Ecuador... Here We Come!

I finally made it! It was a forever plane ride, from SLC to Houston to Panama City to Quito. 14 hours of traveling!
Greg met me at the airport and from then on we were off together experiencing this new place. Our first stop was north of the capitol to Otavalo. To make the trip more authentic and to really dive into the culture and people we decided to take public transportation everywhere we went. So we jumped on a bus for a nice long 4 hour bus trip on snake-like, narrow, 2 laned road where buses would pass cars and trucks on blind corners. My only comfort is that we were a lot bigger then the other cars.

We pulled into this beautiful little town that was nestled in between three large vocano mountians and the foot hills. As we walked off the bus and put on our backpacks we were the focus of alot of peoples attention. With starring eyes we walked down the street; past little stores filled with food, clothing, shoes, and everything else. The things that completely surprised me was the food they had sitting out in the sun; mostly the meat and eggs. They would have a pig or a leg of a cow or cubbed pieces of raw meat hanging in broad daylight baking in the sun.

We found the main street and eventually found a hostel to stay in for the night. Dropping our stuff off we went out to explore the city. We walked all the way up the south side hills then turned and went up the north side! It was such an amazing place. It was also really nice to get out of the city and see were and how the people really live. There were shacks/ houses all over the hill side... once you felt like you were in the forest there would be a house around the next corner. We also visited the local market, and some fruit stands where Greg was sooo excited to find the little finger banana's and their local catholic church. Lunch was also a treat! My first dish of rice, meat, frech fries, and eggs!

I was a little nervous because of what I had seen earlier that day, but all went well and no one was sick. Also, that huge dish of food only cost $2 bucks each! Not to shabby!!!

Us up on the south side of town. The cobble stone roads were really cool, but hard walking.

There is no faith in washers and driers around here. Even if the family is wealthy enough to have them. Everyone washes clothes by hand hang dries them. My favorites were when the tops of the houses were covered in clothes!

Farming in Ecuador was alot of having your pigs, chickens, or cows right in your front yard.

From the north side.

These corn stalks were all dead and made for an interesting picture, but they grew just about anything and everything down there. They are a country that is rich in food and natural resources like their gold and metals, but has to import things like plastic and certain building materials.

This is one of the houses I mentioned above. We found this little trail and were following it thinking we'd eventually make it to the top of the hill, but we ran into this house built right into the hill side.

These were my favorite flowers! They are tiny and multi-colored and just plain beautiful.

Fuya Fuya

We went on a beautiful hike up Fuya Fuya. It is a volcano, the lake is the caldera, and the highest point was just over 14,000 ft. We needed to get high and start acclimatizing for our hike up Cotopaxi so we just hung out up here for about 8 hours.

It was the most different 14,000' mountian I've ever hiked. By this point in Utah I would be in a boulder field, but here it was all grassy slopes and warm!

This is Caymbe, the volcano in the back.

The morning was so clear! We got a glimpse of Cotapoxi before it was devoured in clouds for the day.

We made it to the top and were awarded with breath taking views!

This was one of the most interesting plants out there. It's round and tall like a cactus, but fury ;-)

Looks like these belong in the oceanic reef.

We got up there, hung out for a bit, then took a nap. We woke up to find the clouds coming up over the mountian. It's really neat to be in the cloulds and see how fast they really move. It would take 5 min for one to make it over, we'd have blue sky for 5 min then another cloud would be right below crawling its way up the hill. It also gave it a sort of eerie feeling when you couldn't see off the edge of where you were standing.

Our taxi drove back up the mountain to pick us up at the trail head later that afternoon. We went back into town to pack up and grab a bus back to Quito. Alot of the natives here still wear their native dress. It was great to see tradition being passed down. This is the typical clothes you would see on people around this town and in smaller towns as well.