G's South American Adventure

Home at Last!

2006-04-15T14:47:00.000-04:00

After two intense days of shopping and eating my last pieces of meat in La Paz, I hopped on a plane and flew all the way home, back to wonderful, beautiful, freezing cold Canada. I was exhausted because I was so nervous about missing my flight that I barely slept the night before. I changed planes in Miami and it was definatly strange to leave Bolivia and arrive in the United States after only 6 hours of sitting on a plane. Miami was so weird! Everyone was so pale and geekly dressed and wealthy, although at least people were still speaking Spanish. After Miami, I boarded my Air Canada flight home and realized how close I was after hearing French and seeing all the Maple Leafs. Being home is fantastic! For the next two weeks, I am going to eat and sleep and watch movies, and there is nothing that anyone can do about it. It is not really as strange as I imagined to be back in the first world, living my normal life. I was definatly ready to come home. I missed Canada and all of you guys. Happy Easter Everyone! Go and check out the final installment of photos on my website, the monkeys are really cute!

More Monkeying Around

2006-04-03T22:48:00.000-04:00

Well despite all the monkey pee and diarrhea that I get covered in by the end of each day (some idiot keeps feeding the monkeys grapes), I have decided to stay here in Villa Tunari, at the animal refuge in the jungle, for another whole week of volunteering. The monkeys really needed me to stick around. I also decided to stay because I have made some good friends here (of the non-monkey variety) and am a little sad to leave. And, I want to stay a few more days in order to visit some more of the amazing animals in the park. Although visiting is officially not allowed, once you get to know everyone, people will sneak you into the jungle to visit their animals. I went to see an ocelot named Rico yesterday and it was freaking amazing. Ever since I met the ocelot coat that Nain keeps in the closet at the farm, I have always wanted to see the real animal. And he was gorgeous. And the walk through the jungle to get there was also gorgeous. Everything about the jungle is wild. There are ants the size of your finger that will make you sick if bitten. There are trees entirely covered in huge prickly thorns. I got stung by a bee a couple days ago and my entire finger was swollen to 3 times its normal size. It seems like all the animals here are 10 times more poisonous than in the rest of the world. And also 10 times more colourful. The insects here are fantastic. I saw a neon pink dragonfly the other day and the butterflies are unbelievable. Hopefully tomorrow I will get to visit the female ocelot or maybe a puma or the spider monkeys.
Right now, I am working in the monkey quarantine, and at times it is great and at times not so much. A typical day in my life starts around 7:30, with the dishing out of breakfast to the monkeys (bananas) and then freeing them from their cages. All the monkeys that are given to the park (from families, zoos, etc.) have to live in the quarantine area for a while to make sure that they will not spread monkey parasites to the rest of the free monkeys. So, they live in cages at night and play on ropes in the trees during the day. After breakfast, I spray down the cages and clean up some monkey poo, clean the monkey blankets (my least favourite job) and then babysit some of the extremly needy baby monkeys. This last part involves lots of being peed and pooed on, although now I barely even turn a hair when it happens. Then, I untangle a few of the monkeys who are dangling from their cords. Some are smart enough to untangle themselves but others are not too bright or just too excitable, and end up upside down and backwards. I also play with the monkeys for a while, which envolves getting my hair groomed and my pockets picked. Lately, all the monkeys are grooming my hair and eating things out of it, which is starting to worry me a little. I pray that I don't have lice or ticks. Then we feed the monkeys lunch, normally bananas and papaya. This is followed by some more cleaning, some more playing and some more being peed on. Our job is basically that we have to watch the monkeys all day to make sure that they aren't sick or fighting or behaving badly with each other (all of which effect their potential of being released into the park). One of the sick monkeys named Kiwi died the other day and it was quite sad for all of us in quarantine. I knew she was going to die after she passed out in the water bowl that I had filled for her. After dinner (veggies), we give them api to drink (oatmeal juice) and tuck them into their cages for bed. The last part does not always go so smoothly, although most of the monkeys now do as I tell them. With the exception of one new monkey named Raul who is schizophrenic and keeps pretending to be my friend and then biting me with his enormous teeth. He's a jerk.
The scenery of the town and the park here are incredible and I am definatly enjoying my time here, especially the unique chance to befriend jungle animals. It is not all a bed of roses however, and there are tons of animals in the park that I want to secretly let out of their cages the night I leave. The mentality of the refuge is a little too loving and caring (in my opinion) and tends to ignore animal reality. Wild animals, especially crazy things like monkeys and pumas, tend to fight and kill each other all the time. But there are numerous animals in the refuge who will live in cages for their whole lives because, if released, they would be attacked by other animals in the park. Many of the animals are also too used to the presence of humans to be released, as it would put them in danger for being trapped again. It is complicated. But, if I were a monkey in a cage, I think I would rather be released into the thick of the animal kingdom and fight to my wild, bloody monkey death, if need be. Who knows. All that I know is, the longer I stay here, the more I feel like a monkey and the more I smell like one too.

Villa Tunari, Bolivan Jungle

2006-03-30T20:02:00.000-05:00

I am now working as a volunteer at an animal refuge, called Inti Wara Yassi, at the edge of the Bolivia jungle in Villa Tunari. Which explains why I have not made a new entry in my blog for a while, as the internet is slow slow slow and busy from all the volunteers hanging out here. I was working with the birds in the quarantine at first, which was nice because of the beautiful toucans and parrots, but somewhat boring, and then I was moved to the monkey quarantine where I feed and untangle and play with monkeys all day. And I also get pissed on by monkey babies who also like to poo on me and bite my ears and pick my scabs off. All in all, it is fairly hilarious. Although, it is a fair amount of work, with very little 'free time' and lots of attention needed for my new monkey friends. I hope I do not get any monkey diseases. It is a mixed experience, as I have found all my volunteer work down here in SA to be, but I am now really quite enjoying myself and sad to leave. I have to go and eat some dinner, so I will continue thisblog later on with another, faster computer connection. I just want everyone to know that I am alive, safe and travelling perfectly fine on my own. Although some would seem to think that I am incapable of keeping myself alive and avoiding abduction while travelling by myself. Attached are two examples of emails I received after arriving here and not checking my email for 5 days. I appreciate your love very much but just want to clarify that I am FINE and will survive on my own. Will write more soon. Ciao.

The last email out of 6 that I received from Simon in 4 days.

From : simon bill
Sent : March 25, 2006 8:40:21 PM
To : gwynmac@hotmail.com

G. I really hope you are safe. I am worried right now... I am taking the bus in 1 h, so I'll be checking my Email once in Chiclayo, crossing my fingers that you are fine. Please G, write to me!
Simon

The response of my Mom when I 'finally' replied to her email with the subject of ''Please write me a 2 line email''. It only took me 5 or so days! I am sorry!

From :
Sent : March 30, 2006 3:24:01 PM
To : "Gwyneth MacMillan"
Subject : RE: aloha

well THANK YOU!! I suppose you don't mind that you have been the subject of a few sleepless nights around here. Could you please at least tell me the name of the place you are in, so that if we never hear from you again we know where to start looking? I mean honestly. please send an e-mail no matter how short no less than every 5 days, preferably every 3-4, OK?
love ma

Hilarious.

Day One of Travelling Solo

2006-03-16T19:07:00.000-05:00

You will not believe how badly the last leg of my trip just began. For the next month, I am going to be travelling solo here in Bolivia, as Simon had to head back to Peru to meet up with Martin, his friend from Quebec, and I had no desire to take a 30 hour bus ride back to that dangerous place. Simon woke me up early, probably around 5, the morning he was leaving for Peru. Neither of us could get back to sleep, probably because I was nervous about travelling alone and he was nervous about leaving me alone, so we lay around awake until he left for his bus around 7:30. After a sad goodbye, I snuggled back under the blankets to try and fall back asleep for a while. To help me doze off, I reached over to pick up my guidebook in order to read about the city I was planning on going to next. But the book wasn't there. After two minutes of tearing apart the hostel room, I realized that Simon must have mistakenly taken the book, as it was him who normally carried it in his backpack. It was around 7:45, so I threw on some dirty clothes, ran down the stairs and out the door, my heart racing like a maniac, and jumped into the first cab to get me to the bus terminal, MUY RAPIDO POR FAVOR. The idea of travelling alone, in Bolivia, without a guidebook, was really not appealing to me at this moment. The guidebook is almost the most essential thing for travelling here, it makes things 10 times safer and easier. We have been calling it the Bible on this trip. SO, I show up at the huge, busy La Paz bus terminal and start sprinting around the gates (there are about 40) in a panic, with only 5 minutes on the clock before departure time. Suddenly, I hear my name, and there is Simon sitting calmly waiting for his bus. I explain the situation and we quickly tear through his bags, but no guidebook appears. THEN, with only a couple minutes before he leaves, Simon remembers that he probably left it on top of the computer in the internet cafe, back at the hostel. Fantastic. So, I race back to the hostel and MIRACULOUSLY, the book is still there. Then, I went back to the room, thanking the heavens for being so lucky, and start tiding up the mess I made looking for the Lonely Planet in the first place. While cleaning, I realize with some shock that my bank card is not where it should be. Actually, I soon realize that it is not anywhere. Shock soon turns to disbelief, horror and then panic. I start imagining what it is going to be like to have no money, alone, in Bolivia. I realize that Simon must still have the card, from when he used it to borrow money the night before. His bank card, which was robbed in Oruro, has still not arrived in La Paz and he was planning on using Martin's in Peru. After sending Simon a panicked email (although he was now on a bus for 30 hours straight), I head out into the city to see if I can get a cash advance on my VISA. However, after going to 5 different banks and getting rejected each time, I give up and go back to my room to sob for a while. When I calm down, I get in touch with home and my amazing brother Tom wires me money on the double. Now, I have a big wad of cash to carry around and feel much more relaxed, much less panicked, and maybe even willing to have some fun this month, even if I am by myself on this crazy continent. At least I don't have to worry about Simon being without access to money, now he can just keep using my account! What a day that was. Unbelievable.

Photos!

2006-03-15T14:30:00.000-05:00

This is the best batch of photos yet, check them out!

Salar de Uyuni

2006-03-13T11:19:00.000-05:00

After another crazy bus ride from Potosi, where we drove into the bus infront of us, on a steep hill, in the middle of the night, by the side of a cliff, while I had a serious case of diarrhea, Simon and I arrived in Uyuni. Crazy bus rides are now the norm. Uyuni is another main stop on the extremly busy gringo highway due to the amazing scenery of southwestern Bolivia that can be reached from the town. Simon and I signed up for the classic 3-day tour and headed off in a cozy jeep with our Bolivian guide Roman, our cook Martha, and two young couples, one German, one Flemish. After five minutes of sitting in the back, I began to have some misgivings about the tour, as I was already beginning to feel nauseus from the bumpy dirt road. Sure enough, I was nauseus and sick to my stomach for three days straight and it made me a very grumpy unhappy person (poor Simon). The problem with the tour was that it was essentially three days of straight driving on either rutted dirt roads, bumpy salt flats, or sand dunes in the desert. The high altitude (we reached 5000m at one point) and the parasite living in my stomach did not help improve my mood either. However, despite my nausea and weakness due to an inability to eat much for three days, the scenery was completely and unbelievably amazing. The first day we drove to the famous Salar de Uyuni, which is an enormous salt flat with an area of around 2000m2, if I remember correctly. It is the biggest salt flat in the entire world. The flats were blindingly white and looked like snowy fields. The ground was a hard crunchy salt crust with pools of water all over, because it is the rainy season. It was beautiful. The rest of the afternoon we spent driving to other small touristy sites in the area, which weren't that interesting, except for the train 'graveyard' which was kind of cool. That night, we slept in a small town in the middle of nowhere, called Alota. The town was clean and colourful and nice, and we watched an amazing sunset from the Mirador in the main Plaza. Unfortunaly, the night was cloudy and we couldn't see the stars. However, Simon woke me up around 5 in the morning when he went to the bathroom, and there were a million stars in the sky. I could have stayed out looking at them until morning but the hostel dog starting barking and snarling, and I got scared and had to run inside before he found me.
On day 2, we drove through some beautiful snowy mountains, some of which were old volcanoes, and visited numerous pretty lakes, some of them salty and some of them not. AND... I saw flamingos for the first time! We ate lunch by a lake filled with pink flamingos splasing around. We also saw the first part of a series of weird shaped rocks that were scattered through the whole trip. It was called the Valley of the Rocks and was filled with tall, strange shaped rocks. I was feeling nauseus so I neglected to take any photos of it. Then came the COOLEST part of the entire tour, and one of the most beautiful things that I have ever seen. We arrived at the Laguna Colorado (the Red Lake) and the entire lake was bright pink AND filled with millions of flamingos. Close your eyes and imagine that: PINK LAKE PLUS MILLIONS OF FLAMINGOS. The lake was huge, around 10km long, and did I mention that it was PINK. Apparently, there are tons of microorganisms in the water that make the water pink when the wind mixes up the top layer. The flamingos match the pink lake perfectly because they eat the microorganisms and that it what makes their feathers pinkish. Or so the back of the admission ticket to the national park told me. While we were there a storm starting building from across the lake and the mixture of blue-black sky, white wind on the pink water, and big groups of flamingos taking off, while the llamas watched from the shore, was more than amazing to watch. That night, we slept in the desert in a basic hostel where we all shared a room together. Our group entertained each other before dinner with scary stories of travelling in South America, from Rio to Bolivia, including abductions, gun fights and robbery. I will not elaborate here, but I will have tons of stories to tell you all when I arrive home again, safe and in one piece. Alas, I was sick and skipped dinner to sleep. The next morning we were awoken at the ungodly hour of 5 (oh Lord, how am I ever going to tree plant in one month?) and drove straight away to the Geisers. Oh, and on the way to the geisers, our guide Roman kindly set off some dynamite for us, which the German on our tour had accidently brought with him from Potosi and which was making us all nervous. Nothing like a good old dynamite wake up call. We arrived at the geisers for the sun rise and it was like stepping out of the jeep and onto another planet. Actually, the whole tour was like taking a driving tour of Pluto. At 5 in the morning, at 5000m, the mixture of sunrise and volcanic activity was pretty special. There were thermal vents gushing steam and boiling mud pits everywhere. And, of course, we were allowed to stroll through the whole area at our own leisure, within meters of boiling pools, mud, and thick sulphur steam vents. It was mesmorizing. After the geisers, we all pilled back into the jeep and heading down to the lake to soak in some natural hot springs, while our breakfast was being prepared. What a luxury, although I was really craving some pancakes and maple syrup and not the usual bread and egg. Although pancakes might have made my parasite go crazy. After brekkie, we drove to the Laguna Verde (Green Lake) to take some more photos, because it was also very beautiful. We left half of our friendly group at the border with Chile, where the lucky bastards got to drive an hour to San Pedro, and then Simon and I started the long long long drive back to Uynui with our guides. When we arrived in Uyuni 9 hours later, I thought I was dying of nausea and bum soreness. I hate driving. And an hour later, Simon and I hopped on an overnight bus to Oruro (7 hours) and then another to La Paz (4 hours), where we arrived in the morning looking like corpses, but happy to have seen such amazingly beautiful things.

Cool Stuff in Potosi and Sucre (Still Bolivia)

2006-03-07T16:09:00.000-05:00

After a relatively comfortable night bus to Potosi, Simon, Adam and I checked into the hostel, ate a breakfast of left-over chinese food, and then roamed around the town. The view of the town from the roof of our hostel was fantastic, what a change from sprawling, dirty La Paz (although La Paz is beautiful from far away). The whole city is surrounded by rolling green hills and big red dusty cliffs. Plus, the main feature of the town is the large cone shaped mountain (Cerro Rico) that is full of silver, and of course, silver mines. Potosi was once the richest city in South America, due to the lucrative silver mines, and although it is now poor like the rest of Bolivia, it is still full of beautiful buildings. Now its claim to fame is that it is the highest city in the world, at an altitude of 4600m, and I could feel that altitude when stuggling uphill, gasping for breath. I keep having to tell Simon that it is not a race, as he walks so fast sometimes that I think I am going to pass out from lack of O2. Simon's stomach was up to the usual tricks, so we all decided to make a trip to the hot springs at Tarapaya and relax. It was a great decision, even though Simon looked slightly green on the combi ride, because it was the most beautiful natural hot springs that I have visited. We got dropped off at the side of the road, in what looked like the middle of nowhere, and the driver pointed to a narrow path up the side of a red cliff. When we arrived completly winded at the top, we found our American friend Liza and the most beautiful natural lake, which was apparently an old volcanic crater. The hot spring was a lake, surrounded by large wheat-like grasses, and the whole thing was the temperature of a bath tub. The water was actually bubbling in the middle while we were swimming. It was also really deep, and we quickly realized how difficult swimming in warm water at high altitude was, all ending up simply floating or clinging to the edges. It was gorgeous and we had the whole lake to ourselves to lounge about in. The most beautiful part of the day was watching the huge rain storm roll towards us over the mountains. We jumped out when the huge forks of lighting began and watched the storm approach from inside. The lake was steaming when the rain hit it. The next morning we all joined a tour group to do the classic tour of the silver mines. It was definatly one of the highlights of my trip. We started our tour at the Miner's market, buying presents of Coca leaves, alcohol, and dynamite (!) to take in to the miners. Our guide set off a stick of dynamite as a demonstration before we entered the mine. Where else but in Bolivia can you casually buy coca and dynamite in the market? And then set off the dynamite for fun? Our guides kept pressing coca leaves on us, telling us to keep them in our cheek and chew them, so that we would be able to handle the conditions inside the mine. The miners apparently chew 200 leaves (with ash as a catalyst) before starting their shifts, as the coca leaf acts as a stimulent, relieving hunger and fatigue. The leaves were so bitter that they gave me a headache. However, I am glad that I chewed them, because when I spat them out near the end of the tour, I became rapidly hungry and tired. The mine tour was wild. The conditions inside the mine are incredibly awful, abysmal. The tunnels are small and low, I banged my head about a million times, and, once you get a couple 100m inside, really really hot and stuffy. The coca was also supposed to help you breath easier with the lack of air. We were climbing through tiny tunnels that you had to squeeze through on your hands and knees, and heaving ourselves up narrow shafts with only small pieces of wood to help you up. We saw the statue of Tio, the god-like figure who protects the miners, and made some offerings of alcohol and cigarettes. The alcohol we bought for the miners was 96% and, although it said 'alcohol potable' on the bottle, it tasted exactly like rubbing alochol. We saw lots of iron and tin veins, and then climbed up a ridiculously narrrow shaft to visit some miners who were mining high quality silver. Some girls had to turn back because it was too difficult to climb up and 100% claustrophobic. Also, it was probably not the safest thing I have ever done, although the guides were great and I felt fine. We talked to the miners, gave them some coca, water, and cigarettes, and watched them work. I tried to help make a dynamite hole but was too weak. It makes you realize just how lucky you are when you see someone doing hard physical labour in a dark pit underground, with no air, hot as hell, and for very little money (by North American standards). Tree planting is a walk in the park in comparason. I have never been so happy to breath in a gulp of fresh air as I was when we left the mine a couple hours later. What an experience. We ended off the night with a delicious dinner and wine in Potosi, bought by our generous Italian friend Joseppi from the mine tour (who reminded me of the Italian version of Dad). The next morning, Simon and I were off to Sucre, the beautiful capital city, to relax in the parks and go to the 'biggest market in Bolivia'. It was actually small and not worth the effort, although we still bought lots of pretty and cheap things for ourselves. We watched a Bolivian movie called 'American Visa' and I only understood half of it, although that means my Spanish is much better than 5 months ago! I apologize that this blog is so long, I am really just writing this blog for myself and don't expect any of you in the real working world to read my ramblings.

La Paz, Bolivia

2006-03-04T21:25:00.000-05:00

We just did the most fantastic bike trip down the 'DEATH ROAD' in Bolivia and it was some of the most beautiful scenery that I have seen on this trip so far. Starting from La Paz in the early, early morning, Adam, Simon and I met our tour and drove out of the city in the mountains. After an hour or more of chugging uphill in second gear, with bikes pilled on top of the van, we arrived at the top of the road and unloaded. The tour was basically 60km of biking downhill on one of the most dangerous roads in the Bolivia (and apparently in the entire world) to get to the town of Coroico. We started on the paved highway and zoomed downhill with great views of snowy mountains. However, after about 5 minutes we dropped down below the clouds and could see absolutely nothing of the amazing scenery off of the huge cliff to our right. After 20km of paved road, we arrived at the start of the unpaved, steep, wet, precarious, dirt road called 'Death Road', dun dun dunnn. It was the most ridiculous road that I have even seen. It was blasted into the side of a huge cliff that dropped straight down at least 100m. It was narrow, rocky, and visibly eroding. The first 10km of the road were amazing, so steep it made your stomach drop just looking over and the scenery was unbelievable. Adam claims he almost swerved over the edge in the first few minutes because he wasn't paying attention. The lower we biked, the more jungley it became. Everything was green and damp, with huge waterfalls tumbling over the road, birds calling everywhere, and trees and vines clinging to the side of the cliff. Sue told us afterwards that her guide told them that at least three buses go over the side each year and no one even bothers to look for survivors, it is so unlikely that you could be alive. Luckily, I didn't know this specific statistic before biking. The guides we went with were awesome, giving us snacks every half hour, finding lost people quickly, fixing my chain when it skipped. The road was really gnarly at first but it soon became wider and easier. It was just the constant bouncing over rocks with sub-standard shocks and non-stop braking that were the difficult parts... my wrists are still a little sore. We arrived in the town after about 3 hours of downhill and amazing, amazing scenery. I was the last one to arrive because I was so enthralled by the scenery on the way down, and also the boys in our group had some speedy Tour de France competition thing going on in the front of the pack. Everyone was hot, dirty, dusty and tired but happy. We drove up to the a beautiful hotel in Coroico for a delicious shower, swim in the pool and amazing buffet lunch, which we ate on the patio with a view over the entire jungle valley. I wish we had known how beautiful the place was, as we would have stayed the night just to soak in more of the scenery and peace. No one died on the drive back up the danger road, and we got to see the amazing views from the van at the top that we had missed earlier because of the clouds. It was a great day. Later that night in La Paz, we discovered, hands down, the coolest bar that I have even been to in my entire life. The outside looks like a junk yard, with twisted metal, train tracks etc. and the door is a huge metal spinning door with a flashing red light above it. So, of course, we were lured inside. The inside was like a museum and we had to ask the bartender to show us around the place. Everything was recycled metal from various things, mainly from old airplanes. The bar seats were old tractor seats, there was a huge airplane motor on the ceiling, old trumpets hanging everywhere, and the bathrooms... wow. The bathrooms were the coolest part. They were all metal, including the toilets which looked like toilets from the first airplanes ever built, and had hanging mirrors and weird taps and so so much more. It really is hard to explain but the whole bar was a piece of art. You have to go there. Other than that, the rest of La Paz was good, except that Simon´s bag was sliced open with a knife in the market and our friends from Finland got drugged in the bar. Ahhh travelling in South America, the excitement never ends.

2006-03-02T19:57:00.000-05:00

Insanity at the Carnival of Oruro

2006-02-28T17:05:00.000-05:00

Oruro was like a war zone. The city was completly insane during the Carnival. We arrived on Thursday and already people were preparing for the weekend by nailing everyone, especially blonde females, with water balloons and foam. We lucked out and found a hostel to stay in when everything was full and people were sleeping anywhere. Kendra's 'hostel' was basically an abandoned building with a dangerous toilet that locked people inside it (you had to get out using a paint brush). We paid about 5 times as much as normal, but that is normal for the Carnival and still cheap for at home standards. Friday started out great with Simon and I roaming around the market, which was full of bright colours, loud noises, and weird smells. We were doing some shopping for toilet paper when some young boys passed and sprayed Simon in the face with foam, blinding him, and also threw a water balloon at my boob, distracting me. Simon and I laughed as the boys ran away, as it was still early in the weekend and we hadn't become angry people yet. Then we stopped laughing a couple seconds later when Simon felt his pockets and his wallet was gone. He ran after them but they had disappeared in the crowd. I was so angry! I am just so damn sick of being robbed. And then when we returned depressed to the hostel, I realized my sarong was missing, which I had left outside to dry. Yes, that's right... someone stole my towel. It was not the greatest day. Saturday was better because we had bought seats for the fantastic parade, and got to sit and drink beer and enjoy it. The parade started at 8 in the morning and went all night long, with people in elaborate, feathered, beautiful costumes dancing the whole time. There were about 100 bands playing the same Carnival songs over and over and everyone was partying. We were still getting smoked with water balloons and foam, of course. When we arrived at our seats, all the kids starting spraying and completely covered us in foam, only stopping when they realized we were sitting with them. People in the stands across the road from us would throw water balloons whenever there was a break in the dancers, and completely soaked us because they didn't have a tarp over them and could therefore throw much better than us. We were sitting ducks. It was pretty fun though because the people around us were awesome, and I just sat there in a huge orange ponco drinking beer and occasionally hucking a water balloon across. I think I ate about 4 or 5 bags of candy floss and at least two candy apples. It all got a little much later that night when the water balloons and foam didn't stop and people even tried to pee down on us from the stands. On Sunday, the whole city was totally disgusting, with pee and garbage everywhere, and ridiculously drunken people stumbling around or passed out in the dirty streets. We hid in our hostel in the morning and got drunk with the Canadians, while watching the final Olympic hockey game (Go Sweden!). When we finally ventured out to eat (Pizza was the only food available in the entire town), we went insane. We were a gang of about 6 Canadians and we went on a rampage. It was like the Revenge of the Gringos. Anyone who throw a water balloon at one of us got whipped right away with 5 balloons. We just kept buying balloons every 5 minutes. We got into full on battles on every street corner and it took about an hour to get to the restaurant, which was only 5 blocks away. Someone drove buy and sprayed us and we whipped 5 water balloons in the car. Simon hit the driver of a combi (a van that is a bus) with a water balloon inside the windshield. Jaime knocked the foam can out of one kid's hands and I picked it up and covered him with it. Someone smacked a bag of water balloons over some trouble maker's head. The boys would just wind up and smoke anyone who tried to hit the girls. It was like having bodyguards. I realized how insane I had become when I found myself holding a kid upside down in the middle of the street, spraying him in the face with his own foam. It was wild. But, we had all had more than enough by the end of the weekend and I was dying to get the hell out of Oruro. There are only so much buckets of water you can take on the head before you lose it. It was beautiful, and fun at times, but it was also hell. Carnival wasn't the happy, drunken festival that I had imagined. It was really aggressive and seriously felt like a war. One kid sprayed us and said 'Fuck You Shit' and some guy peed on Simon while giving him the finger. If it weren't for the parade, costumes and dancing (and candy apples), it would not have been worth it. And I definatly did not need 4 full days of fun in Oruro. We gratefully left for La Paz on Monday, where we are still getting hit with balloons but it is way more relaxed here and I feel like I can leave the hostel without getting attacked. Happy Birthday Norah (yesterday)!

Lago Titikaka and Bolivia!

2006-02-25T08:48:00.000-05:00

It seems to have been a while since my last post and I have a lot of things to catch up on. I am in a new country! Bolivia! Which is different, and good, but also the same as the past two Andean countries. After Cusco, Simon and I travelled to Puno, a Peruvian town on the side of Lake Titikaka, and the scenery was beautiful, of course. However, I wasn't in love with the town because it was big, dirty, sprawling and dangerous. We were told not to walk up to the park for a view over the lake because we would be mugged for sure. It really makes you not want to leave the hostel when people tell you things like that. It was also still Carnival, and although we missed the folk dancing in Puno, we didn't miss the foam. Everyone's favourite thing to do in Carnival is to throw water balloons and spray you with foam, in the face. So we, and more specifically I, got sprayed a lot. One day we took a 45 minute bicycle taxi (we didn't realize it was uphill) to check out a museum that was on a boat. Actually, the musuem is the boat. It is called the Yavari and is an iron hulled ship that was transported over the Andes to Lake Titikaka in more than 700 pieces over a period of 6 years. I liked it, and we finally got some views of the pretty lake. The morning before we left, we took a tour boat out to the famous floating islands of Puno. It was one of the most ridiculously touristy things we have yet to do in South America. But I enjoyed it because it was so unique. The islands are artifical and made entirely out of totoroa (sp?) reeds, which float and have to be anchored to the floor of the lake with long poles. People think that the islands were originally just large reed boats, lived on by the indigenous people. Families would tie their boats together and float around, and eventually these rafts became permanent islands. Nowadays, the people who live on them just keep laying down more reeds each year, so their homes don't sink. On one of the islands we visited there was an international phone, in a reed booth. Honestly. We left Puno, had a very tranquillo border crossing in Bolivia, and arrived in the town of Copacabana, which is also on Lake Titikaka but is ten million times nicer than Puno. The night we arrived, we were drinking a beer in a tent-restaurant by the lake when we were suddenly in the middle of a huge storm. For 5 minutes, we sat there with dust swirling around us, wind whipping the tent, and everything sounding loud and crazy. And then the rain hit, and we sat there, under a tin roof, realizing why people had warned us about the rainy season. However, the next few days were totally beautiful, lots of sun and not a lot of cloud, and we went for a hike on the famous Isla del Sol. This island is where Incan civilization is thought to have began. Our hike was a little disappointing, there was just so many people, so many tourists, and so many hostels and restaurants with banana pancakes. The scenery was gorgeous but we were the only people camping on the island and we were never alone. It didn't really feel like a hike and I really missed the empty and lonely feeling of hiking in Canada. It is so easy to get away into the middle of nowhere at home. Here, it seems to be almost impossible unless you climb to the peak of some distant snowcapped mountain, and you would probably find an international phone there too. The pictures are really nice though from Isla del Sol. Copacabana was a really great place to stop, full of tourist things like internet, laundry and restaurants with variety, but it didn't feel spoiled and the views of the lake were beautiful. And we heard some great Cuban jazz one night in one of the bars. I was sad to leave and rush away to La Paz (the biggest city, de facto capital) and then Oruro but we wanted to check out the biggest Carnival in Bolivia. Little did we know what we were getting ourselves into, arriving in Oruro was like stepping into a war zone. I got a bucket, a BUCKET, of water dumped on my head five minutes after we arrived, and then got mad at Simon when he asked if they ´got me´. It was a bucket, how could they miss me. Even the first day, I got hit with so many water balloons I had to retire to the hotel to recooperate after a few hours. It was going to be an interesting Carnival weekend.

Some more PHOTOS

2006-02-15T16:53:00.000-05:00

Check out the new album of photos. Today in Cusco, some punk kids threatened me with water balloons unless I bought their postcards. When I refused, I got nailed in the back with a huge balloon, and I was so mad. But then, when I met Simon in the Plaza, he had a war going with the kids trying to fill up water balloons and bottles in the foutain. He and another Quebecois managed to throw some of the kids throwing water in the fountain, which made me feel great. All the kids think it is hilarious, because it is carnival, to throw water at the gringos on the street. I just think it is so annoying!

Cusco and the famous MACHU PICCHU!

2006-02-15T15:48:00.000-05:00

Cusco is a great city... old colonial buildings with balconies, narrow streets that cars cannot fit down, and a huge central Plaza de Armas with a fountain and 3 churches. Kendra and I met up with Simon and then spent a few days exploring the city and eating some delicious food. Unfortunatly, I got ridiculously ill after a day and spent a whole day in bed, moaning that I was dying to Simon and sprinting madly to the bathroom every half hour. I think it must have been food or water poisening. It took me a couple days to recover, but the worst seems to be over now. To get to Machu Picchu (I just learned how to spell that, I always thought that it was MaNchu), we took a late train from the small down of Ollantaytambo because it was the least expensive route to get there. MP is biggest tourist trap that I have ever seen. It costs 80 soles to get in for one day ($25US) for foreigners, and only 30 for Peruvians. The train to get there from Cusco costs $70US and it is only 4 hours! And that is really, really expensive compared to normal Peru - for locals the train is only around $18. There are no roads to Aguas Calientes (the small town near MP) so, to save money, lots of backpackers take the bus as close as they can get to the village and then hike in. I wasn't feeling up to an 8 hour hike in the rain along narrow train tracks, so we took a bus to Ollantaytambo and caught the train frm there. Ollantaytambo was beautiful, right in the mountains, and the train ride there was fun. Our friend Adam said that it was like the Polar Bear Express because there was so much excitement buzzing around in the air. We had run into the Canadians (Adam, Jamie and Sue) in Ollantaytambo and travelled to MP in a big Canadian posse, talking about tree planting the whole time! That night, I crashed because I was still feeling bad, and the others drank vodka and juice until they realized that we were getting up at 5 to hike up to MP (the bus was expensive). We all stumbled out of bed and headed up the stairs bright and early, and then kept heading up and up and up for over an hour, as the stairs never seemed to end. It was so humid and foggy, I felt like we were in the rain forest. And then, dun dun dun daaaa!, we arrived at the top and were finally at Machu Picchu. However, we couldn't really see MP for the first hour because everything was covered in dense mist. When the mist cleared, however, it was completely spectacular. People weren't lying, Machu Picchu is truly amazing. It didn't matter that everyone had talked it up so much, I loved it. We spent the entire day wandering around, exploring, eavesdropping on tours, and saying.. this is so COOL. We had sun the whole afternoon. Check out my pictures. We found a cave in the rocks (no Incan gold) and saw a local animal that looks like a squirrel bred with a rabbit. We were exhausted as we walked down the thousand stairs, but all pretty happy. The next day, after taking the train back to Ollantaytambo, Simon and I hiked to Las Salinas, these old salt terraces used by the Incas to collect salt from the river, which are still being used today. Then, we hiked along to the village Maras, with gorgeous views of the mountains and the sun burning down on us. We got so completely burnt as we had no sun screen. I have white squint mark lines around my eyes right now, pretty cute. When we arrived, exhausted, in Maras we got a cab with the happiest young Peruvian guy, who drove us to Morai. Morai is a site of ruins that look like amphitheatres, but are supposed to be old agricultural experimental sites. Apparently, although I didn't notice, each layer of the circles is it's own microclimate and is 1.5 degress hotter than the one above. We arrived back in Cusco exhausted and looking like two tomatoes, and then I took Simon out for an expensive dinner because we realized it was Valentine's day. It was delicious.

Arequipa and Canyon de Colca

2006-02-10T15:04:00.000-05:00

When Ken and I arrived in Arequipa we were so exhausted from our non-sleeps on over-night buses that we slept for almost the entire day. The following morning we went strolling around the massive monastery de Santa Catalaina, appreciating all the old furniture, religious pictures, huge stoves and ghosts. They had barbed wire underwear that the nuns used to use as punishment, for what I can't imagine. Then we jumped on a bus to Cabanaconde in the Canyon del Colca. It was one of the longest, most tiring and boring bus rides of the entire trip. It was only 6 hours (short by South American standards) but it felt like twice as long. There was nothing to see out the window, the first half of the ride was ugly desert and the second half was dense fog. And, we had no food. And, the TV was playing the most ridiculous, repetitive, traditional music that sounded like the same song played 58 times in a row. It is hard to explain how hilarious the 'music video' was, but it involved a female with a squeaky voice singing, doing the same dance move over and over, and changing every 2 minutes into a differently coloured traditional poofy dress. After an hour of her, the video changed to a man (probably her brother) who sang the same songs, with a worse voice, and wore a bright pink silk shirt the whole time. At least he had two half-naked background dancers shaking their bums the whole time to keep us somewhat entertained. However, when we arrived out-of-sorts in Cabanaconde in the pouring rain, we were brought to the nicest little hostel called Valle del Fuego. We got a huge room with 8 beds and a fireplace to ourselves, and spent the evening chatting to other guests in the restaurant, which had a roaring fire, candle-light, good food, and soothing English new age music. The atmosphere was really nice. In the morning, we started our hike down the canyon to the Oasis in dense fog. However, after 15 minutes, we dropped down below the clouds and the sun came out to show us an amazing view. Canyon del Colca is one of the deepest canyons in the world, and it was HUGE. At the bottom, we went for a dip in the pools at the oasis, admired the amazing scenery, and then headed back up the canyon in the afternoon. It was definatly not as easy going up as it was going down. It took us about 3 hours of climbing straight uphill (in the rain) and we had forgotten to bring chocolate! We arrived in Cabanaconde with shaking legs and frozen hands. We felt better after scarfing down some chocolate bars and lying in bed with our sleeping bags and 3 blankets and pillows each. After dinner, my friend the bartender made Kendra and I, and our British friends, excessive amounts of strong Pisco sour. Pisco sour is the favourite Peruvian mixed drink, involving mixing Pisco (like Brandy), egg whites, lime juice, ice and sugar. I figure that the amount of alcohol used would kill any bacteria in the egg whites. Anyways, after one strong drink, I started into one of the most intense conversations of my life with the bartender, all in Spanish of course. Basically, he was bitter towards both women and gringos, and you can imagine that the conversation wasn't going very well for me. It is impossible to defend yourself in a langage that you barely speak, and so unbelievably frustrating. It was a little upsetting -I do not like losing an argument in a foreign language- but Kendra and I just had to laugh about it in the end. I may not understand Peruvian culture very well, but Peruvians definatly don't understand me! The next morning on the bus, we saw a Condor circling in the clouds. The condor is a huge South American bird, like an eagle but bigger, and black and white, which was worshipped by the Incas. We got dropped off on the road going to Cusco (10 hours away) and ended up waiting in a police station, which was really a concrete hut on the side of the highway, for 3.5 hours. The police men were great, running outside in the pouring rain to flag down any bus that passed by in the right direction. However, no one was going our way and we were all planning out how we were going to camp on the police's cold stone floor, when a bus magically appeared for Cusco. Kendra and I were high-fiving in the rain but our excitement died when we got on the bus and the smell hit us. We rode for 10 hours on the smelliest bus I have ever been on in my ENTIRE elife, with kids puking up and down the asles all night because the smell was so bad. Fantastic. Then, we starting imaging that our bags down below had been robbed and couldn't go to sleep. It was not that much fun. We got to Cusco in the early hours of the morning (our bags were not robbed) and checked right into a hostel to thankfully go to bed.

Peru Photos

2006-02-08T13:07:00.000-05:00

Thanks to Nico, I have put some photos from Peru online, from my camara-less period. Go check them out! More to come from the new cam. Gwyn

Lima, Huachchina, Nazca.... Life goes on in Peru

2006-02-03T18:48:00.001-05:00

I haven't written my blog for a while mainly because I haven't been doing anything blog-worthy (for example, 'today I went to the embassy in Lima twice to check for my bank card and passport...') but now, the trip is moving on and I am getting over the whole ugly robbery experience. Except for the fact that I am now EXTREMELY paranoid and think that everyone, including dogs in the streets, are trying to rob me - things are back to normal. I have a new passport, bank card, VISA, and... dun dun dun daaaaa... a camara! So, although I am kind of scared of using it now, you can all expect some more pictures. Really, how could I have gone to Manchu Picchu without a camara? We spent so long hanging out in Lima that the hostel started to feel like our home, we lay around on the couches all day, watching cheesy movies, chatting to the people who worked there, drinking juice and cooking meals. I found soya cheese at the grocery store and it was really amazing. We went to a beach called Punta Rocas for Simon's birthday but neither of us went surfing because it was a reef break and the waves were enormous and powerful. Kendra and I tried unsuccessfully to go swimming and while we were standing in the water up to our thighs, a wave came, knocked us to our bums, and dragged us on our faces all the way up the shore. It was pretty hilarious. We drove home with Nicolas' friend Steven (who is from Lima) and I almost lost it! People drive like complete crazy, insane, maniacs here! I could never drive here: pass pass honk honk HOOONK slam on the breaks race forward pass honk honk slam on the breaks cut someone off honk honk HONK.
For my birthday, we went out for lunch on the cliffs over the ocean (I had the most amazing salad) and then had dinner and drinks at the hostel with Nicolas. It was relaxing. I got a new purse, wallet, pencil case, and change purse. To kill some time, we went to the small oasis town Huacachina (near Ica) to try sand boarding. I had never been to an oasis before and it was totally beautiful, especially after hours of driving through Peruvian desert. We went dune buggying and I was screaming and clutching the buggy the whole time - who knew that it was scarier than a roller coaster. We were in a huge buggy for 10 people and we were getting air off of sand dunes! The whole time we were flying down steep, steep dunes and roaring up the other side, doing hairpin turns, and sometimes going so fast it was hard to keep your eyes open. Kendra was laughing the whole time and I was saying, wahhh wahhh woah! and laughing and getting thrown around in the back with Simon. We tried sandboarding down the dunes, using boards that were planks of wood with some wax, and I was terrible at it. I suppose that it is somewhat similar to snowboarding, but really it is just trickier to turn, stand properly, and way easier to catch an edge and fall on your face (which I did). It was definately fun and you get sand lodged in every crack of your body. Good thing our hostel had a pool, which is where I stayed for the rest of the day. Although, I did go sandboarding one more time with Nicolas and Simon and I almost died of exhaustion trying to walk up the sand dune. There is nothing more tiring and irritating than stuggling up a sand dune in shoes full of sand.
We arrived back in good old Lima a few days later to find our passports and plastic money waiting at the embassy. Thank you Sandra at the embassy for being so nice! Kendra and I left Lima last night to come to Nazca (after missing a bus and being pickpocketed at the station, ah what a life we lead) and we went for a flight in a small little Cesna this morning to see the Nazca lines. These lines are ancient formations in the desert, made my removing dark rocks from the surface and making lighter coloured roads, and there are numerous ones, including a spider, monkey, spiral, hummingbird, whale, and some triangles. It was pretty cool to see, except for the fact that we both got nauseous and wanted to vomit from the plane banking to the left and right to see the formations. It reminded me of the time when Pam took me flying over the zoo and I got sick when we were circling over the elephants. We went to the museum here but it was dull and they wouldn't let us sit in the shade (said it was impossible?). We then went to get bus tickets and got nailed by boys with water ballons. Their excuse was that it is carnival but after getting nailed a second time, we were not impressed. Everytime I saw a young boy this afternoon, I just started yelling in Spanish 'Please, I am already wet' and then running if they got close. Tonight we are heading to Arequipa and then to Cusco, where we will meet up with Simon (who we left in Lima to do some Physio for his elbow, Pauve Simon). Ciao.

P.S.

2006-01-25T15:21:00.000-05:00

Alas, no more photos on the blog unless I get a new camara! :-(

Part Two of the Robbery

2006-01-25T14:35:00.000-05:00

So after the robbery we decided last minute to hang around in Huanchaco for a few days because these awesome Peruvian guys who we met, Charlos and Jose Luis (that owned the surf shop) had grown up in the neighbourhood where we were robbed, thought they knew the exact punks who had robbed us, and that maybe they could get us some of our stuff back on the black market. I know, I know, a long shot. But we decided to wait around and take the chance, considering how amazing it would be to get just the passports back. How amazing would that have been? Alas, it all came to nothing and now we are in Lima going about it the legal way, and paying tons of money to the Embassy to replace the damn things. At least we got to do some beaching, surfing and drowing-our-sorrows-in-ice-creaming while we waited. Apparently, what happens in the world of robbers is that the youngins who robbed us take all our money and then sell off the rest of our stuff cheap to some dealer dude who then re-sells them for lots more on the black market. Someone even told us that in Trujillo there is an actual physical black market area, it is not just an abstract wheeling and dealing type of thing like in Toronto. Anyways, because he was latino (key = not a gringo) and spoke real Spanish, Nicolas became the middleman between us and the dealers of stolen property. He had to spend one night rolling around the scary neighbourhoods in a taxi with Jose Luis asking locals about the robbery. And then he had to spend the whole next day crusing back and forth from Trujillo, with wads of our money stuffed in various secret pockets, waiting in the main square (the Plaza de Armas) and meeting with the dealer. In the end, the dealer was taking too long to track down our things and we were all sick of waiting for something to happen and not wanting to keep sending Nicolas back into a sketchy situation. After a couple days, we lost all hope. Again. I really wish that we had been properly warned about the dangers of Trujillo and Peru in general. We knew but we didn't KNOW. This is one violent country compared to Ecuador. We were fooled because we spent the first week here in Mancora, which is a chilled out little surf town that feels more like Hawaii than Peru. Fools! We have definatly woken up to reality now. The day after the robbery, Simon and I were walking in the Plaza de Armas and we saw two guys get out of a taxi, drop a bag and walk away. Then, some other guy sitting in a corner on the sidewalk jumped up, opened the bag, emptied it of wads of money and a camara, and disappeared in the opposite direction. A girl from Quebec (who lives here in a tent with her Peruvian boyfriend and her baby) was on a bus coming back to Huanchaco (with her baby) and they got held up by three men with huge guns that fire those bullets that spray. Luckily, the police caught the robbers and no one got hurt or robbed but MAN. After the arrest, all the men who were on the bus stripped the robbers naked and beat them brutally, with the police just looking on. You have probably heard enough scary stories from Peru but this is -for real- a different world. What is the worst right now is thinking about all the little, but important, things that we lost that the robbers probably chucked in the bin five minutes after. Like our photos and video clips, Kendra's journal and dictionary, my favourite knife that Dad gave me years ago, some favourite clothing, pencil cases, lip balms, music, cool stamps in our old passports. It is hard not to keep going over and over what we lost. This is Kendra's second camara to get stolen in SA. It is just stuff, but I hope we don't have to cut the trip short because of having to replace stuff. Just lucky that our ATM (who also goes by the name of Simon) still has means to support us. Just lucky that we are all OK. All we can do now is sit back and play the waiting game until the FedExs show up. P.S. This is totally off topic but I wanted to write it down somewhere before I forgot. Our Argentinan friend Nicolas came down with cholera while he was in Ecuador and was healed by a local with some seeds from the forest. Cholera! Unbelievable.

Reality Check In Peru

2006-01-24T16:17:00.000-05:00

This last week has been a little crazy. I am not sure how to start the story but the long and short of it is that Kendra and I got robbed blind. We arrived in Trujillo on Friday morning early and checked into a hostel on the beach in Huanchaco. We were exhausted but decided to go and do some sightseeing in the morning when there would be no crowds. The four of us, Kendie, Me, Simon and Nicolas (our Argentinan surfer friend) went to see the old pre-Incan city of Chan Chan which was impressive. Chan Chan is a labyrinth palace with lots of high adobe brick walls and open ceremonial rooms. It was so so hot there as this part of Peru is a desert - aparently Chan Chan means Sun Sun. Then, we all decided to walk to a temple that was a couple kilometers down the road because it was included on our ticket. This was a mistake because it brought us into a sketchy neighbourhood and we were too busy talking and too tired to pay proper attention. We decided not to take a cab (despite 100 cabs honking at us while we walked) because we just wanted to walk. This was also a mistake. Anyway, we turn a corner, chatting in English, and within (literally) a stones throw from the Huaca Esmeralda two very young Peruvians race towards us on the almost empty road. Kendra handed over her bag pretty quickly as she had a gun pointing in her stomach, and then when Nicolas tried to say ´Please let me keep my passport´ in Spanish the robbers panicked (didn 't expect to hear proper Spanish), cocked the gun, clock clock, and pointed it at Nicolas' head. Meanwhile, I am struggling with robber number 2 who is trying to rip my precious bag out of my hands. I really, really, really did not want to let it go but when my brain registered that they had a gun, I just let it go and suddenly the boys raced off with our little bags. We all ran and hid inside the temple, Kendra and I in complete shock, and the boys lucky to still have all their stuff even though both had been on the verge of handing them over when the boys took off. I swear the whole experience was only 20 seconds. I remember running towards the temple and thinking, are we just going to let those fuckers run in the opposite direction with all my stuff? Damn those robbers. We spent the rest of the day crusing around with the police and filling out the complicated police report. Too bad that I have no insurance. I was so mad and angry, even hours after it happened. Actually, I am still mad and angry now. It was completely stupid but I had EVERYTHING valuable in that one bag. I had taken my valuable stuff out of my other big knapsack because there was a man sleeping in the luggage compartment on the bus (nothing surprises me anymore). Also, I like to have most of my valuables on my lap on overnight buses. Then, we were so tired and out of it in the morning that I neglected to move my passport etc. back into my other bag. We were also camping at the hostel and I didnt want to leave my stuff in the tent when we did not know who else was camping there. Basically, it was a stupid move and the only day in these 3 months where I have had everything in one bag. If only I had one valuable thing left, like maybe my passport or Ontario driver's license. What the hell are the robbers going to do with those. So, now Simon has become the temporary ATM for Kendra and me and we are heading to Lima to replace our lost goods. And that is the end of PART ONE of the story, more to come in a few days.... And I am A-Ok, just broke and angry at Peru.

Mancora, Peru

2006-01-18T14:11:00.000-05:00

We have now been lazing at the beach in Mancora for a week and it has been a sweet life. Surf towns are so relaxed. We are camping at one of the hostels and we just roll out of our tent, put on our bathing suits and then head down to the beach to bake and surf. I am definately getting a little better at surfing, I got 3 nice waves yesterday and felt really proud. Simon says that I look funny when I surf but it is just because I have no idea what is going on or where the wave is taking me. I am just trying not to fall off. My arms are definately getting stronger, that's for sure. We had a huge BBQ the other day with a group of friends from the hostel. We bought two huge fishes, shrimp, tons of veggies, corn, and pasta with pesto. We ended up barbequing for about 4 hours, eating the whole time, and it was totally delicious. It is so hot right now that I can't handle being at the internet cafe, I am sweating like crazy. I need to go for a swim or go and get an ice cream. Tomorrow we will probably leave for some beaches further south to get a little more surfing in before leaving this dry desert coast for the mountains. I want to go see the longest left-hand break in the world at Chicama and surf at Huancaca.

Wahoo More PHOTOS!

2006-01-15T13:36:00.000-05:00

Hello Faithful Readers. I have added MORE PHOTOS to my blog! I spent hours and hours slaving away infront of the computer and it was all for you guys! Check BOTH of my last albums, Ecuador 3 and 4, because I have added photos to both and some explanations too. Miss you all like crazy, hope it isn't too cold and snowy, the beach is hot as hell and completely fantastic. Love Gwyn.

PERU

2006-01-12T19:10:00.000-05:00

We just spent an entire day getting to Peru. We wanted to avoid one notorious bad boarder crossing at the coast, so we took a longer route to Piura. We left Vilcabamba at 5 and barely got to Loja in time for our bus, with only $2 in our pocket. We owed the bus driver for the tickets, so at every stop, Simon had to jump out and search for a bank machine. We never found one and had to wait until Peru to finally find somewhere to take out money. It was stressful. I crossed the boarder with 25 cents to my name! The boarder we crossed was pretty relaxed and the worst thing that happened was that the boarder guy was an idiot and stamped the wrong page in Simon's passport. Piura was a different story, the city was wild! People yelling, taxis screeching down the street, robbers and scammers everywhere! We definatly got ripped off in the taxi, but it was only a little money and I figure that the first day in any country you are bound to get suckered by someone. At least we didn't get false bills from a false money changer like most of our friends. We ended up taking an unofficial taxi to Mancora, a surf town on the coast of northern Peru. We showed up at the taxi and right away I had 10 boys shoving water and coke in my face and trying to sell random shit. They kept asking for my email. Simon was trying to tie the surfboard onto the 'taxi' which was really a huge old 1970's Camaro with 7 of us stuffed into it! We took off at top speed and continued at top speed the whole way, and although we got there faster than the bus, it was the usual scary experience of passing other cars uphill, in the dark, on a blind courner, on the edge of a 100m cliff, honking the entire time. We got to Mancora in one piece and had a huge meal (the first of the day) and our first Peruvian beer. It was delicious. And now, more surfing.. !! And hopefully selling the damn surfboard which we have been lugging around this entire time. Halleluah! Bienvenidos a Peru!

Vilcabama - Final Days in Ecuador

2006-01-12T18:45:00.000-05:00

From Cuenca, we took a very twisty, cliff-hanging bus ride to this small town in the south of Ecuador, right near the boarder with Peru. Vilcabama is a marvelously relaxed town. It was gorgeous! So green and lush and mountainy. Simon and I stayed in a little cabana on the edge of the Rio Yambala which reminded me of the farm because it was old fashioned. We relaxed for one day reading in the hammock, swimming in the river, and eating good meals with the family who owned the place (who were very kind and chatty). We got some homemade cake! Simon and I then set off on a 4 day hike through the mountains of Vilcabama. The hike was beautiful but exhausting. The first day was straight uphill in a rutted horse trail, along a bare ridge, in the burning sunlight. When we finally got to the refuge where we were camping, I had to collapse for an hour in the shade. After swimming in the waterfall (and getting lost in the woods on the way home), I made some dinner while Simon tried to distract the horse who was trying to lick me to death and eat our oatmeal. I should probably not have sneaked him a carrot earlier on. When we finally got the horse out of the way, we ate and then went to bed earlier. The second day was also directly uphill, except this time it was through dense cloud forest and we were constantly hopping over and under logs and ferns with our large backpacks. When we finally emerged from the forest at an altitude of around 3100m (we started at 1700m), we had eaten all the chocolate and cookies already that were supposed to last for the entire trip. Simon was mad (I ate more) but we needed the energy! That night, we camped on the paramo (barren high-altitude environment with grass and no trees)near a lake. Right as we started cooking, it started to hail and then POUR, so we had to escape to the tent and cook in the vestibule. The rain pounded down for 4 or 5 hours while we huddled in the tent, and then the rest of the night we were woken up by huge gusts of wind and sheets of lightening. It was wild. We stayed dry thanks to my marvelous tent! The next morning, the mountains were completly clouded in and we couldn't see the two high passes that we were supposed to take across the paramo. Simon and I ended up wandering up the mountain checking the compass every 5 minutes. We found the passes without too much trouble but could not see the - apparently - gorgeous view due to the dense fog and cloud. When we arrived on the ridge at 3600m, the wind almost blew up right off down the side of a cliff! It must have been at least 60km per hour, I am guessing. We quickly made it down the the Lagunas de las Perlas and then continued to descend down another ridge back to the cloud forest. The walk down was as difficult as the walk up, through more dense forest with numerous vines and tree trunks and strange spiky flowers and ferns. When we FINALLY arrived at the river at the bottom, I was overjoyed to discover that part of the trail had been destroyed by a landslide. I panicked slightly on the struggle up, but I think it is understandable considering I was hanging off the side of a landslide, with no idea where the trail was, and a huge pack on my back. Eventually, we rediscovered the path and headed to our last campsite, which had the MOST gorgeous view (especially from the outhouse) and a beautiful sunset. The last day was a little bit less intense than the others, but it was still exhausting and steeply downhill. Simon did a bit of bushwacking, which was exciting, I guess, because I got to watch while he fell down the side of a cliff and almost killed himself. In the end, we were both really excited to get back to our Cabana and drink a cold beer and take a hot shower. In the end, it was a very beautiful but also challenging hike. Vilcabama was a great town to visit, muy tranquillo!

Hiking in Parque National Cajas

2006-01-04T10:58:00.000-05:00

We have just returned from the most beautiful hike in the Cajas national park in Ecuador, near Cuenca. The park is this amazingly beautiful, high-altitude area in the mountains, full of lakes, waterfalls and birds. It was gorgeous, cold, and empty, expect for very few others. We camped out one night in the ´refugia´ at Lake Toreadora, which really wasn`t a hiker`s refuge at all and was just the park office. We slept on matresses on the floor of the office and used the kitchen of the warden who lives there to cook dinner, despite having to pay outrageous fees to stay in the park. Tourists have to shell out money at every turn in this country, the entrance to the park for Ecuadorians is $1.50 and for all foreigners it is $10. The four of us, Simon, Jess, Joel and Me, did a short walk in the afternoon around the lake and had to stop every 3 minutes to look at something and say ´This is so beautiful!´. That night we had a fire in the office to keep us warm and the woke up early to see the ground covered in frost! Joel and Jess headed off for a one day trek, and Simon and I headed in the other direction to do a longer loop through the park. We hiked high up on a ridge, that had an unbelievable view, and then followed a narrow, and slightly scary, path along the ridge to the east. We lost the trail for a while when we descended from the ridge, but with the help of our wits and our compass, we met up with another section of the Inca trail which runs through the park. On the way to our campsite, we passed through a large valley full of waterfalls falling from high up in the mountains. That night, we pitched our tent on the side of a river in the middle of some Incan ruins. It was so cool. I went for a freezing cold swim in a waterfall and then we made a delicious dinner of peanut satay pasta. Simon cooked up some apples in chocolate and sugar which turned out to taste amazing. When night fell, we built a fire and watched the millions of fireflys fly around the valley. I have never seen so many fireflys in my life! To keep warm that night, we zipped our sleeping bags together. However, my zipper goes down further which means that Simon's bag fits only onto the bottom half of mine, and his head was warming my belly-button all night long. The next morning, we had the most amazing hike alongside a lake that had a small little beach, where we decided to take a mid-morning nap. Part of the trail went through a section of tropical like forest where we had to climb over and under fallen branches and jump over small ravines. The scenery changed every half an hour, from lake to tropical forest, to high mountain pass, to a steep descent through more tropical forest. It was so beautiful and hard to describe completely! It was sad to have to leave such a peaceful, breath-taking place, and to return to the city again.

New Years in Cuenca

2006-01-04T10:25:00.000-05:00

Simon and I have now been in Cuenca (and surrounding area) for about a week now and have been enjoying every minute. The city is such a change from the other Ecuadorian cities that we have visited, most noticably Quito, as it is full of Spanish colonial architecture. There is a gorgeous old church on every other courner, each with a peaceful tree-, flower- and fountain- filled plaza in front. We spent the first day we were here walking around the banks of the river in the sun (Halleluah sun!) and relaxing. We visited a museum that had some old Incan ruins and was filled with artifacts on the ethnography of Ecuador, including numerous shrunken heads of both sloths and humans! Simon and I then discovered the most delicious ice cream store in the world and ate a huge cone in the central plaza looking at everyone stroll by. It was delicious. Cuenca had a really nice feel for a city, with all the beautiful buildings and the large student population, this is one city we have visited that I could imagine living in! On the 31st (of December), we did a day hike with Joel and Jess (the French couple we met in Banos) that was beautiful. We hiked along a portion of the old Inca trail that ran between Quito and Lima, and also continued on to Manchu Picchu. The path we followed was all red clay from the ceramic bricks used to construct the Inca road and the views of the east and west cordillas (mountain ranges of the Andes) were incredible. The sun shone for the whole hike and we all arrived back in Cuenca tired but happy. For dinner, Joel cooked us up some delicious French crepes and for desert I got a sugar, apple, cinnamon crepe that was completely delicious. After dinner, we all headed out to the streets with a box of wine to check out the New Years festivites. The tradition here for New Years is for everyone to construct large dolls, or efigies, of various local politicians, football players from rival teams, army generals, or hated international figures (i.e. Uncle Sam and George Bush made appearances) and at midnight, all the dolls are thrown in a pile and burned, to loud hooting and holering from everyone. All through the streets were displays of the dolls, one focusing on the US, one on local Ecuadorian politicians, and at each display men were dressed up as women, dancing in the street, and forcing any car that tried to drive through to pay a toll of some small change. It was definatly different! So, at midnight, we watched the dolls burn in a big pile and then set off some pretty fireworks that I had bought, while drinking some horrible champagne! Kids had been setting off fireworks all night and everytime you turned a corner one would explode almost directly in your face. We were looking for a big party somewhere, but as soon as midnight passed, everyone disappeared from the streets and all the tourists were left standing around wondering what had happened! At 12:30, we couldn`t find an open bar in the city! Apparently, everyone just goes to bed after all the dolls burn up! Anyway, we ended up dancing salsa in the street with some friendly locals and drinking fizzy beer, and then returning to the hotel to finish our beer on our balcony that has a gorgeous view overlooking the entire city. It was definatly an interesting night! Happy New Years Everyone!

The Jungle in Mishualli

2005-12-29T15:58:00.000-05:00

I just got back from a quick two day trip in the Jungle with Patricia and Kendra. We took a long bus ride to a small town on the edge of the Rio Napo and smack dab in the jungle. The town is beautiful with a beach on the river, monkeys in the central plaza and tons of wild jungle flowers! We stayed in a cute little hotel but we kept waking up all night long because it was raining incredibly hard. It sounded like someone was throwing buckets of water down from the sky, buckets! When we got up early in the morning to go on our morning jungle tour, the river was absolutely PUMPING and was about twice as high as the night before. We set off apprehensivly in the pouring rain to ride in an long rickety wooden canoe (powered by a motor) with our guide Eduardo. The river was moving incredibly fast and there were huge waves that were throwing the old canoe around. All three of us put on our life jackets because we were so nervous and also thinking about crocodiles and pirannas! It was quite exciting. We took a beautiful walk through the jungle, starting in the secondary jungle and ending up in the primary jungle. We saw numerous medicinal plants used by the jungle people, including some for cuts, colic, fever, and poison. We ate some little ants that tasted like lemon and saw numerous large termite homes. What amazed me were all of the beautiful tropical flowers growing along the path, including tons of birds of paradise flowers (Mom, you would have loved it). There were curvy vines and huge trees and palm leaves everywhere, it was beautiful and even more jungely because it was raining the entire time. We saw a tucan when we visited the museum and also drank some fermented yucca drink (called chicha or something) in a local village. While we were eating lunch back in Mishualli, one of the monkeys came and stole the bag of chips that Kendra had just bought from under our table. He then sat down, calmly opened the bag exactly like a human would and then gobbled up all the chips with his monkey friends! Later on, one of them stole an American man's glasses. In the afternoon, I had a short walk through the jungle and then headed back on the bus to met Simon in Banos and hear about his biking adventure in Chimborazo. I do not know how single girls can bare travelling alone for long periods of time in this country. I was constantly harassed for the 5 hours or more that it took me to get home. Unbelievable.

XMAS in Banos

2005-12-29T15:13:00.000-05:00

Well, Christmas day has flown by and I hardly noticed it come and go! We had a great day of course but it just never really felt like Christmas without the snow (or grey slush) and pine trees and constant carols playing the old favourites over and over again (which I thought I hated until I started missing jingle bells and Rudolph!). We spent Christmas in Banos, a small town southwest of Quito, that is absolutely gorgeous. It is quite a tourist town, lots of hotels with hot water and restaurants with international food (delicous!), but it deserves to be because there is lots to do. It is surrounded by hills, a volcano, hot springs and jungle. On the 24th, we spent the morning touring around the Basilica which was amusing. The walls were covered in paintings of people being saved from car crashes and deadly falls into canyons by the Virgen de Agua Santa (the town's patron saint). There was a museum upstairs that was a mixture of the most bizarre things. There were donations to the Virgen from townspeople, including photos, locks of hair, old typewriters, toy trucks, old wedding gowns and old rocks. And rooms and rooms full of elaborately embroidered velvet and silk robes for the Virgen and the baby Jesus! There was also a taxidermy room full of half-decomposed animals! And remember, this was in the church! That afternoon we had a quick soak in the hotsprings which are under a waterfall, along with a million local kids going bananas, and then hurried back to the hotel to prepare dinner.
We had a delicious Christmas Eve dinner and everyone in the hotel contributed something. The owner Paul supplied the chicken (turkey is a little rare in Ecuador), Joel and Jess (France) made vegetable soup, Brooke and Vanessa (USA) made mashed potatoes and key-lime pie, Aaron and Daron (Canada, from Regina) made fresh bread rolls and vegetable kabobs, Kendra and Patricia made a huge salad, a German couple made apple cake, and we made shrimp/tuna kabobs and chocolate fondu. We were all so full afterwards that we all had to go to bed early to lie down! I got some earrings and some candy from the girls and a hot water bottle from Simon. They make a taffy-like candy in Banos and you can watch them stretch out yards of taffy on the side of the street.
On Christmas day we went for a bike ride towards Puyo, a town in the jungle, and we biked along the side of a huge canyon full of waterfalls. We had to bike through this long dark tunnel through the mountain and it was so dark in the middle that I thought I was going to fall off the bike. We took a little sketchy cable car over to see a waterfall and did a little hike down to another famous waterfall, which wasn't really that impressive. I suppose Niagara Falls has made me expect a lot out of waterfalls. We had another delicious meal that night and then got ready to set off for more adventures!

The End of Volunteering

2005-12-22T16:37:00.000-05:00

We have finished our volunteer stint in Tabacundo/Pedro Moncayo/Guallara Grande today and have returned to Quito. I think I just ate the best meal of my life, samosas, juice, and fruit salad, and everything was full of flavour and spice! I also just ate a delicious chocolate chip cookie and couldn´t be happier. My stomach is singing Halleluah right now. We had a nice goodbye with our Ecuadorian family, the Andrango´s, and exchanged some little Christmas prezzies. We made them picture collages of photos that we had taken of the family during our stay, and they turned out really beautiful. The family gave us some little things for Christmas, including a delicious...ahum... lunch of Cuy (guinea pig)! To make the grandmother happy (and to satisfy my curiosity) I ate a little leg of Cuy, which was probably only a tablespoon of meat. To me, and I am no expert, it tasted like duck because it was fatty. We actually got to see the whole process of preparing the Cuy and I am suprised that I ate it after seeing the de-hairing and gutting process. None of us did much work the last week in Pedro Moncayo because there was so so much rain. We ended up planting some carrots, planting some trees, and of course, cutting that good old alfalfa. We also did a lot of babysitting the girls and playing cards.
I have to say that we were all quite excited to leave working and plan for a delicious Christmas dinner together in Banos! However, it was sad to leave the family and especially the little girls who we were all very attached to. The mother Mirium was sad to see us go. Her husband spends only 2 days a week at home and I think she must get quite lonely with only her 3 young children around all the time. She is only 21 and does not have much freedom in her life. I would not love the life of a rural woman in Ecudor. It takes Mirium 4 or 5 hours of constant work to do the laundry (in cold water) for the family. Alonso was also sad to see us go, I think. He is such a free spirit and I wish he could travel and see more of the world. He would love it.
I do not have much to say about last weekend because it is a dark time in my memory. I got hit with a flu like virus, that also affected Kendra and Mirium, and was mildly sick for one day with stomach problems, fever and headache. I woke up that night around 2 unable to swallow. Then followed 2 days of hell and intense pain from a raging throat infection that left white dots all over my throat. I ended up having to get a penicillin injection from the doctor that brused my bum. I am all better now and did not pass anything on to Simon, which is a god-send. Oh, I almost forgot, I got attacked by evil dogs the other day in Guallara Grande when I was going for a walk. One vicious yellow one tried to bite my leg! I kicked it. The dogs here are brutal, underfed, mis-treated, and evil! Two are fighting right now in the street as I write this and it sounds like one might end up dead.
Ok ciao, Merry Christmas to all who are still reading! Peace.

Living in Guallara Grande

2005-12-15T16:34:00.000-05:00

We have now been living with an Ecuadorian family in the campo (=countryside) for almost 2 weeks and what a crazy experience, let me tell you! Where do I even start to explain? Simon and I are living with the grandparents Clementina and Don Melchor, and their laid-back son Alonso. And Kendra is living next door with the other son Ernesto, his wife Mirium, and their threes kids Melanie (6), Haidi (4) and Ismael (1). We are living in a tiny village, down a long dirt road, with tons of pigs and sheep and cuy, lots of mangy dangerous dogs, and fields and fields of alfalfa and maize. Our house is a little adobe house with chipped pink painted walls and cold floors. The toilet has no toilet seat and the shower is the usual burning drip or freezing gush. The family keeps calling Simon my esposa (=husband) and we found out yesterday that they thought we were in our 30's and 40's! The abuelo asked me yesterday when we were planning on getting married and no one seems to understand why we don't have any children yet! Simon mentioned that he wants 15 and they were all very impressed with that. Mirium is only 21, which means that she had Melanie when she was 15! We always laugh because we call her Kendra's mom but Kendra is at least a year older than her.
We have been spending out days working with the family on the Hacienda and going to the school in Picalqui or Esperanza. I just got back from an after-school homework program in La Esperanza where the kids were going wild and un-supervised and not doing any homework. Honestly, I keep thinking my Spanish is ok and then I am faced with a crying child and have no way of comforting them! Kendra and I had to babysit the girls at home the other night and what a night that was, tears tears tears and rice thrown all over the floor. Speaking of rice, let me make a summary of a days meals for us. Breakfast = bread and egg and instant coffee (or rice and corn). Lunch = soup, rice and beans and lettuce/tomato. Dinner = soup, rice and potatoes and avocado. Repeat. Kendra doesnt even get the soup and our friend Patricia's family doesnt eat dinner. We are still all going on crazy candy binges whenever we get into town.
The work at the Hacienda has been hard but not too bad, it is mainly the hot hot sun that tires you out during the day. I have been cutting lots of alfalfa for the Cuys (reminder = guinea pigs), planting trees, working in the tree nursery (vivero), sowing corn seeds, transplanting little lettuces and cabbages (and onions), and hoeing hoeing and more hoeing. You should see me go with a hoe now, I am an expert. Next year at tree planting I am switching to a hoe. Maybe.
The farm is beautiful and totally organic. There are gorgeous mountains all around. I am also learning a lot of farm slang in Spanish. Simon busted up his arm playing football with the boys (got a little too competitive with people who have played football for their entire lives, I think) and has been unable to work. Alas, I have had to cut twice as much alfalfa! He had been working in the school with Patricia and babysitting. We are all completely exhausted at the end of the day, probably due to the combination of sun, hoe, spanish and carb-only meals (or alternativly, school, crying kids, spanish and carb-only meals), and we all go to bed around 8!
We attempted to make two gingerbread houses for the girls yesterday, and one looks great but the other had a roof disaster. Hopefully we can paste it together tonight! The gingerbread tastes great but no one here knows what ginger is, I showed Mirium yesterday and she laughed at it! The food here seriously lackes in flavour. The favourite comida tipica of Ecuador is rice, potatoes and pollo (chicken), maybe with some chili sauce. I apologize for talking about food so much, but we can't help it! We talk about food for at least an hour a day here.
Anyways, you have all probably given up reading this message because it is so long, but I have so much to say and this is not nearly all of it! Life here is so different and complicated and hard, and I cant really say that I love it or am in love with Ecuador. But I am learning loads and definatly becoming a strong hoer. More to come soon, I hope! Thinking of you all at home and wishing everyone a Merry Christmas!

More Photos!

2005-12-11T17:17:00.000-05:00

Ola! I have just added the next installment of photos, so click on the link on the left (over there) and check out the next album. Enjoy Amigos. Love Gwyn

First Week at the Hacienda Picalqui

2005-12-04T12:48:00.000-05:00

So we finally arrived at the Hacienda to start volunteering and our first chore after we dropped off our bags in the cottage involved driving for half an hour through the countryside in the back of a pickup (actually Kendra and I got to sit up front because we are chicas) to a man who farmed chickens, named Hector. Hector´s chicken farm had 6000 chickens, four each in a cage about one foot square, and none of them had beaks to prevent them peaking each other. They were egg chickens and every few minutes they would let out a loud squak and lay an egg. Our job was to shovel up 25 full bags of chicken shit for fertilizer. Kendra and I were holding the bags open for the shovelers, which meant that clouds of dry chicken shit dust were constantly surrounding our faces. Simon was carrying out the bags of shit to the truck, each of them weighing around 30 kgs., and I could only carry two before my arms felt like they would fall off. We were only inside the coop for an hour but that is a long time to be inhaling poo dust and hearing squaking chickens lay eggs. At least we got some fresh juice and homemade honey at Marcelo´s house afterwards. Lucky Simon got to ride home in the back of the truck with the 25 bags of poo. So now, I can say that I have definately inhaled both cow and chicken poo for an extended period of time. For Thursday and Friday we were planting trees in the Paramo, which is the high altitude ecosystem here up in the Andean mountains. It was completely unlike Canadian tree planting because we had to use hoes to dig the holes, which sucks. Hoes are useless. We also had to dig huge holes for the tiny little trees and the altitude did not make the strenuous work easier. On Friday, the truck ´forgot´ to come pick us up on the mountain and we all got caught in a massive hail storm at 4000m. It was beautiful but we were all borderline hypothermic, and we ended up walking around 8km downhill to keep warm. We basically walked back to the Hacienda in the 3 hours we were abandoned on the mountain. Needless to say we were not impressed with the organization´s organization, especially because we had just paid all our money (to volunteer) that morning! Everyone felt better after some potent alcoholic juice and soup, but we all fell asleep around 8. I have curbed my resentment towards the organization and am looking forward to moving in with the family tomorrow. We also got to feed the Cuy (guinea pigs) and pet the llamas on the farm. This weekend we were back in Quito (blah) and rode around the city on the top of a bus with a band to celebrate the fiesta de Quito. Simon almost passed out from blowing a whistle for 45 minutes straight on the bus and we almost lost our heads going through a tunnel. We are going to the equator this afternoon to see if we can balance an egg on a nail. Ciao!

Laguna Cuichocha

2005-11-29T20:54:00.000-05:00

We wanted to start our volunteer work at the Hacienda on Monday but now it is almost Wednesday and we are still in Otavalo! We are all disappointed because we have been looking forward to starting with for a while and now we are waiting around. The reason that we are still here is that some of the indigenous communities are striking on the highway and throwing rocks at any traffic that tries to go though, and hence there are no buses even though we are only half an hour away from the farm. They are doing it for a good reason though, which is partly why we have not tried to get through, which is to get water to their communities. So, instead of working today we went to Guinia Pig lake which is this massive volcano (called Cotocachi) which collapsed after erupting and formed a beautiful lake. We hiked around it for a while and then I went for a swim and FROZE to death, though I pretended it was pretty warm and everyone else was missing out. On the way back we caught a ride on the back of a farmer´s truck along with a cow! I was sitting in cow poo (literally) and had to hold onto a cow poo covered railing to stay on. Simon was hanging off the side like a dog and I kept expecting to see him rolling behind the truck when we went around corners. Damion (the Colombian) was up front and enjoying himself while Kendra and I almost choked to death on sawdust mixed with cow poo in the back. We were laughing so hard we kept inhaling the flying sawdust and when we got off the truck we had dust (and poo) in our hair, ears and nostrils. Kendra kept wondering if the cow that was bumping into her would shove her into me and then I would go flying off the side of the mountain, which would have been a disaster. Maybe we will get to the Hacienda tomorrow.

PHOTOS

2005-11-25T11:22:00.000-05:00

I have finally got some photos online! Use the link on this website to check them out and tell me what you think. More to come later and perhaps some descriptions. Thank you Tommy for getting this organized for me, you are the best.

Cotopaxi

2005-11-25T10:22:00.000-05:00

After one night in Quito, Simon and I left for Cotopaxi National Park to do our first hike of the trip, called `Across Ruminahui`. Kendra stayed in Quito to take some Spanish classes. The hike was fantastic, we took a bus to the park and then a pickup truck into the park. We camped at the base of Cotopaxi, which is one of the highest active volcanos in the world. The mountain is shaped in a perfect cone with a snowy hat. We did a short acclimatization hike the first day after we got there, and proceeded to get a little lots in the paramo (the high altitude desert here). Everything is so bare and there are no trees, completely different mountain scenery than Canada. We were camping above 3000m and it was FREEZING all night long. Neither of us slept a wink. In the morning, we took off towards Mt. Ruminahui, which is an ancient volcano which had a massive eruption millions of years ago which blew out the entire centre of the mountain, leaving a huge crater. The hike was not long but it was INTENSE because we were hiking up to around 4000m (more than 12000ft). I would take 5 steps uphill and my heart would be POUNDING so that I was worried that it would jump out of my chest! We had to take tons of breaks, but we weren´t in any rush and the scenery was amazing. We woke up to the first SUN in a month and we could see the summits of all the mountains in the area, Cotopaxi, Chimborazo, Antasana, Singuinahi (or something) and more. We camped at the base of Ruminahui and had another chilly night of sleeping. We saw lots of birds, tons of hummingbirds, eagles, Andean gulls and other unidentified ones. I even saved Simon´s sandel from being eaten by a Andean fox. There were wildflowers everywhere, Nain you would have loved them! The next day we climbed up a pass through Ruminahui at around 4200m and then had a long hike down scree, sand, and mud into the rural valley of Machachi. We were surrounded by the mountains the whole time and did not see a single soul until the end of the hike. It was totally beautful. Simon and I had a slight panic attack at one point on the way down and thought we were lost (we weren´t). We ended up bushwacked and trying to climb over a creek that was in a steep narrow gully. Simon got across first but had to climb back down into the creek when my attempt to chuck his bag across failed miserably. I basically threw it directly down into the river. Then I had to climb down to help him when my attempt to throw my bag across also failed miserably. We ended up scrambling through the gully for a while until we could get out. However, all our work was pointless as we ended up on a road that led back to the road that we had just been on (the right road). We felt a little ridiculous but it was kind of exciting.

Last Days in Montanita

2005-11-24T10:50:00.000-05:00

Now that I am back in Quito I can spend lots of time on the internet for not very much money and am now going to do some major updating of this blog site! We just spent two weeks in Montanita and despite all the fun surfing, there was not a lot else to do and I was happy to leave for something new. And enough of the jealous comments in emails etc. about me lazing around and tanning on the beach! I did not see the sun ONCE in Montanita. Being at the beach without the sun is a little discouraging and chilly. I would have to pump myself up to get in the water to go surfing everyday, but once I was in I was as happy as a clam because the water was so deliciously warm. I am definately a better surfer, I just have to get my own better board! I was using Sabrina´s board (thank you Sab!) but it is designed for big waves of around 20ft and wasnt exactly easy to use. Kendra and I spent one afternoon in Montanita driving to the next town to file a police report about her stolen camara (sob..) and let me tell you it was quite different than police at home. The police station was completely empty when we arrived and the hotel owner who drove us had to search around for 10 minutes to fish up a police officer. We then had to go to the internet cafe in town while the police typed up an official stolen items report for the camara, and Kendra was paying for his internet and printing costs the whole time. Kendra then forked over 2 dollars for some official stamps on the paper and we had to wait another 10 minutes to look for a pen so the officer could sign the paper! I found it pretty hilarious. We also went for a bike ride to a small town, Dos Manges, the next day and ended up having to bike through a giant herd of cattle, I got a cow tail whacked in my face, and we got covered in mud and cow poo. I have really seen that people have a completely different view of the environment here than in the developed world. People just throw trash everywhere and no one recycles. Our bus driver was unwrapping crackers and just chucking the wrappers out the window as we drove. We were also at this outside bar that had a fire (in Montanita) and the fire was out, so Simon was fiddling with it to give it a little more oxygen. The bar man came running over, yelled at Simon in Spanish, and placed all the logs back on the fire, smothering it again. He then disappeared behind the bar and came back with a cup full of gas, which he then poured on the fire, and POOF. We even saw kids jumping on this huge turtle on the beach, although it may have already been dead.

Still on the Beach

2005-11-15T21:10:00.000-05:00

It is hard to believe that in one more week, when we leave Montanita, we will have been away already for one whole month. I get the sad feeling that this trip is just going to fly by and before I know it, I will be back planting trees in Canada in cold May. Kendra just arrived in Montanita to met us, along with a whole gang of cute male travelling buddies she had made in Quito after one day, and Simon´s friend Sabrina just left here to go home to Quebec, which is sad because she is leaving her boyfriend behind. The life here is relaxing, we go surfing, we eat, we play cards, we drink Cervesa, but it is also a little boring. And we have not seen the sun, basically, since we got here. There was some sun in Quito but NOTHING here (although I still burned the back of my legs through dense cloud cover yesterday) and I am disallusioned about the amount of sun and warmth you get when you are at the Ecuador of the planet. I think that I am making some improvements in my surfing ability, standing is not as rare as it once was ! but I am covered in bruses from being washed around with my board in the bigger waves that blow through. Simon is pretty good, I might even say better, but he has had more practice. We know all the locals and the more permanent travelers in the town now and we have eaten in all the restaurants once. I have not been practicing my Spanish but we will start volunteering in a couple weeks, and we will be living with a family who does not speak English. Hence, I will soon be back in immersion and one my way to being TRIlingual. Sounds pretty impressive. Nothing else exciting to report. Life here is not so different than at home, although we realize that we have not really experienced true Ecuadorian culture yet. More to come next week... Ciao.

Montanita

2005-11-06T21:46:00.000-05:00

The bus ride from Quito to Montanita took the entire day, from 8 to 8, and was quite a ride. Three consecutive movies starring Jackie Chann and frequent scenes featuring explosions and people shooting each other with machine guns, made it a little difficult to sleep. Then we had 4 straight hours of salsa music on TV that was accompanied by salsa music videos from the 80s. Salsa is cool but not when it is so loud that you cannot talk to the person next to you, and not for 4 hours. Another exciting Ecuadorian moment happened when Simon bought some interesting looking chips at the bus station. I tried a few but they didnt really have a taste so I only ate 10 or so. While waiting for the bus, I decided to try and translate the ingredients from Spanish and almost had a heart atack 30 seconds later when I realized that I had just sampled ´dehydrated pig skin´. No Joke (Tom and Simon I know you are loving this right now). It was really not a good day for snacks because later I bought some interesting looking candy (I thought it was caramel) and it turned out to contain edible paper. I have decided to read the ingredients before I buy things. Today, we arrived in Montanita from Puerto Lopez, both really sweet towns on the coast, but it is very touristy here. Surf shops and aussies everywhere. We have a gorgeous hostel with a porch overlooking the ocean and a hammock, for $5 each a night. We are hoping to bargain down to $4 because we might stay for 2 weeks. We went surfing today and Simon ran over my head on his board, left a huge bruse on my leg, and then said that it was my fault (it was not, he just can not control his board). Supposedly we are going surfing tomorrow again at 6am for high tide but I am not as obsessed. Surfing is tiring and I am not fit right now. Ok, going to go read some Spanish in the hammock. Peace. xo Gwyn

A la Costa!

2005-11-04T21:52:00.000-05:00

Yo termino los clases de espanol! And we are heading for warmer weather, the coast, and some surf. Simon has been checking the surf report daily and I am not looking forward to the chilly water, as we did not bring wetties. But I am looking forward to the sun, Quito is so cloudy! We went up the Quito Teleferiqo (gondola) yesterday with about one million other people (vacation day yesterday) and the view was worth the 2 hour wait. Gorgeous mountains everywhere and the city spreading out below forever in the valley. It was freezing cold and you can really feel the altitude. Simon was the only one wearing sandals and all the locals were laughing because his face turned blue! I bought some books in Spanish today (le Principata, or le petit prince) and a dictionary, and am now on mission improve my Spanish. It is amazing how much we learned, I can read children´s books and understand them, although not every word. It is very similar to French and it helps being in the familia and hablar Espanol with Papi y Mami. Our Papi has all these crazy stories of getting lost while hiking all the mountains in Ecuador and one unbelievable story (although I believe it) of being gorred by a bull when he was a teenager on his grandpa´s hacienda. Getting sleepy. I think it is the altitude.

Still in Quito

2005-11-01T19:00:00.000-05:00

Hello Faithful Readers,

Simon and I are still in Quito, taking more Spanish lessons and hanging out. We have definately exhausted the interesting things to do in Quito that do not cost a lot of money, and are longing to get doing something (other than studying) and to get to the beach. Quito is beautiful Yes, but it is a big city. And to be honest I am a little sick of it, probably just because today was a lot of wandering around the city aimlessly. I am still giving my stomach only 5 out of 10. Maybe even 4. We were just studing reflexive verbs in Spanish and we both have headaches. Looking forward to another BIG dinner at Susanitas tonight. Well, what have we done? Went to some museums, Banco Central with lots of super Chevere (translation cool) arceological artifacts, including a mummy with skin on her arms. Also the Museo Guayasamin, who was a famous Ecuadorian painter. The museum was beautiful but the art was shocking and sad.I liked it alot, very visually impactful.
We went for a short hike on the weekend in Papallacta, and then soaked in some natural hot springs with a sweet view of the Ecuadorian countryside. The bus trip was exciting to say the least. The only really annoying thing, that has really been rubbing Simon the wrong way, is that everyone overcharges the Gringos for everything in Ecuador. It just doesnt feel right to pay twice as much for the same bus ride as the person next to you just because your skin or hair is lighter, especially when you are standing on the bus for most of a 2 hour ride! We need to be tougher when people try to overcharge, but with limited Spanish it is not easy, and I am not used to haggling over things such as cab or bus rides which are usually standard.
Special mention to my comment leavers, Pam, Norah, Tom and Kate. Hasta la vista.
xo G

Dias Cuatro

2005-10-27T20:56:00.000-04:00

Mi Familia en Quito es muy bien! I have just eaten a delicious traditional Ecuadorian meal (and not all are delicious, refer to last posting about the guinea pigs) and am ridiculously full. The meal was, damn I have just forgotten the name in Spanish, but it was lettuce with potato pancakes (some cheese inside which I ate around) and a fried egg. Avocado, Corn on the cob (which is actually muy feo here, dried out, not so tasty), beet and corn salad, and hot dogs for the carnivores. Our Mami also makes her own fruit juices for all the meals, FANTASTICO. I could drink about 5 of them at one go. The fruit here is amazing, you would not believe the GINORMOUS size of the papayas! I think that they are as big as watermelons. Our family is also amazing because they are so patient to speak to us in Spanish and make everyone feel very comfortable and laugh at our poor jokes. Simon thinks it is funny to call me TONTO all the time. It is really good practice to have to speak Spanish at all the meals and when chatting about things, family v. impressed (suprised?) that my Mami was a medicio as well as my Padre. We were thinking about going to Otavalo to the huge indigenous market this weekend but we may wait and do some things around here. Lots of things to do, but most of them cost money, especially the touristy things, and we do not want to blow all of our dinero at once. Might go for a hike this Domingo. Que Mas? Oh, we heard at the hostel we stayed at the first night that at least one tourist from the hostel is mugged each week. Silly drunken brits who take $500 out of the bank machine and then go stumbling home from the bar. Quito is not necessarily violent but robbery is a huge problem at night. Our family says just take the money you need and a photocopy of your passport and leave the rest at home. I feel a little guilty because Simon is at home right now studying vocabulario, but I think I am quicker than him in class, so I will let him catch up, ha! Right now, I am sitting in Gringolandia, the most touristy street in Quito. Will go home in a bit to relax (only one block, dont fret mom), the combination of Spanish and altitude makes me crash at around 10, if not earlier. Adios xo

Hola Ecuador!

2005-10-25T16:14:00.000-04:00

Hola familia y amigos. I am now in Quito, sitting inside and watching the rain fall on a typical afternoon in the rainy season/winter in Ecuador. Not as cold as home, but it gets a little crisp here at night and no one has central heating (memories of NZ). Simon and I have rapidly enrolled ourselved in a two week INTENSE Spanish course for 4 hours each day and we had our first class this morning on day 2! Things that I have learned: Hasta leugo, Soy de Canada, Soy vegetariano, y Mi llamo Gwyn (among others). We enrolled quickly because we almost missed our connection in Mexico city due to our inability to understand Spanish, only my brilliant translation of `a tiempo` saved the day. Last night we stayed in a popular hostel here that provides free rum and coke for the guests, needless to say it was a little hectic all night and Simon had trouble escaping a punishing drinking game, and hence has been whining about his head all day. Good thing I saved him when I did. Lots of Brits here. We moved in with an Ecuadorian familia today, who we met through our Spanish school and it is muy bien. We are right downtown, basically beside the hostel, in the most hilarious cute and clean little apartment with Alexi and Susanna, and another student from Switzerland. We get our meals cooked daily and even though it is a little more expensive than the hostels, we figure that the chance to hablas espanol and the peace/quiet are worth the extra dollars. There are virgin mary´s and little knick knacks everywhere around the casa, and the couple (our mami y papi) have made us feel very welcome, they have Canadian maple syrup in the cabinet! Mom, here is our plan for the next month. Leave Quito after our course (dos semanas) and then go to Montanita to surf and hang out. Everyone we have spoken to says that it is beautiful. So far, I rate my stomach at a 7 out of 10, so it really could be much worse. No problema with the vegetarian food but our teacher has suggested we try ´Coy or Cuy´(dont remember how to spell it) and I have put my foot down. No Guineapiggies! Ciao, Send me comments or emails. xo >Gwyn

2005-10-20T11:40:00.000-04:00

Plane Tickets

2005-10-20T11:23:00.000-04:00

Dun dun dada! We have bought the tickets and are leaving on Sunday for Quito, Ecuador! Our flight is at 8pm on Mexicana and we are flying through Mexico City. For anyone who wants to contact me while I am away, my email is gwynmac@hotmail.com. Check back for the first update on the adventure after Sunday.
ADIOS amigos/amigas. Hasta luego.

Stage Zero. Still Planning. Going Nowhere.

2005-09-28T13:33:00.000-04:00

Still need a TEFL certificate, flight, and job. Still need a definate travel plan. Still need a destination! Ecuador? Quito? Cuenca? Costa Rica? San Jose? I am a little worried about money (and Simon is a lot worried) but I think/hope that everything will come into perspective when we see how much cheaper it is to live in the South than up here in the North. Making travel plans over MSN and the phone has taken some of the excitement out of going on an adventure, mainly because it is so damn stressful to be in limbo! I think that I need to relax and wait for my other half to sort himself out. Once I finish with all of these doctor and dentist appointments that I have been avoiding for the past year or so. Should probably be doing more research right now on the Trip but am too overwhelmed google searching. Going to get cavity filled soon.