Breathing in the Fresh Air

We had vacation last weekend (February 13-16) for Carnaval, so I headed out of the city to breathe in fresh air. I went with Lauren on a Central Highlands adventure. We visited four cities in the four days, but spent the majority of our time in a small indigenous town, Guamote. We left Saturday morning (along with the rest of the country) and got a bus to Ambato…usually a 2 hour drive that was almost 4 for us! After arriving in Ambato a lot later than expected, we decided to head directly to Baños to get a little more time there. We walked around a little bit when we arrived, ate dinner, and then took a 3 hour nap from 6pm-9pm! We were exhausted. Then we went back out for a little while and we’re sleeping again by midnight! Pretty exciting Baños trip ;)

We had to get a good night sleep, however, we got up and were on a bus out of Baños to Ambato by 7:30am. It’s only about an hour bus ride and we wanted to get there in time for the flower and fruit parade. It is basically like the Rose Bowl Parade (which has always been a dream of mine…one day the Badgers will get there again!) and it was absolutely gorgeous. All the floats were covered in all natural products and usually had a ‘princess’ on them. There were a ton of people there and we didn’t get anything to eat that day until 12pm, but it was well worth it! Shortly after eating though we headed back to the bus station to go to Rio Bamba. We thought we were going to be staying in Rio Bamba until we got there and called Pascual who told us to catch a bus to Guamote, only about 45 minutes from the city….well usually. Being Carnaval, there was a huge party and traffic jam in the street in this little town, Caja Bamba, on the way to Guamote and the bus ride ended up being 2.5 hours long! It was cool to finally get there though where Pascual met us right off the bus. Oh yeah, Pascual is a friend that Lauren met on the airplane coming here from the US in August! He is a deacon in the Catholic Church and also lives with the priest, both of whom we stayed with for the next two nights.

Guamote was a little indigenous town where a majority of the people didn’t even actually speak Spanish, but rather Quitchua, the native language. I know very little Quichua so it was funny sometimes when some of the old guys stopped me to talk to me. Many of the people live up in the mountainsides, but came down to the town for the festivities, a big concert and a parade. The parade was on Monday and basically included a little dance or something from all the communities from the mountainsides wearing their traditional dress (which they for the most part actually wear in everyday life as it is very cold up where they live and a lot of the outfits include wool ponchos and alpaca pants). Being the only foreigners in town of course drew a substantial amount of attention, which during Carnaval means that Lauren and I were covered in carioca, flour, and splashed with water a couple times. We had fun with it though and bought our own cariocas (foam spray) to get revenge! It was pretty cold in Guamote, but besides that it was fun, cultural, and relaxing.

Que viva Carnaval!

This weekend…

Despite just coming back from vacation on Tuesday evening, Lauren and I talked on Friday evening and both still had cabin fever. We had to get out of the city again, so we picked up a tour book and looked into options for a day trip out of Quito. We looked into a couple options, but I have traveled to quite a few of the cool places close by, so we kept looking. Well last weekend, we had to wait a majority of the time in our drive to Ambato through Cotopaxi National Park, and I had talked about wanting to go there as I had never seen it. Cotopaxi is the second highest volcano in Ecuador, part of the Andes Mountains. We didn’t really know what to expect, but we thought it would be a fun little adventure. So we decided to leave at 8am the next morning, along with Cassie who is visiting for a month from Mequon!

What a great decision! We hired a guide, Javier, who drove us around the park to the lagoon where we hiked around and then up to close to the mountain where we could hike up to the refuge. Wow, it was not a very long hike, but it was hard due to the altitude. It was also FREEZING! It was very windy and it was a light freezing rain as well. We made it to the refuge though! While up there we had a hot chocolate and talked to this cool French guy named Stefan who was going to summit the next morning. He was hardcore, but also super interesting (his job: he’s a sculptor, currently he designs marionettes and then travels around the world with them). No snowy summit for me, but making up to the refuge was cool too. And coming down was awesome, it was like the wind was just pushing us down…kind of felt like we were walking on the moon (not that I really know what that feels like). We just headed back to Quito after that and made it home in time for dinner. It always feels good to take in some fresh air and clear up my lounges a bit!

3 days until Mom and Dad get here… :)

Another Field Trip Weekend

Another great weekend has come and gone...

There is nothing better than a busy weekend of pure fun! On Saturday morning, I woke up to a cloudy day....'normal' Quito weather...and by early afternoon it was raining. It's okay though, because Sarah and I planned on taking our boys, Jasson and Arsenio, to the indoor water museum anyway, and then trying to see the presidential palace. We made it to the water museum, Yaku, and then had a nice little, informative tour. It was made for kids, so it was very interactive and at first our teenage boys were "too cool," but they ended up loving it. At the end of the tour, we got to make huge bubbles! What a great idea...a whole room dedicated to making big, soapy bubbles. It was a huge hit! Then we walked back down in the light rain to Centro Historico, but we were too late to enter the presidential palace. We got huge, delicious sandwiches instead and headed home. By the time I got home, I was just freezing and ready to curl up and watch a movie...so that's what I did, actually two movies!

Then Sunday, Cinthya, Adam, and I went to Parque Carolina with two of our favorite families from La Marin. They have the cutest kids ever (Brennan's little buddy, Oscar, for example), and I taught the one mom, Luz, Adam teaches Fabiola, the other mom, and Cinthya teaches Francisco, Luz's husband and Fabiola's brother. Almost all the kids came too (only missing Fabiola's oldest son) so there were 15 of us total! It's pretty fun having big families. We had lunch out in the park, another beautiful sunny day (Praise the Lord after the rainy Saturday) while listening to this awesome concert raising money for Haiti. Then we played some soccer and volleyball, sprayed the foam at each other, and walked around a bit. It ended up being a full afternoon of just hanging out, but it was an awesome time to bond and really get to know the kids and parents better outside of the school setting. Although it was a full day and I was tired from all the sun, I most definitely had to see the Super Bowl! It ended up being only me and another volunteer, Jessica, that wanted to go watch it, so we went over to our friends', Colin and Brandon, house. It was an awesome game and we even got the commentary in English, but unfortunately sans the all-star commercials. Oh well, at least I got my football in!

Nothing better than a fun, busy weekend to get be excited for another week of school. It really has been a good week, which is also due to the fact that we know we have vacation this weekend for Carnaval! And speaking of....all this Carnaval craziness came to the Center a bit last night. It is prohibited at the Center for safety reasons and to keep it clean, but Adam and I slightly broke the rules and played right outside the doors....maybe dragging/tricking students to come out to us :) Anyway, it was a lot of fun, but then one of the mothers came after me from behind and cracked an egg in my hair! Another tradition here...but kind of a gross one. I just had to laugh though, because honestly I did start it. Some of my high school girls helped me shampoo my hair and get me clean enough to go home to the nuns and priests for dinner. Supposedly you get kicked out of the Center until next week if you're caught playing Carnaval....so maybe I'll just get to take vacation early ;) I was a good girl today though, but Friday I'm going after all of them with no remorse!!! It's such a fun tradition and although a bit dirty, it is really harmless and all in good fun.

Que viva Carnaval!