Hello Cuenca, Goodbye Appendix

After a night of stomach pains and shivering (duh, a fever, how did I not realize that) we decided maybe my stomach pains were gastritis so we went to the pharmacy and picked up some medicine then headed off to explore Cuenca, determined that the medicine would heal me. First we went to Parque Calderon which has their "new" cathedral, which was actually built in 1885. It was a pretty dazzling site, especially the gold structure built over the sanctuary- incredible! It also has huge blue domes which are lit up at night- beautiful although a bit out of place. We also got to see a parade on our way over to the "old" cathedral, it was a bunch of schools- some had bands, some have baton twirlers, and some were little kids dressed up as saints, priests, and angels- apparently they are very serious about their parades in Ecuador. We were told that the parade was for the baby Jesus and that they had similar parades everyday of December!

Next we went to the "old" cathedral, El Sagrario, which was built in 1557. In this cathedral we got a great tour- it was particularly interesting because even in its construction you can see the fusion of cultures, Spanish, Incan, and the local indigenous group. There were shrines built by local wealthy families that displayed some incredible old vestments. One of the shrines was particularly interesting because it was done in the Spanish style that incorporates Christian, Jewish, and Muslim symbols which is interesting and rather odd to see in Latin America. On the alter of the cathedral there were figures of the apostles- life size figures! There was also an incredible organ that took 5 people to play! There were 4 accordion things that people had to open and close to get sound, they were about a meter and a half by half a meter- huge. Then the 5th person would actually play the organ. At the moment though, it can't be played because it needs 1/2 million usd in repairs- the pipes were clearly worn and falling apart but it was impressive none the less. In the adjacent galleries they had pictures of Cuenca throughout that past century-ish.

Next, we walked to the river- Rio Tomebamba and stopped into the Museo Medico, which was a pleasant surprise. It was just a bunch of old medical equipment, medicines, and a pretty incredible collection of old medical literature. We were some of the very few Americans who had visited judging by the guest book so that was cool to see!

Next we headed to some ruins a little farther down the river, we had a lovely tour but I was having trouble focusing- I wasn't in a huge amount of pain but I was so exhausted, I could barely put one foot in front of the other. After the tour we headed to lunch at which point Linnea and I decided that I needed to go to the hospital. Luckily our Lonely Planet guide had a clinic listed so we headed there.

The clinic ended up being a medical office building but luckily there was a hospital next door!! So we went over to the hospital but were continually redirected to different places because at that point we didn't know I had appendicitis so when people asked if it was an emergency we said no. Well, saying you don't have an emergency in a latin american hospital during lunch time is no way to get seen. Finally we made our way to the emergency room and they agreed to see me despite the fact that it was lunch time :) It ended up working out well though because apparently patients don't come to the hospital during lunch time either- I was one of maybe 3 patients there!

They ran a lot of tests but I was assuming that I had some sort of parasite so when they suggested that I have an ultra sound I asked how expensive it would be first, thinking that wasn't a valuable test. Much to my surprise the ultrasound was in fact the exact test that needed to be done- I have to say it was quite a shock to hear spanish, spanish, spanish I don't understand, APENDICITIS, that's the same in Spanish.

Immediately I asked how I could fly back to the states- no time. Ok, how about Bogota, get me back to Bogota- no time. That's when it began to sink in that I was having surgery in Cuenca, Ecuador....

Banos

Banos is know for its incredible natural beauty so we decided to join a horse tour leaving from our hostel. Unfortunately it wasn't nearly as pleasant as the horse tour in San Augustine beause we spent most of the time feeling badly for the horses because we seemed to constantly be walking downhill on concrete :( In the middle we did go to a pretty waterfall that we got to climb up a bit but then we had to tourture our horses for another 2 hours after that so it wasn't super fun. Banos though is truely beautiful and it would be great to go back and spend some more time hiking and rafting there- apparently the river is awesome for rafting in June. In the evening I wasn't feeling very well so I stayed back at the hostel while Sagiv and Linnea went to the hot springs- Piscina de la Virgen- without me. It was particularly a bummer because that was our last night traveling with Sagiv and I didnt get to spend it with him.

The next morning, we headed to Cuenca by way of Riobamba which took most of the day and was one of my more unpleasant experiences because the bus ride was so bumpy and I was having stomach pains. We did go through some amazingly untouched small towsn though so it was interesting to watch the local dress change from place to place. When we got to Cuenca we checked into a hostel and then went out for dinner at a place called Cafe Eucalyptus, which was very pleasant- good food, good service, and live music- quite the unattainable trifecta in latin america. Then we headed back to the hostel to get some sleep before exploring Cuenca and heading to the Peruvian border the following day.

To the Refugio

The night was truely freezing and at some point the wind changed directions so for the second half of the night the wind was blowing through our tent. Linnea and I both woke up with a lovely suprise, Systemic Pulmonary Edema, which roughly translates into a severely puffy face due to altitude. We looked like monsters, we could have scared small children. The guy who came to tell us there was room in their Jeep up to the parking lot before the refugio said he didnt recognize us! So anyway, eventually our faces started to go down and we managed to do the fastest camp pack up ever- 20 minutes to go from eating breakfast with everything unpacked to putting our packs on the Jeep in 20, pretty amazing!

We got a ride up to the parking lot with the guys who were going to acclimate at the refugio before their summit attempt. We had originally planned on finishing our breakfast in the parking lot but when we got out we were convinced otherwise. There was nothing there, no plants, nothing- it was too high. the wind was literally strong enough to blow you over and definitely strong enough to take away what little break you had if you faced the wind. So we just started up the mountain...slowly. We only had a kilometer to hike but it took us about 45 minutes- it was that steep and high!

Finally though, we did get to the refugio, at a whopping 4890 meters, which is higher than anywhere in the continental US. And wow was it cold!! We went into the refugio to defrost and have lunch, but we didnt get to do much defrosting, it was pretty much the same temperature inside as out, just without the wind.

We saw people who had attempted the summit the previous night and after we were there for an hour or so we saw the people get back who had actually achieved the summit. They said that the time we had come up was pretty much as windy as it gets so that was amusing. We knew we were on a serious mountain and out of our element when the people around us were talking about summitting Everest, and not about how they'd like to do it but about the companies they'd used, which they liked best, etc!!! We met some other Americans in the refugio who had rented a car for the day so they let us pay their driver to take us back to the turn off to catch a bus back to Latacunga and then on to Banos.

In Banos, we stayed in Hostel Transylvania, which is the best deal we've had- $6 for a private room, hot showers, and complementary breakfast- it was amazing! We were also able to get some much needed laundary done there :)

To Cotopaxi

We left Quito for Latacunga midday and just checked into a hostel for the evening to get some rest before tackling Cotopaxi. The next morning we got up early and got on a bus heading back in the direction of Quito and got dropped off at the Cotopaxi turnoff. From there we took a collectivo up to the Laguna Limpiopungo (at 3830 meters). Along the way we stopped at the park's museum- our driver gave us the tour, just telling us about the local flora and fauna. At the museum we also so a deer and a rabbit (wow!) which suprisingly were I think the first animals we had seen while backpacking so it was pathetically exciting.

We got dropped off at the lake and the first thing that we noticed was the cold, man was it cold! Then we headed off literally into the hills, we wanted to do the hike behind the lake but there wasn't much of a trail so we pretty much made our own way- which unfortunately involved walking through a very marshy area- we were very jealous of Sagiv's waterproof boots! About 1/2 hour in we stopped and made some of Sagiv's amazing Arabian coffee with his little travel kit- it was pretty cool because all we had to do was find a clearing and sit ddown and the grasses protected us from the wind and then the temperature was quite agreeable.

After that we continued hiking and we went up this steep hill that was mayb 40 meters but it was incredibly hard- that was when we really started to notice the altitude! After that climb we got to a little plateau and it also happened to coincide with the clouds clearing in front of Cotopaxi and we got some amazing pictures! It was particularly exciting because we were told that you could be in the park for days and never get the kind of view of the volcano that we had pretty much our whole time there. After that we hiked up to basically the highest point that we could go without climbing gear so that was a lot of fun.

Then we started hiking down but instead of going all the way back down to the lake and then taking the road down to the camp site we decided to hike over another hill around the other side of the lake. Cresting it was no problem but the hike down was nasty, there was much heavier vegitation and the footing was more uncertain. As is my specialty, I managed to step in a hole and sprain my ankle. Luckily, we had our handy Israeli soldier with us who carried my bag down to the lake for me. Once we got down behind the lake, which was way bigger than we had originally thought, the terrain was a lot better so I could carry my bad. We also got to see a few fox on our hike and there were wild horses at the lake!! We hiked alongside this drainage on perhaps fresh water ditch along the lake for what seemed like forever looking for (1) the camping site and (2) some place to cross the ditch.

When we could finally see the camping site ther was no place to cross the ditch in sight and the path kept getting sketchier and harder to follow so we decided to cross it! So in the freezing cold, we took off our shoes and socks, threw them across the ditch and Sagiv carried our bags across. Then we hopped into the freezing cold knee high water, crossed the ditch, and pulled ourselves out using trees on the other side. Then we hiked another 10 or so minutes and found there was a bridge right at the camp site!

Once we got to the camp site we set up our tents and made our very late lunch- we had been hiking since 10am and we got back around 4pm. The camp site came highly recommended as having water and bathrooms which was king of funny because it had unpurified water that came form the ditch we had crossed and the "bathrooms" were hardly that. They were toilets, yes, but they didnt have seats, nor did they flush and there were no trash cans in which to throw tp. Also one had a shower curtain as a door and the other's door when closed only covered 2/3 of the doorway, so you could see straight in.

While we were there we met a group planning to summit Cotopaxi in a few days- one of teh guys was a really in shape but the other one was kind of puny and didnt seem to be in particularly good shape so that was kind of funny. Their guide was about our age and as he put it, he just followed the climbing seasons, guiding in Alaska in the summer and in Ecuador during the American winter.

After lunch we just chilled, huddled in our tent and listened to a bit of music and then promptly started fixing dinner so that we might get it in before dark- that totally didn't happen haha. After we finished up dinner we pretty much just went to bed because it was very dark and there was nothing to do. We did however get some great views of Cotopaxi in the moonlight and the stars were incredible because there was no artificial light for miles and miles. From our position the summit of Cotopaxi looked great but apparently it was a terrible night to summit- you can only summit Cotopaxi at night because the sun heats up the snow during the day and there are lots of avalanches. The summit from the refugio at the snow line is supposed to take 7-9 hours and as we would find out the next day the people who were up for that were pretty crazy!

The Saturday Market at Otovalo

We got up bright and early again to tackel the market. Unfoturnately we spent about 1/2 hour trying to get out of our hostel, the woman who worked at our hostel wasn't up yet and we were multi-padlocked in. We finally ended up knocking on the most likely door to be hers (because there were a few little shacks adjacent to the hostel, within the gate) and calling her name until she appeared. Once we managed to get out we first went to the animal market which was needless to say, an experience! the first section of this big field they used had all kinds of small animals dogs, cats, ducklings, chicks, chickens, turkeys, guinnea pigs, you name it, it was probably there. Next came the the smaller live stock animals- pis and goats- all on leashes, and then the cows and a few horses. It was very loud and smelly! I think the pigs were the loudest! It was crazy to imagine people bringing animals every week because we didn't see many people buying animals, just trying to sell them- although supply and demand dont necessarily rule business here.

After we had enough of the animal market we headed down to the famous craft market which had by 8ish taken over the city- literally all the streets were covered with vendors. It is incredible how people bring in all their goods to sell. They bring them in on their backs in huge burlap sacks and not just the goods but also the frames and walls for the stands. Its pretty crazy to see a man my size or more likely smaller carry somethign at least 6 times his width and who knows weight wise at almost a right angle!

So we spent a few hours in the market barginning. Then after we had exhausted ourselves and our wallets we grabbed a bus back to Quito. When we got off the bus though we couldn't find Sagiv- he hadn't gotten off the bus. We were standing there looking confused and white and a few people kept trying to point out the other 2 white people who had been on our bus- and the funny thing was they were sure thats who we were looking for- it had to be we were white! After about 15 minutes Sagiv reappear he had stayed on the bus because someone had taken one of his bags of souvenirs and he had stayed on to look for it more- unfortunately to no avail :(

Then we headed back to the hostel we had stayed in before and got our old room back:) That night after dinner we watched the parade to celebrate the Independence of Quito, which was crazy! It must have been about 3 hours long. The parade had high school and military bands, many of whom were accompanied by cheerleaders and/or baton twirls. There were also randomly people dressed in crazy costumes on stilts with their faces painted who yelled "Viva Quito," to which the crowd responded "Viva!" There were also beauty queens riding on floats that we still can't figure out- they were huge paper mache people- maybe local figures. The last hour was mostly other town delegations congratulating Quito- they wore traditional outfits and did local dances- they were definitely our favorites. Their stamina was incredible, some of the dances involved almost constant jumping and there were old, old people doing them! Amazing!

Laguna Cuicocha

We got up bright and early to hike around Laguna Cuicocha, which is in Reserva Ecologica Cotacachi-Cayapas (long name!). We were very excited about this hike because we had seen an amazing picture of it in the tourist information office in Quito and Sagiv had pointed at it and said, I want to go there! And the woman at the agency was like well actually its pretty close, you can go there- so we had been excited about it ever since.

We got to the lake around 7 and by 7:20 there was some significant cloud cover so we were glad that we had pulled ourselves out of bed at 5:00 instead of 5:15! The view we did get though was breath taking, definitely worth the trip! The end of the hike though wasn't along the lake though it was just down a dirt road. We did however get a few potatoes straight from the ground because we asked a farmer what he was growing.

After the hike we took a taxi back to Otovalo and then got on a bus to Laguna San Pablo. The lake was lovely but that was pretty much it, there was NOTHING there- well besides people who were literally up to my chest at their adult height. We got off the bus and walked down to a pavillion by the water which looked like it was built to be a tourist attraction but never quite got there. There were a few pontoon party boats tied up probably for tours but there wasn't anyone there. Only a waist high woman letting her coew graze there. There was a john boat-ish thing close to the land so we got on and had lunch there, looking out over the lake.

After lunch, with nothing else to see, we hopped back on the bus to the fork in the road to the water falls Peguche. It was about a 45 mintute walk to the falls which were beautiful and bigger than we orignally expected because the stream we were walking along to the falls was pretty puny. We managed to get to the falls just in time because it started raining, as always.

We hopped on a bus back to Otovalo and checked out the market a bit in order to guage prices for the next morning. I got an incredible painting of a woman with one of the traditional multi-tiered gold necklasses on. That night we had a funny experience, we went to a pizza shop for dinner and they were all out of dessert so we asked where we could go to get something sweet but there was literally no place in the entire town open for such things. Literally the place shut down at 6 pm every night.

To Otovalo

We had to say goodbye to Alissa and Lukas because they headed out for the Galapagos (so jealous) but we were also leaving Quito. We headed to Otovalo- a town a few hours from Quito that is famous for its huge Saturday market. One of the funny things that happens on buses here is that people get on to sell refreshments. They go up and down the isles putting things in people's laps to pique their interest and then they collect them again as the leave. Sometimes they are associated with the bus companies but sometimes they do it independently, sometimes they even give you their life story and tell you why you should buy from them.

We got to Otovalo in the afternoon and picked a hostel- Maria- it was honestly pretty bad, the water was luke warm (at best), they didnt have a kitchen or Internet but we did however get a tv and haha they let us put our perishables in the fridge that they sell drinks from. There was also a sign on our door that said don't leave your passport in the room, the hostel isnt responsible for it but when we asked if they had a safe to put our passports in they said no, we can leave them in our rooms- haha interesting.

For dinner we went to a restaurant that was suggested by our travel book but it was mediocre at best. We decided that if we became expats and lived in South America we would definitely open a business catoring to tourists with reliable service- we'd make out incredibly!

Mitad del Mundo

The next morning we headed to Mitad del Mundo- the middle of the world- the division between the northern and southern hemispheres. It was outrageously touristy and ridiculously priced but we still enjoyed ourselfves- it wasn't a tourist trap we weren't willing to miss. The monument is actually about 240 meters away from the real Mitad del Mundo but awesome none the less.

Next we went to Pululagua, a crater made after a volcano collapsed thousands of years ago. Now, there's a small village of about 300 people there- its beautiful, quite picturesque. We had the option of hiking down for 30 minutes and then about an houir back up but we initially thought there was a lagun there, which there wasn't, so we decided to pass and head back to see the museums at Mitad del Mundo.

Well, we got a lot more than we bargined for in those museums because instead of going to the touristy museum where they do all these tricks that can supposedly only be done on the equator- we went to the "scientific" museum because it seemed interesting and it was free :) So instead of some cool tricks that aren't real we got a diatribe against the Mitad del Mundo monument, which was apparently put in the wrong place by a French exploration and then never moved once they realized it was in the wrong spot. The "scientific" study, which funded/ was funded by this museum had located the real equator with a GPS (very difficult haha) and found that 1000 years ago the indigenous people of the area had built a monument themselves on the correct equator. It was almost a full circle of rocks with the center at teh equator and only 23 degrees of the circle was missing and that is apparently the tilt of the Earth. They were able to do this based on solstices and equinoxes which in the sky make a pattern similar to a star which is a common pattern in Andean art. Also- a fun fact- Ecuador is the only place on the equator where there are mountains.

All of that seemed relatively legitimate although not really novel but then the guy just kept going on and on about how Ecuador means equal and balanced and how the people who lived there 1000 years ago were more balanced than those who live there today because their government was perpetuating a lie by supporting a monument in teh wrong place for foreignors to come and visit. He also insisted that the globe and maps were made along the wrong axis and that they should be rotated 90 degrees- odd. A neat thing they had though was an astronomical map with both hemispheres because you can see both sets of stars from the equator. Also, all the churches in the surrounding area were built over indiginour religious sites so the churches are all along the equator. Many churches are also built over what were once sun shrines such that on high holy days the sun will be in just such as a position as to shine into churches on the faces of statues of Jesus, Mary, saints- which is pretty cool.

After that odd experience we headed back to Quito and went to a Mongolian grill for dinner- there are a lot of ethnic options in the Mariscal.

Quito

Our first stop in Quito was the tourist information office- we found a lot of incredible places we wanted to visit in Ecuador so we decided to stay longer than planned and skip Bolivia (which we thought we might get to before we realized how unpredictable traveling in South America by bus can be) on this trip.

In the afternoon we headed to Museo del Banco Central. The museum is filled with artifacts from throughout Ecuadorian history- mostly pottery and sculptures. Unfortunately the museum closed close to the time that we got there so we were a bit pressed for time- I think given the chance we would both go back. We did however have perfect timing to catch up with Alissa and Lukas- we saw them just walking down the street- too funny, that's how much we stick out!

That night we went out to a middle eastern restaurant for dinner- it was good but uneventful night :)

Ipiales and the Ecuadorian Border

We got into Ipiales mid morning and took a cab up to Santuario de las Lajas a neo-Gothic church built between 1926 adn 1944. Its connected to a bridge that spans a river. The church was built after someone saw the face of the virgin on the rock wall. The church is actually built into the rocks and the alter is where the virgin was seen. The rocks around the church are covered with plaques asking that relatives be taken to heaven or thanking God for miracles. The church was truly amazing!!

Then we headed to the Colombian/Ecuadorian border- we got through tht eColombian side easily- no line at all. Then we got to Ecuador wher the computer systems were completely down- so no one was crossing the border anywhere in Ecuador. The funny thing was they didnt announce that the computers were down, there just wasnt anyone at the computers- honestly our first thought was does the border really take lunch breaks?

We waited for 2 hours until the computers came back up. Alissa and Lukas, our American friends, hadnt come right to the border after the sanctuary because they were stocking up on Colombian coffee so they were way behind us in the line. The worst of it was when the computers started back up they allowed the line to go all the way to the door and then instead of wrapping it around the room they just locked people outside until everyone inside had been taken care of...but it was raining and they literally separated a father and son who were traveling together.

Once we got through the border we took a taxi to Tulcan and then a bus to Quito. We got into Quito around 9 and tried to go to a hostel that some other backpackers had suggested but there wasn't enough room for all 5 of us so we went to another hostel in the Mariscal district called El Taxo. Since Alissa and Lukas we so far behind us at the border they got in late that night so they stayed in the hostel we had originally agreed to meet at. Our hostel was good though, 5 beds for $5 a person with our own bathroom- the funny part though was that there were windows facing the street on one side of the shower so literally everyone could see you before the window steamed up!