Onward
Grace uses email as a primary means of communication. On weekends, Quito's many parks are full of families. On 1 corner, you can participate in exercises led by exercise gurus on the stage with boomboxes. In another corner, you can watch a soccer game while sampling a frozen confection. Down the street and around the corner is a vast display of every style of art from primitive to modern. We bought paintings of the places we were going to visit on our tour. You can buy jackets of llama wool, wood carvings, ceramics, belts, shoes, socks; you name it-it's in the park on the weekend.
Quita is called South America's most beautiful city; it's museums are superlative with explanations in both English and Spanish; it has many cathedral and churches in the European style with innumerable works of priceless art and the view from our hotel window of 2 volcanoes-1 active-certainly seems to reaffirm the guide books.
We left on our tour down the Avenue of the Volcanoes stopping for breakfast at Hacienda La Cienega, an Ecuadorian home which had been in the family for 250 years. They served persimmon and tree tomato juice; the coffee was so thick I didn't take any but then found out that you put a tiny bit in the bottom of your cup and the server adds boiling water to taste. Live and learn!
We continued on to Riobamba visiting sever markets. Ecuador is the land of eternal spring. Situated on the Equator only its highest mountains get snow. It has 2 or sometimes 3 growing seasons. The fruits and vegetables are many, beautiful and unique. It surely would be heaven for a vegetarian.
When we stopped at our hotel for the night we were entertained by more Ecuadorian dances like the ones in the ballet and were even invited to dance The next day we got on the ferrocarril, a bus mounted on train wheels and headed for the Nariz del Diablo, the nose of the devil. Some tourists rode on the top of the train cars; we were chicken. While riding down the steep, narrow gauge railroad, we noticed broken ties had been fixed with eucalyptus branches shoved in their places with knots and boles sticking out on the sides of the tracks. In one place a truck was overturned on the track so we got off, went around it and got on an even older train which had been pressed into service. Interesting, but nerve wracking.
That night we arrived in Cuenca, 1 of our favorite cities. Jerry was ready to buy a colonial house to restore; Ecuador made us feel at home. We visited Ingapirca, an Incan military ruin where we saw the llamas which are making a comeback in Ecuador; we visited rug factories where we watched rugs being woven by hand and bought 1 for whenever we go home; we visited balsa wood factories and bought a handsome parrot, and we bought many Panama hats after watching them being woven by hand all over Ecuador. Check website www.grace44.com for pictures.
After seeing all the wonderful Galapagos tee shirts, we decided we needed to sail to the Galapagos to buy some. The next week we set out-sailing most of the way-arriving in San Cristobal 5 days later What a thrill-anchoring in the Galapagos, but we kept watching for all the strange animals and constantly checking the boobies feet. Black? Blue? Red? It is a thrill to see a blue-footed booby. Who would have thunk it?
The next day Jerry went diving at kicker roack-a rock that looks like someone kicked it apart-out in the ocean-and saw his first shark and swam with a large sea turtle. I am still in the introductory diving stage so I am not about to go down 100 feet in 63 degree water to see a shark. I'm not that crazy, but I loved-loved swimming with the sea lions The moms come right up to look into your snorkel; the babies bite on your fingers and toes, and dad huffs and puffs but swims away before he can blow anybody away.
Just before we got to the Galapagos, we had been warned about rioting fishermen, but the situation was resolved as well as it has ever been before we got there. The argument between the environmentalists and the fishermen is one of long standing. The fishermen want to take whatever they can from the ocean because it belongs to them as much as to anyone; the environmentalists are trying to prevent the extinction of many species. The Japanese market for sea cucumbers, which I had never seen until our guide pointed them out to me, and shark fin is insatiable because Japanese fishing grounds are already denuded. High prices can be demanded, but the argument was basically about lobster on which there is a quota in the Galapagos.
After a week in San Cristobal, we sailed to Bahia Academia on Santa Cruz. It was filled with charter tour boats; we anchored stern and bow quite a ways out trying to give them plenty of room , but there was no such thing. We ended up with a huge cargo ship sitting on our bow anchor and a little cruise boat sitting on our stern anchor. Oh, well We weren't going anywhere anyway. We were off to see the giant pink flamingos and the giant land turtles. In Wisconsin, where I was raised, cows belong in pastures; in the Galapagos, huge boulders from a distance become grazing turtles up close that sound like someone needs to oil their hinges as they move very, very, slowly over the ground chowing down 25 kilos of grass a day and leaving behind the largest, you know what. Beware of stepping in turtle dung!
We would like to have gone to Isabela, the 3rd island which allows visitors, but the canal was calling.
It is December 15 and with the help of the wind and waves we raised our anchors from the bottom of Academia Bay in the Galapagos after a couple of great weeks.
At our best speed, it would take at least 7 days to make the return to Balboa so we settled in for the long haul trying to plan the best route for escaping the strong currents which move in and around the Galapagos. We thought we would make it to Balboa in time for Christmas services with Lori and Seth at St. Luke's in the Canal Zone, but Poseidon had other plans. Woe to he who does not give Poseidon his due.
We had the whole Pacific Ocean to ourselves the only sound being the swoosh-swoosh as Grace embraced the wind and the sea, laughing all the way. It's the sky diving, motor cycle riding freedom feeling that everyone needs once in a while, but we live it daily.To be continued
- 17 January 2001
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