Nearly everyone at the school is cold. Mucho Frio! they exclaim. It seems really nice here to me. The weather never stays the same – except it’s always about 60 degrees. From dawn to dusk theres sunshine, clouds (sometimes low enough to envelope the building) and rain. For the third day in a row an afternoon thunderstorm rolled in. The
It seems like the bathrooms here are all a result of the lack of resources. Water, electricity and ability/system to process. Water: In Puerto Lopez water is trucked in from an hour away and thats the water for showers, toilets, sinks. Bottled water is cheap. One of the places in Puerto Lopez I bought water charged a quarter for
I’ve done a lot of walking in Quito. Like any big city, there’s a lot of distance between you and your destination. After a couple of weeks of walking the hills in the city, my calves and feet ache. Most of the yoga I’m doing is to relieve some of the aches of walking, sitting, and travel in general. I’m
My trip TO the basilica yesterday went off without a hitch. RETURNING I got mixed up and got off the trolly one stop too soon, got on the bus going the wrong way and then got on the bus going the right way but the wrong bus. Its all part of the experience and I got where I was going,
I visited the basilica today. Its modeled after Pariss Norte-Dame and reminds me very much of it. Its shape and the round stained glass windows seem like a direct copy. The large central nave with concrete and marble make this space cool and quiet. The stained glass is fabulous and they each probably represent a story thats told in the
I took the city bus north to Mitad del Mundo, literally “Middle of the Earth”. I think riding any bus here is a crowded noisy proposition. I stood for a while and then, as we got further and further north, more and more people got off. I sat for a while next to a woman in tradition clothing: hat, wrap
Half the fun getting to the monument was the ride. The bus is huge, the roads narrow, so there can be some tricky maneuvering. There were great views of the densely packed housing that is Quito from the open air top of the bus. When I got off I told the driver her was “fantastico”! The statue itself is 148
New to Quito is the double decker red tour bus. Its $12 and stops at 12 places. Its a steal, if you ask me. I could have spent twice that much in taxi fares. Because the bus is new, it gets as quite a lot of attention from people on the street. Today people looked, waved and smiled as we
While on the coast I observed, or rather heard, the men on the street whistle to each other. They communicate with each other, whether it be a greeting or a way to get someones attention so they can have a conversation or do business, for example, to hail the moto-taxi or give someone a lead on a tourista needing some
At a little taller than 57, Im on the tall side for an American woman. Here, in Ecuador, I feel like a giant. Im taller than all of the women and almost all the men, sometimes a whole head taller. In the US, Im used to being taller than a good number of woman but to tower over the men