Vulcan Cotopaxi

The last four days we spent near the volcano Cotopaxi. At almost 5900 meters, it's one of the highest active volcanoes in the world. Luckily it hasn't done much in the last few years. The volcano is at the center of one of Ecuador's national parks, just south of Quito. We stayed at Secret Garden Cotopaxi, which is the second hostel by the folks at Secret Garden Quito. We got a nice $5/person deal on the taxi between the hostels (it normally costs at least $40 to get a ride up). The ride from Quito takes about two hours, one on the Panamericana highway and then another on the cobbled (and not-so-cobbled) roads up to the mountains. The hostel is at the base of Pasochoa, one of the many mountains within view of Cotopaxi.

It was cloudy when we got there, and we couldn't see any mountains. We were told the view is best around 5:30 am (around dawn), so when the sun came in the windows the next day we took a look. Socked in fog. Ah well. We opted for the horse riding trip for the morning. The ride was...interesting. The gear for the horses varied widely. Some saddles had actual stirrups, about half (including both of ours) had wooden blocks that looked like sawed-off clogs. One set you could get your foot into if you had someone push it in (it was a tight fit, try not to need to fall off) and the other one only allowed your toes to be inside. The ride was along the 3 km driveway to the main road (whoo!), then along the cobbled road (horses don't like cobbles), then finally off the main road for a short bit along a dirt road past another hostel nearby. Not exactly an inspired route. Along the road, one horse threw its rider and fell (perhaps in the other order) when a truck went by. Holy cow! Except later the "guide" for the trip said "o yeah, that horse is afraid of cars. that happens all the time." Can you say "don't send that horse out with a rider"? Things got worse from there.

Aaron's horse was not having a good time; specifically he really wanted the bit out of his mouth. And he liked to run. And he had the "only your toes fit in here" stirrups. When the group finally got to the dirt road, the lead horses galloped off. Galloping doesn't agree with crappy stirrups, and soon there was a stirrup-less rider. Ouch. Reining the horse in seemed to piss him off (remember we think something was wrong either with the fit of the bit or the mouth of the horse). Eventually he tried to buck his rider off. Aaron got him slowed down enough to find a stirrup, got off, and walked the rest of the way to the snack break (where everyone else had galloped off to). Incidentally the horse was really friendly when you weren't jamming a metal rod in his mouth.

After the snack break we switched horses. Maybe that horse just didn't like Aaron. We also told the guide that the horse was not having a good time and tried to throw me, but he didn't seem concerned. Things got worse from there. This horse didn't like Hilary either, and by now his mouth really hurt. Luckily a good bit of the trail back was along the road, so the horses were forced to go slowly. Once we got to the driveway, the lead horses went ahead to run back. We stayed behind with the guide to go more slowly. However, he started trotting his horse. The other horses trotted; Hilary's feet came out of the stirrups; the horse got reined in; the horse tried to eject the rider. After several minutes of actual pleading and yelling at the guide, we got him to stop his horse long enough for Hilary to get off. We walked the last 1.5 km back to the hostel. Again this was recounted to the staff and met without concern. 4 of 8 riders walked back off their horses--apparently this is normal? [Talking to folks who went out in groups of 4 or less however, the riding experience is very good. Just don't be those guests 5+.]

The next day we were extremely sore and bruised. Various clasps and buckles had left bruises on our legs and the experience of riding with terrible gear had really messed us up. Aaron was feeling a little stomach-ugly again, so Hilary went for a short walk to a nearby waterfall while he hung out with the staff and practiced conversational Spanish. The clouds were higher up and we got some pictures of Cotopaxi.

The next day we took the hike to Pasochoa, a small mountain topping off at only 4200 meters. The hostel sat at 3500 m, so we had only to walk out back and climb. Hiking at altitude was quite an experience, even though we'd spent 9 days at 2800+ m  in Quito and the last several at 3500 m. It was a good hike though.

The hostel filled up that night, buoyed by folks who couldn't get to Banos since the road washed out at some point during the day. That of course solidified our plans to go to Latacunga before Banos, and we booked a hostel and arranged a taxi for the next morning.

Last Day in Quito

Today is our last full day in Quito. It was a fairly good week, though Aaron spent a couple days in bed drinking oregano tea and eating Cipro pills. Let's hope that's the last of that. A week of class was a good amount; it will take some time for it all to sink in before we're ready to cram more information into our brains. On the plus side, we've got a pretty good handle on basic conversational skills even though our vocabulary is limited. Hilary is still not sure what a gerund is though.

Our host family has been really awesome, especially during the whole "debilitating illness" portion of our stay. Homemade chicken soup and frequent deliveries of tea are a big plus for the febrile. We did learn that juice in restaurants is often diluted with tap water; let's not drink that anymore. (but it looks so good!) We've also been foregoing the little containers of hot sauce that live on the tables, despite those also being delicious. Stupid food-borne pathogens are ruining our dining experience; sucks that food is one of the highlights of our experiences in new places. No worries I guess, we are also fans of the soups, empanadas, and other steaming objects.

Tomorrow we are taking a 2-ish hour ride to the Cotopaxi area to hang out in a "luxury resort" with our own private "cabana" including two floors of hedonism: a sunken tub, a fireplace, a private bathroom, and a bedroom with no neighbors or active construction projects! 3 meals of locally produced organic veggies included: $90/night after the obligatory 12% tax. Es chevere! Oh, we'll include pictures later. :)

Language Classes

This week we are taking language classes through the Simon Bolivar school in Quito. We're also staying with an Ecuadorian family for the week to do the immersion thing. It's been quite intense, but we are definitely getting better at Spanish.

The school is in the Mariscal district, which contains "Gringolandia". We've walked through several times, poking our heads into the restaurants and then leaving as soon as we see the prices. Many places have pricing similar to the US ($9 for a burger). Yowsa! We've been dining just outside white-people-land in the more reasonably priced areas. Today, however, we did go to one of the restaurants in Gringolandia that was a bit off the main drag. It had "authentic Ecuadorian" food, which after looking through the menu is probably accurate. We had choclo (local corn with giant kernels and humongous germs, very starchy) with cheese and haba (beans similar to fava), una humita (essentially a tamale), and llapingachos (cheesy potato blob) with chorizo & egg. So good! We'll probably go back and just get a humita and soup since all that was a ton of food. They also had cuy (guinea pig) but it was $23 for a whole one; we'll probably get that somewhere besides Quito.

Outside of class we've successfully found paper for notecards, bought several meringues, ordered lunches, caught a taxi in the rain, etc. So far, so good! Here are a few pictures of Quito from the roof of the hostel we stayed at last week:

Dos Gringos en Quito

Spanish lessons start on Monday. It's Friday. What to do? Let's wander around the city!

We got a map, roughly figured out where we were, and set out for Old Town Quito. Apparently the last pre-colonial rulers burned the city down on their way out in 1534, so old town dates to slightly after that, after it was set up as a colonial capital. If we're reading the signs correctly, some of the buildings--churches actually--date to the 1500s. Wow. We wandered through some squares, past statues and crosses, lots of old churches, and lots and lots of small shops. The architecture of the old buildings is very cool, and some of the carvings on the churches is incredibly intricate.

Like any old city, the streets are narrow and not terribly straight. Walking around was an adventure as most intersections had no traffic control signs of any kind. Traffic just moves slowly enough that no one runs into each other, or the pedestrians that randomly cross the streets. Horns are used liberally. And gas is only $1.40/gallon.

The hostel does breakfast and dinner, but we were walking around the city at lunchtime. We decided to embark on the list of things the state department tells you not to eat by randomly choosing a local place with a mostly-indecipherable menu and attempting to order lunch in halting half-Spanish. The waiter was patient with us and we got our 4-item lunch for $1.65/each: juice, fruit or soup, a chicken & rice dish, and a "purple mousse". There was a shrimp option instead of chicken, but we got the sense that the waiter was trying to dissuade us from ordering it. We're still not sure what it is and Google isn't helping. Anybody know what cameron murado is (maybe fermented shrimp)? The food was great, and after we left we looked up the menu items in the dictionary. Apparently the opaque white juice we liked best was "oat juice", whatever that is, and the chicken was in a mushroom sauce, which we guessed while we ate it. The fruit is "sliced" and the soup was a bean soup. Yum Ecuador! So far we're feeling fine.

Bienvenidos a Quito!

Hola from Quito!

Our flight from Miami was slightly early. We arrived in Quito to cool and rain, just like Oakland! The hostel we're in (Secret Garden) is very British-y. Getting used to the altitude, today we'll do some city walking.