Hola a todos!!
Well, I finally brought my computer to school with me, in hopes that I could attach some photos, but for some reason, of course it won't work. So I'm sorry to those of you who are desperately waiting for some visuals, I'll try to post my pictures on a website soon and send you the site so you can look at them!!! (Laura, can you help me with a suggestion of what site I could use??).
This past week has been pretty dang amazing. On Thursday I volunteered at a Children's Cancer Hospital and got to play with some adorable kids, which was really nice. Sadly enough, I won't be able to continue with that, as I found out that I have to be really committed to it, and that's hard to do with all of the traveling around I'll be doing. Hopefully I can find somewhere else to volunteer at that doesn't expect a weekly visit on Thursday night.
As for my weekend, on Friday a friend and I took a bus to a town called Otaválo, which is known for its market, which they have everyday, but is much bigger on Saturdays. The drive there was great, very beautiful, as usual. On the way there, we stopped in a town called San Pablo, which is the home of a big pretty lake (San Pablo Lake?? Maybe?? Wild guess). We pretty much just walked through the town for a couple hours until we got to a resort on the lake called “Cabañas del Lago,” where we ate lunch. On the way back to the bus, we got attacked numerous times by children with water balloons (actually more like mud water balloons) and buckets of water. This coming weekend is Carnaval, which is a festival where it is very typical to throw water balloons at pretty much anyone. It's also very normal to be attacked with this foamy stuff that you can shoot out of a bottle (kind of like silly string or shaving cream). We actually were able to convince a good number of kids to leave us be, as we didn't have any clothes to change into. We were relieved when we got to the bus. The bus ride out of the town was cool, the rest of the town was very Ecuadorian. At one point our bus even almost got stuck in a mud hole, hah. That was amusing.
Once we finally arrived in Otaválo, we explored the town a bit and then took a cab to a hostel that had been recommended by a friend called “La Luna” which means The Moon... it was a little family-owned farm about 4 km from Otaválo that was surrounded by fields with cows and horses. There were also a lot of hummingbirds (they were really big compared to the ones in WI), as well as a bunch of enormous dogs, which of course I didn't complain about.
On Saturday we ended up waking up pretty early and walking about 45 minutes to a waterfall (Cascada Taxopamba) near our hostel. It was a great hike, although very muddy, as it had rained the night before (as usual). Walking to the waterfall was like walking through a dream, the scenery was beautiful. When we were just about to the waterfall, we realized that we had to cross a little stream (coming from the waterfall) in order to actually get to the waterfall. We didn't really want to get our shoes wet (as they were the only ones that we had), so we ended up ditching our shoes, socks, and backpacks, and walking barefoot the rest of the way to the waterfall with our cameras. We felt so part of nature, haha. After hanging out at the waterfall for a bit, we took off for the market in Otaválo. We walked the 4 km down the cobblestone road to town, chatting with a few locals along the way to make sure we were going the right way. The market was really neat, there definitely was a lot of cool, cheap, typical Ecuadorian... well, stuff, that you could buy. I always find it fun to bargain and chat with the vendors. They are always very excited to tell us where they have been in the US, or what family lives there. We also found it interesting to see a garbage truck trudging down the street playing music like an ice cream truck (we were a bit disappointed when we realized the music was not an ice cream truck... tear). After spending hours at the market, we found the bus to go home, and took off.
On Sunday I had my trip with my volcanology class. We drove to five different places to collect different samples of rocks (hooray rocks!!). Three of the stops were at different places along the edges of the mountains, and the other two consisted of either crawling through the Amazon, or through a river. Our trip through the “heart of the Amazon,” as my professor Teo said, honestly consisted of crawling up and down muddy hills, using vines and trees to pull yourself up or keep yourself from sliding down a mud slide. It took a good 30 minutes for our class to get up or down each of the four or five slippery slopes we had to conquer. It was fantastic. I was extremely distracted when we reached our destination at a huge rock wall, where there were people climbing!! I wanted to ditch my class and join the climbers. Our second adventure with my volcanology class was at a river flowing down a mountain. We spent about an hour climbing up the river (really, through the river) until we reached a small waterfall that a few people stood under (and almost died while doing so), and where Teo gave us a lecture about the (nice (well, really gnisse or something like that) and greenstone) rocks there.
After we had finished our sample collecting, our class made our way to Papallacta, where there is a natural hot springs. We sat in the warm pools for about two hours, relaxing after a hard (?? well, for some people I guess) day's work. We had fun jumping into the ice cold river near the springs and then back into the pools. Also, at one point, it started thundering and lightning. Some people wondered if we had to get out of the pools, but of course Teo responded with his motto, “no risk, no fun.” Haha, I love him. The thunder was the most amazing thunder I've ever heard in my life. It was so loud and deep, and each rumble echoed off of every surrounding mountain, making the sound even more intense. You could feel it throughout your entire body. It's too bad it only lasted for about 15 minutes.
Well, with that I'm going to take my leave, this email is already long enough anyway. I'm super excited for this coming weekend, as I'll be going to a research station in the Amazon called Tiputini for four days (we leave Thursday night and get back Tuesday morning, which is fine with classes because I don't have classes on Fridays and I have off Monday and Tuesday for Carnaval). I don't really know what to expect, other than spectacular things of course, so I'm pumped!! As always, I'd love to hear from you if you get a chance to write back... thanks for listening, hasta luego!!
xoxoxoxox,
Jenna
