, and there are always plenty of chickens scratching out insects everywhere. We saw small and large sections with banana plants, rubber trees, cocoa trees, mango trees, orange trees, passion fruit, and sugar cane. Every home is surrounded by hedges of flowering bouganvilleas, or hibiscus, or multi-coloured bushes. As we got closer to the coast there were huge plantations of oil-palm trees, and the processing plants to extract the oil. The road even expanded to 4 lanes for a couple of stretches down in the lowlands. We also passed through several towns, each one bustling with stalls selling fruit and "platos tipicos" (local food).

Finally - we arrived (320 kms later) at Cabanas Isla del Sol. Our bungalow was right on the beach.



 Although the weather was overcast the whole time, it was still refreshing to walk on the beach, hang out in the hammock and fall asleep to the sound of the surf. We explored the coastline north and south, and ate delicious shrimp ceviche, and coconut fish and prawns. After 3 nights on the beach, filling our bodies with oxygen-rich air we were ready to head back up up the hill to the thin air of Quito. We left at 6:30 am to avoid the heavy traffic of all  the other Quitenos who had also headed to the beach for the long weekend.



A side trip - exploring the coast

Always on the look-out for other places to stay on another occasion, we decided to take a little trip down the coast to explore. One of our maps and our GPS said there as no through road between San Francisco and Muisne, the other map said there was a small road through and the sign at the turnoff said "Tourist Route" and gave distances to the towns along the route. So, we decided to check it out. It was a very interesting route. There were signs along the way, signs of bicyclists, and hikers, indicating this was a tourist route and to drive slowly. There were occasional glimpses of the Pacific Ocean, and small homesteads, with horses, cattles, bright yellow birds, orange birds, etc. THEN we came upon this sign...



OMG - Slow down for WHAT? should we go on? turn back? roll up the windows?
 

As it turns out, we never did see the creature we were being warned of, even though we saw this sign several times. Kinda' too bad, really. About 2/3 of the way around this tourist route, the wide, paved road suddenly turned into a single-lane mud track, that did not even coincide with our one map that showed a small road. Ole is an excellent driver but he was becoming a little more tense about whether we should continue on the wet, slippery mucky one-lane path, or turn back. Our Vitara is not a 4-WD and he did not relish the idea of getting stuck in a mud hole. We continued ... and we got through... but when we came out at the other end, we were 80 kms from our beach hotel. We had been going too fast to read the distances at the start of the route. It was a great drive, definitely off the beaten path. Not sure when the last tourist went through that route!






Small fishing village along this route

The jungle was alive with bright red flowering trees

Home from harvesting plantains

Typical housing - on stilts

Horses are a common means of transportation





Hillside Graveyard facing the sea 

Pictures from the beach

Tonchigue - fishing town at south end of the beach



Atacames Beach a bustling town



Mototaxis (like Tuktuks in Thailand) - popular mode of transportation on the coast

Beach patroled by both police and army - we did not feel unsafe, but this fellow did tell us not to walk further down the beach



It is a heavy job rolling these fishing boats up on the beach

North end of Same beach - Casablanca Condominiums

Follow-up on decrees, holidays...

The Ministry of Education has responded to Academia Cotopaxi's request re. the modified school schedule, given the decree that came out in August. This was the compromise-
Nationally, schools are closed only  Dec. 24 and 25 and Dec. 31 and Jan. 1. Our school will close Dec. 24 through Jan. 1. This means that we have to make up Dec. 26, 27, and 28, by having school on 3 Saturdays. We had a PTO (Parent Teacher Organization) Brunch from 10am - 1pm on Sept. 29, which, with a little padding of the agenda, counted as one Sat. The other two Saturdays are Nov. 10 and Nov. 17. On the Nov. 10 weekend our school is hosting the Caribean Area International Schools Sports Association (CAISSA) volleyball tournament (including schools from Venezuela, Domincan Republic and Trinidad). So most of the classes will take place in the gym,  cheering on our teams. Sat., Nov 17 will be an academic day. November will be a looonnnngggg month, with school 6 days a week!!!
School will be in session Jan. 2, 3 and 4, but we do not expect many students to come then. Administration is in the process of surveying parents and teachers. There will be some creative grouping to cover for those teachers, including me, who will not make it in on those three days, due to prior committments (Sarah, Torsten, Kelly and Amelia are coming).

This unfortunate scheduling, but it is not all work and no play. We have just had a 4 day long weekend (which Ole and I spent at the beach - see next post) and we have a 3-day long weekend on Nov. 2 (All Souls' Day) - we'll probably go to the jungle for that one, and then a 4 day long weekend Dec. 6-9 (Quito Days).We may stay in town and see some bull-fighting or maybe head to Cuenca. There's lots of time to plan for that :)

Cotopaxi national park

first glimpse of Cotopaxi

Late September 2012, Emily - Kain, Judy - Tim, Sherry - Ole made sure to visit this majestic mountain, which is also an active volcano in the line of fire or corridor of Volcanoes..............

lunch in shelter behind road sign



oh the colours

Cotopaxi is only 28 km from Quito, as the crow flies. By car it takes about an hour and a half. First stretch on the Pan American highway, which is mostly a four lane road leading south. So the going was easy until turnoff towards east and the park. From there on it is a cobblestone road, very, very rough, loose screws on the cars and teeth in humans are shaken out. It was so bad that the days first beer break had to take place just before 10am. We had left our suburb site of Quito at 8am, and after then break arrived at the hacienda shortly before 11.


low rainbow over hacienda
 

llamas are curious
 



the mighty Cotopaxi




We had decided to make the trip to the park now, because the rainy season is fast approaching the highlands we live in. The weather was fantastic, rolling clouds over deep blue skies. Brisk wind though and temp close to freezing at night at the hacienda. Hot water bottles in the beds at night was a nice touch by the staff. 

clouds moving in fast

the smaller the "curious'er"

a real "cowboy"

We were at 3,600 meter at the hacienda. This is cattle and horse country, with a few llamas and alpacas thrown in. The fellow above was a true gaucho, virtuous in the handling of the horse and in full gallop after a cow shortly after.
The hacienda was situated 5 km from the entrance to the national park and built only about 35 years ago, but did truly look like a Danish "firlænget bondegård" a few hundred years old. Very romantic setting. Well worth a visit again and then again.

 

The signpost shows the many, many volcanoes and mountains with direction and heights.
Great country for endless trekking with un-forget & believable vistas. We drove up a gravel road towards the glacier on the top of Cotopaxi until the baby SUV we drive here dug its hind wheels in and refused to go further. A kingdom for a 4x4.
We were now at 4,600 meters and climbed/walked up a sort of gravel path to about 4,800. Oxygen is in short supply up there.
Sherry and Emily on the way, 15 steps gasp-gasp, and on it goes.
We turned around (with sort of relief) when the clouds rolled in and snow pellets in the air both blocked the view and stung the face.

 

Unforgettable beautiful skies, landscapes, mountains. Friends, family who do not sit at the edge of the sofas and lazy boys to come visit the centre of the world and us of course.
Well no more said!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!