The Dental Finale

We headed back to Ibarra to get our final dental work done. Mary's caps and implants were all ready for final fitting and I had to get my crowns glued in. Mary had a long session with a few final adjustments and her wonderful new teeth were in. There was great excitement in the dentist's office with dozens of pictures being snapped of the final product. It was great to see as he was so proud of his work. He has a photographic record of the whole process and is sending us a DVD.

Dr Bolanos and one of his assistants. Note Mary's shinny new teeth!

We decided to go back to Cotacachi for a few days to relax and we met some local builders who were developing a small subdivision of homes of adobe construction. He took us through one home that was about 2500 sq. ft. with all kinds of wood blended in, much like the Whistler homes. The logs were laurel which was hard for us to believe as laurel here is just in hedges. However, in the hot moist jungle areas of Ecuador it gets up to 8 inches in diameter. The house was selling for $155,000 US which included a big lot - no wonder people are moving and buying in Ecuador.

We were staying in a hostel in town which was not very nice and our guide volunteered that he had very a very good connection with a deluxe hotel called Rancho Santa Fe and he could get us a room there for $28 a night including tax. We jumped at it as we knew the place and shared the 60 room hotel and 200 seat dinning room with two other couples! Talk about poor marketing!



The only fault of the hotel was it didn't have a good TV connection and no ESPN so we couldn't watch the US, Canada hockey game. This resulted in a mad dash around town to try to find a bar or restaurant that would have it on. Of course, in this soccer mad country, no one cared about hockey so we missed the big game.

We discovered a small restaurant called Serendipity that is owned by an American lady. They serve very nice meals and in particular, very good brewed Ecuadorian coffee which is rare as most is instant everywhere which is hard to understand as they grow really good coffee. Needless to say the place was a regular visiting place for all the US expats living there. We resisted the urge to go back and gloat about the hockey game result!

We had 7 days left in Ecudor so we decided to head for the coast again. Through a friend we were able to get a return flight for the two of us for $140 (half price for seniors!). This 40 minute flight appealed to us much more than another 10 hour bus so off we flew to Manta. We were expecting a small coastal town but Manta is quite large with a huge fishing industry. The Travel agent who had booked our flight also booked a hotel for us for the first night. It was about 500 yards from the beach so we ventured across and had dinner in a cabana right on the beach and watched the surf roll in.

The outlook was quite fun as dozens of people were crashing around in the waves and enjoying the surf. The other floor show were dozens of huge Pelican birds constantly diving for fish. Some birds dive quite gracefully but the Pelican resembles an airplane crashing and you feel their 9 ft wings should be ripped off as they hit the water. There were also large flocks of Frigate birds cruising around looking to steal fish from other birds whenever they could. It reminded us of our visit to the Galapagos years ago.

My back had been quite sore and the pain was starting to go down my left leg. We hobbled back to our hotel and up to our room on the 1st floor. I didn't realize at the time that it would be my only visit to the Manta beach. The next morning I couldn't walk and the pain was unbelievable.I suspected it was a disc pressing on the sciatic nerve so we found a Physiotherapist and had a few appointments which were worthless.

The next 6 days I was a prisoner in the room as without an elevator, I couldn't get downstairs. The hotel was fantastic as they gladly brought meals up to the room for me. The owners had two 20 year old sons who spoke some English and were also very helpful.

One of our amusements was watching Ecuadorian volleyball, a special 3 man per side game with very different rules compared to NA volleyball. Almost anything goes in getting the ball over the net as placement of the ball is the whole game as there is no spiking as the net is higher. Pushes and throws seem to go on regularly to try to get the opposite side out of position. There were two courts in the park right in front of our hotel and they were busy from 4.00 PM to 11.00 as one was floodlit. It was very entertaining to watch as the skill level was very high. We also watched a few games in Ibarra where according to our friend, big money is bet on the games as several hundred people come out to watch every night.

                                                                 Manta

                                                          Volleyball in Ibarra

Then came the ultimate challenge, getting me down the stairs! They brought up a wheelchair and the plan was to carry me down in it. The two boys were close to 6ft. and very fit and strong. They also conscripted the security guard who fortunately was built like a weight lifter. We started down the stairs with everyone grunting and groaning and me holding my breath in fear. This is a curving slippery marble staircase and I hate to think what would have happened if one of them slipped! The mission was accomplished with lots of congratulations and thanks and we were off to the airport.

The next step was getting me on the plane as this airport didn't have level accordion loading - just a stairway up to the plane! They wheeled me out to the plane and three guys grabbed the chair and with a "un, dos, tres, go", they hoisted me up the stairs. This exercise was repeated several times until we got to Bogata where they had level loading. Airport staff wheeled me around through security past all the line ups - it sometimes pays to be a crock!

We had a long wait in the busy Bogata airport as Copa airlines were unwilling to alter flight times unless we nealy paid for a whole new ticket so we told them to get stuffed and vowed never to fly Copa again. Aerogal Airlines on the other hand couldn't do enough for us and changed flight times with no charge or trouble. Columbia is still on the peso and everthing costs thousands - our $100 hotel on the way down was 200,000 pesos!

Intercontinental Air Canada flights are very different to in Canada flights. A blanket and pillow free and we were served a nice roast chicken dinner with free wine or beer. Not like the local flights when you pay for nearly everything.

We arrived in Toronto and easily made our fairly tight connection to Vancouver with some terrific help from Air Canada staff. We were so glad to see Canada again we were just about in tears!

Glad to be home, it was quite an adventure for us!

                                                             The $6000 smile!

Trip to The Coast

We got an 8 day pass from our dentist while crowns and bridges were being prepared at the lab so we decided to head for the coastal area. It is quite a downhill ride from 8000 - 9000 ft to water level. The trip to Quito was uneventful but to get the bus to the coast we had to take a taxi from one side of Quito to the other as the terminal north and south are kept miles apart to keep hundreds of buses from jamming up the streets - very smart but inconvenient for the traveller. We have no concept in Canada of the number of buses on the road as we compare the terminals to Greyhound. Both terminals are five acres minimum and there must be 100 buses at a time coming and going in each.

We got the bus to Pendagalis on the coast and as it was a scheduled 7 hour trip we decided to put our computer up on the luggage rack above our seat rather than holding it on our laps. Big mistake as the rack started slightly behind us and it was out of our sight range. We covered the case up with our jackets but someone on the bus must have seen the case and on the trip slipped the computer out of it. This was annoying enough but they also took my battery charger and download connector for my camera. It looks like I have a minimum of pictures to take from now on as my camera only takes a rechargeable battery and there is no chance of replacing it here. Also I can´t put any more photos on the blog until we get home.

The bus trip was miserable through all kinds of heavy construction. At one point we came across a crew building some concrete retaining walls like on the Sea to Sky and they were using back yard cement mixers and wheelbarrows! A lot of the new highways are being built of concrete in quite a wide 2 lane with with a shoulder so I certainly hope these are not being poured the same way!

We got to our destination and found a hotel looking out over a long sandy beach. In the morning we tried to have breakfast but the restaurant wasn´t open but one of the owners came in and greeted us in very good English and got us a cup of coffee. It turned out that she had taken her business admin in Toronto. We explained our problem to her about the computer and she very kindly offered to come to the police station to fill out a report, something we couldn´t have accomplished without her as the police understood zero English and looked like he had about the same number of brains. This completed we caught the bus to Canoa down the coast where we wanted to stay as Pendagalis was horrible.

We arrived in the dark as the trip was very slow with all the constuction and stops along the way. The Inn we had chosed was half open and wasn´t very good (great website though - you can´t always go by them). We got the taxi to take us to another one called the Hosteria Canoa which was wonderful. A few rooms in a building and the rest were cabins spread down to an endless sandy beach with the surf rolling in. We decided to walk along the beach to town which was a very long walk for me and it took a grande cerveza to recover!

We now ran into a problem that we hadn´t known about or anticipated. This was a big long weekend holiday and all the places were either full or they were looking for 4 day bookings. We decided to get to Bahia and hoped we could get the bus back to Quito. The bus goes to San Vincente and the you have to take a ferry to Bahia. Well we anticipated a Hollyburn or equivalent but the ferries turned out to be 20 passenger small and low boats. I had quite an adventure getting on and off the ferry but accomlished it with the help of some strong armed crew members. They now have a long causeway under constuction. The vehicle ferry I am sure is an old US army landing craft that had a freeboard of about 18 inches.

Bahia is a beautiful small town on a point with sheltred ocean on one side and wonderful surf rolling in on the other. We fluked into a nice hotel with a funny little room and wandered down to the restauant for coffee. To our surprise this side of the hotel looked over the open ocean with a great seawall for miles and a few super hotels right on the ocean side. We decided the bar at one down the street must have a perfect surf view so we went there and enjoyed a cerveze with the surf splashing up 20ft from us. The hotel was absolutely first class with all facilities for guests - I inquired at the desk about room prices and a nice double room was only 85 - 350 in Tofino.

                                                    The seawall and beach in Bahia

                                           The best little cerveza joint on the seawall

That evening we treated ourselves to a blowout of the budget dinner and a bottle of wine and watched the sun set on the surf. As the Mastercard ads say, ´priceless´.

We had made a bus booking as soon as we arrived so we regretably left Bahia and faced the long bus rides back to Ibarra. A great trip but very tiring as again there was tons of costruction along the way and a total of 13 hours on the bus - numb bums all around!

Visit to Mindo

We had the weekend free so we decided to head for Mindow, one of the bird areas of Ecuador.

There are no highways across to Mindo from Ibarra so we had to go all the way to Quito and then catch another bus. We read that there was only one bus from Quito to Mindo in the afternoon and that it might be crowded so we thought that we should get to the terminal early- big mistake! The terminal is huge with many busses coming and going but the facilities are very simple, one tiny refreshment stand, a toilet and 10 very hard steel slatted benches – very hard steel! About the time our backs and bottoms were giving out I looked in the small office where we bought our ticket and behold, some soft chairs with backs!

The bus ride down to Quito was uneventful, a four hour trip, $2.50 each. Two more hours to Mindo, $2.50 each. This country certainly moves by bus although there are lots of cars. The highway from Ibarra is very congested and they are widening it to four lanes for about 25K which is very necessary. Shops and homes along the way were built very close to the highway and consequently some have lost half of their building and the cutback is now right at their front door and there is a 5ft drop! Many businesses don’t seem to have any access to the highway for their customers so I hope they get some compensation. Cambie Street, ring a bell?

Some of the construction along the highway - note the house behind cut in half and the modern back yard cement mixers for highway construction!

We wound our way out of Quito and started to climb. Ahead we could see clouds on the hilltops and the higher we climbed the thicker the clouds and mist got. We started to wind our way through a curving valley with high hills all around. For the net 30K we twisted and turned through the hills and we must have done 20 complete u’s and you could look up or down and see the road several times. The valley below was always several hundred feet down.
The rainy mist clouded in more and more and the jungle growth got thicker and thicker and more tropical. By the time we got to Mindo the road was soaking wet and mud puddles everywhere. Apart from a light rain in Ibarra, this was the first we have seen.

A charming local American lady met the bus and welcomed us. She asked if we wanted a taxi which we did and called one for us. Well, we have been used to the shinny yellow fleets of all the cities we have been in so it was a bit of a shock when a beat up old car rolled up and she said, ‘here’s your taxi’. We got in and managed to make the short run to our hotel although arrival was always in doubt. After a few days here we came to learn that taxis here come in all shapes and sizes from four door pick-ups to sedans – none of them marked ‘taxi’.

The nice morning that was predicted for the next day arrived so with the camera charged up, off we went to the famous butterfly dome. It was up a road that was very rough and had potholes so large we thought the truck might disappear! The facility is really wonderful and is very professionally run by American educated Ecuadorians. They have thousands of amazing butterflies that they have bred in the dome and they have them in all stages of hatching.

The butterflys are either fed in these colourful sacks filled with honey or with sliced open papayos dipped in honey.

While we were there, several large groups of school kids came through and the owners are trying to educate the young people on Ecology and conservation – very good and very necessary.
In one area of the facility there are tables and you can relax and get drinks and snacks. We ordered a ‘grande cerverza’, (a quart) and watched about 30 – 40 hummers of all sizes and colours fight over two feeders. I took some movies of them feeding but unfortunately there is a mesh screen between the tables and feeder so they are not very clear.

Mindo is very rough and unfinished with many roads unpaved so consequently they are a sea of mud. You start to walk down a sidewalk and after a hundred yards it ends and you are back in the mud. You talk about a town that depends on tourism, I doubt the population is over 800 and there are at least 25 hostels, one big hotel and 100 small cafes. Most of are quite junky but there is one French restaurant on the main street and either the owner or head waiter (a tall grey haired man of 50) stands at the door dressed in a navy uniform and looking very aloof and never greeting anyone! Quite a contrast to the rest of the places. The meals were about $8.00 which is quite expensive for here. We didn’t ever see anyone in there but there he stood in all his ellegence – he must be French!

We discovered a restaurant/hostal owned by an American family who roast and brew local coffee. Naturally, being coffee addicts and sick of drinking instant, we made a beeline there and got several fixes! They also make incredible brownies and chocolates and both of the owners show the obvious result of patronizing the house products too regularly! I don’t think they are going to make their fortune there.

Mary found a comfortable spot to relax in the gazebo of our hotel waiting for the rain to go away.

The second day the rain continued to come down like in Tofino and we got tired of wading through muddy streets (all our pants covered in it) so we cut our visit a day short and bussed back to Ibarra. The bus ride back was an adventure as both drivers thought they were driving Mini Coopers, weaving around traffic and passing on blind hills and corners. The lady next to me crossed herself several times and I almost thanked her as I felt our safe arrival was always in question and we needed someone else looking out for us! Fortunately we got seats as after several stops along the way, the aisles were packed with people hanging on. Nice modern buses but unfortunately, the loud, ever present music or a very violent movie in dubbed in Spanish!

Cotatachi

Cotacahi is a wonderfull small town near Ibarra so we decided to tke a trip down there today. It's the leather centre of Ecuador and stores line the main street with all kinds of beautiful leather products. Our friends bought a beautiful leather carry on luggage bag. I used my strong will power to resist buying a leather jacket for anywhere from $65 to $165. I decided in the end that our bag is getting to full and our wallet getting too empty and my old jacket at home still has quite a bit of wear.

There are quite a few Americans living here and today we met one of them who has set up a business here selling land and houses and doing tours of other areas. He has a website called Pro Ecuador. Nice couple and quite a few English speeking staff - one from Victoria.

It's about 35 K to Cotatachi and a $4.00 cab ride but we decided to take the local bus. The Government must really subsidize bus transport as the fare is only 25c. The bus depot is the size of a football field with busses to surrounding areas coming and going constaantly.

There are no such thing as bus stops so the bus stops anywhere someone flags it down. This can be a mile or often 100 yards so it can be a long trip. We got on the bus this AM and we were the last one on. I hoisted myself up the steep stairs and the bus started to back out and get out of the terminal. I grabbed a post and hung on for dear life, swinging around like a pole dancer while the bus jerked around. Fortunately a lady in the front row quickly saw my problem and opened up a nearby seat for me which I quickly plunked myself into. The moral of the story, don't be the last person on as the drivers don't have munch concern about handicapped or elderly people!


We found some really nice restaurants here and had lunch in one of them. The retaurants around the hotel in Ibarra aren't much so it was a pleasant change. The whole town is quite a contrast to Ibarra which is a hustling busy place. Cotacahi has nice quiet streets without the constant frantic traffic - it's easy to see why quite few North Americans have retired here. We came baack to Ibarra and the Saturday night traffic was unbelieveable. Saturday night is big night here! We decided to go to the Chinese cafe down the street for dinner and had n enormous plate each of pretty good food for $5,20. Shades of Vancouver Chinatown in the 60s!


Off to Otavalo on the bus the next day to get some gifts at the big market. The bus ride down was quite uneventful and smooth – we managed to get seated early so there were no more pole dancing routines on my part!! This time we were going 50% further so the fare was 40c instead of 25c on the way to Cotatachi. On the way back the fare was 50c ea – you figure it out. The bus was completely jammed with two people aside packed down the aisle. All kinds of young kids in seats – all kinds of elderly people standing up. It seems to be the way down here.

They have a fare collector on every bus and instead of fighting his way down the aisle two or three times to collect all the fares, we couldn’t understand why he didn’t just stay at the door and collect them as people got off . However, we shouldn’t have North American thoughts like this!


Two little indian girls who posed for a picture, there are a lot of them around the market dressed in traditional clothes. They are originally from an area east of here. Many older adults are only 4 ft tall!

The market in Otavalo was terrific again today. Several blocks wide and long and it’s a totally open temporary market. You have to appreciate the effort these people go to every day to pack their products in every morning (probably on their backs), set up their displays and then take it all home at the end of the day. They have whole families manning their booths right down to 11 – 12 year old kids.




There are a lot of alpaca products, scarves, ponchos, shawls, sweaters, hats and beautiful rugsl This is mixed in with a few leather products, hangings, jewelry and wood carvings. We shopped mainly for some gifts to bring home and a few more small treats for us! If we were much younger we would like to ship a container load of these things back to Canada and open a shop.
We were pooped after a few hours as the pressure to buy things is very constant. You get a little tired after a while but you really can’t blame the people as it’s their whole living. You almost feel badly bargaining them down but it seems to be the way of life. They see gringo coming so they start the price high and away you go. There is no such thing as a price tag, it’s all by negotiation.
We settled down for a rest at the hotel and by chance discovered the finals of the Australian Open Tennis on ESPN of course with Spanish commentary so we muted the sound and enjoyed the great final.


All alpaca wool!


Today is a quiet day back in Ibarra with a trip to the big market to restock the fruit basket. It's about 4 blocks away so we walk it as my walking has become much stronger with all we have been doing. It is quite a busy street with a lot of foot traffic so I was quite suprised to look down and see a $10 bill lying on the sidewalk. I picked it up and not only was there a $10 but another $10 and a $20 as well. We felt like we had won the lottery!

After stocking up we saw a barber shop across the street so I got a haircut - not up to Pauline's standard but guaranteed to last close to two months with the short back and sides!

We headed to the Super Maxi Mercado which is in a big NA style mall and the grocery store is Save On Foods size (not owned by Pattison as far as I know). They carry everything including booze so we decided to cellebrate our find and picked up a bottle of Queen Anne scothch (12.50) and a bottle of Chian wine (6.60).

We have another date with the dentist on Tuesday and if we can escape his clutches we are taking the bus to Mindo which is birders paradise – 19 varieties of Hummingbirds!

Ibarra
We have been hanging around Ibarra getting our dental work done so on Friday we decided to get out of town for a few days and relax. We had heard about a lake just outside Ibarra that is called Yahuarcocha (means blood lake because of a massace of the Spanish) which they say is very beautiful so we decided to go there to find a place. After much chatting with a tour Lady who spoke English very well she came up with a hotel for $40 a night overlooking the Lake.
We had left our luggage at the Ibarra hotel desk so after we finished with the dentist we could grab a cab, pick up our small bag and go to the Lake. Well, all this sounds very easy and it should have been but our lack of Spanish got us into some difficulty. We hailed a taxi and showed him the name of the lake and he finally nodded to indicate he knew where it was. Then we introduced the name of our hotel to get our bag – well, no comprehendo this concept. We started tearing around the streets of Ibarra getting further and further from our hotel as he was obviously heading for the lake. I kept saying the name of our hotel and holding up one finger and then holding up two fingers and saying the name of the lake. We even wrote down the name of the hotel and went through our sign language several more times with no success. We finally ended up on the outside of town on the start of the highway to the lake. Mary was thumbing through our Spanish - English phrase book and was throwing out meaningful words like first and second. I was getting madder and madder as I could see us at the lake with no bag.
The solution came when I told him to stop and motioned to go back to town. He was thoroughly confused and frustrated and also a little mad at these crazy North Americans. His solution was to pull up beside another cab and tell us to get out. This was fine with us as we could see we were getting nowhere with him. We transferred our bags to the new cab and we still had to give him the standard $1 cab fare anywhere in Ibarra. The new taxi was a nice happy go lucky guy but had no idea where the Royal Ruiz hotel was but at least had the sense to ask several other cabs for directions and we finally got there and got our bags. We then headed for the lake which is only about 12k out of Ibarra. The cab fare to the lake is only $3.

Our Hotel is called the Imprerio Del Sol and is absolutely grand in every way. Anywhere in North America we would be paying $300 a night – here $40. The hotel is a bit run down for lack of care but they seem to be working on it. They were very glad to see us as there were only about 6 other guests. The grounds are magnificent with brilliant flowers blooming everywhere. We had breakfast in the beautiful restaurant which has large windows to view the lake and the volcano behind. Also complete with a grand piano. Everything is done in tile or marble including the large banquet room and unfortunately the bathroom and shower which is a bit terrifying for me with my unsteady legs. We very intelligently brought a piece of our plastic shower mat which has been invaluable here as all showers are slippery tile.

We got a taxi and decided to go on a tour of the lake. Half way around we came across a speedway with concrete stands that would hold 200 people. We don’t know if it was for car or motorcycle racing. On the other side of the lake we found a small fruit market and food so we decided to eat. The fruit was very limited and so was the food. Rows and rows of stalls selling fresh caught (we hope) fish out of the lake. We declined the fish and settled for two dishes of potatoes, roasted corn (like eating nuts) and a deep fried scone with cheese in it – two plates for a dollar. It was very good.

It makes my marketing brain shudder when I look at what this hotel is not doing. They have no domain name or website and only have a half ass site on Blogsspot which doesn’t come up at all on searches. They have a rack card which is not great and a few signs around the highway. They don’t have internet wireless connection in the rooms and down the hall from our room is a broken guest computer. Then they wonder why they don’t have many guests. They have a device they lend me which they call a modem. I plug it into the USB on my computer and this gives me wireless. It must be more like a router . I don’t know if they are broke or simply don’t know what to do. It is sad to see as somebody has put a pile of cash into building the place and without customers, they are losing their shirt.

We summond up our courage yesterday and decided to try the fish. We picked one out and the lady motioned us into the back where there was shaddy seating which was packed with Ibarra families up for a Sunday at the lake. The CD was blaring loud music and then small band took over for while. Our fish arrived, $2.00 for a large platter with lots of boiled potatoes and some deepfried scones with cheese in them. The fish was very good and we don't have any digestive problems today.

Back to Ibarra and more dental appointments on Tuesday.

Ibarra

Ibarra is a hustling bustling town with a huge public market which sells absolutely everything. There are hundreds of rows of small stalls with meat, chicken, fruit, clothes, shoes and food. The clothing is not anything like the Otavalo market - mostly low end stuff. In the meat section there was all kinds of varieties of meat hanging and also steer heads that had been chopped off and were sitting in a nice row. There was also a freshly roasted whole pig that you could have pieces cut off.




Mary and I needed a cup of coffee (which is usually instant) so we sat down in a small booth and ordered one. She had to borrow two cups from a neighbours stall and poured us 2 cups of the most sickly sweat coffee which we forced down. It was a Tim's quadruple!



We have been feasting on fruit of all kinds and we stocked up here. Bunches of smll bananas, 20c, avocados and mangoes 20c, Papayos 25c, unbelievable! We have both lost about 5 lbs!

One of about 200 fruit stands

Everyone seems to be selling something even on the street - ice cream. clothes pegs, batteries and these two ladies selling strawberries, cherries and loganberries.

Mary saw the Dentist here today. His name is Bolanos and had been recommended on a site called Pro Ecuador, (an American living in Cotatachi nearby). He certainly lived up to his recommendation as he has a terrific pratice and spends three times as much time with you as the dentistsin Canada. Very highly trained, speaks English fairly well and is very thorough. Furthermore, he seems to give all the ladies a little kiss on the cheek when they leave. Caught Mary and Lorraine a little surprised the first time! Very South American. Mary had the first and serious stage of her work done, 5 implants and a few extractions. She chose to be knocked right out so our Dentist called in a very professional anethetist. She was out for about 4 hours and was feeling pretty sore but the proceedure was painless for her. Today is a little different as she has quite a bit of swelling and a bit of a black eye from an implant that went into her sinus - honest, I didn't hit her.

I had my first appointment today for my crown and a filling. Cute little ladies doing the cleaning and X rays. All smiles and giggles! My crown is going to be $400, implants $1000 ea, quite a difference to Canada. Fortunately the Dentist takes travellers cheques as very few people seem to. The Bank machines are a little unpredictable s some won't take our Bank card. Today we found a super machine that took our card and even had an English button!

Crime is obviously a problem down here and to prevent people loitering, sitting and hanging around window fronts, here is the Ecuadorian solution - very effective!

I wish I had the factory that makes steel roller doors to cover windows and doors. Every shop and business down every street in Ecuador seems to have a steel door tht they roll down at night and two extra heavy padlocks locking it at the bottom. Bars on windows don't seem to be adequate.

We made it!

After a painless but long flight to Toronto and getting lost several times in that huge Airport we connected to our flight to Bogata with 6 hours wait. We had connected with our niece Julie and our cousin Karl who live in Toronto and they came out to the airport and we had a pleasant visit with them.

Our arrival in Bogata was something else. Masses of people with baggage in lines everywhere and it was a bit frightening as there were armed guards at every corner. I had made the reservation long before the bomber scare and higher security checks so we only had two hours to change planes. A very helpful airport staff quickly saw our problem and got me into a wheelchair and off we went at full speed to our connection. She got us through security very quickly but of no avail as boarding had closed. There was still 3/4 of an hour to takeoff but there was no arguing, it was closed. Part of the problem was that our baggage had not been sent on to Quito and we had to claim it and clear customs and then board.

The lady put us in touch with a hotel connection and they had a shuttle to town which seemed a bit like Saratoga Raceway. However, we made it with a few near collisions. Everyone drives at high speeds leaning on the horn and crossing lanes every 100 m.

The hotel was great but we couldn't enjoy breakfast as we were told we had to be at the airport
3 hours ahead which meant taking the 5:00AM shuttle. As it turned out we could have easily taken the 6;00 shuttle as we waited for hours for check in. The flight they put us on was via Panama, however it was very nice and they fed us on the way.

We were helped at every turn by wonderful airport staff. Someone would appear with a wheelchair and load Bruce into it and take us to the next line or gate. The same person stayed with us until we boarded. Sometimes our lack of Spanish was a problem but we managed to make ourselves understood enough - usually by handing them our ticket!

Arrived in Quito and checked into our Hostel, The Travellers Inn which was very basic but friendly. Run by a family and the two sons both speak English very well. One of the sons took us on a 4 hour tour of Quito which was very interesting. A lot of walking for me and I was quite exhausted by the end. However, a nap and a grande cerveza cured me!

The highlight of the tour was certainly the native village on the equator and watching the water going down the drain about 6 ft on each side. Mary tried to walk the equator line without success - no one does it.

We learned how to shrink heads too but probably won't.

We headed for Otavalo and met up with our good friends Jim and Lorraine Peloquin, owners of All Seasons Roost B&B in Courtenay. They had been around town for a few days and sugested we go to the 'small market' on Friday as the Saturday main market is really crowded. This market was certainly not small and by any standard it was big - acres and acres. Fantastic stuff and really good prices and of course, there is lots of bargaining. I bought a beautiful alpaca sweater for $10. Mary bought a few goodies as well and we had to resist lots of things as our luggage is already overweight. I think we might be discaring a few extra clothes or buying another bag for purchases as we only have one bag at present. Steaming hot lunch

We had a great afternoon yesterday and took a taxi to Cotacachi - about 20 miles for $4.00. It is a neat little town and is the leather capital of Ecuador. The leather work in the market is outstanding at unbelievable prices. Beauiful jackets for $40.00, wallets, $10.00, suitcases, $90.00. We resisted pretty well! We saw a very small boy dancing to a family band.

We stayed the last two nights at a Hostel with Jim and Lorrine. It is a very nice place run by an American who is married to an Ecuadorian from the Otavalo area. We got up this AM to find out that the night clerk had some friends over last night and after a lot of drinking there was a fight and the clerk was killed! The place was overrun by police this morning but they have no leads yet. A good time to leave!

We are now in Ibarra where Mary has an appointment to see the dentist who was recommended to us. We have upgraded to the Hosteria Chorlavi which is more like a hotel but on 10-20 cres and unbelievale vegetation. 8 ft Yucca plants with the stem 30 ft A beautiful room with all the comforts for $50.00 including breakfast.

The country is full of churches. The big cathedral in Quito took over 100 years to build and is still not finished. It was opened by the Pope a few years ago. It is built on the site of a temple to the moon that the aboriginals worshiped in and from there a straight road leads to the statue of the Virgin of Quito which was erected on the site of a temple to the sun. What a way to erase all traces of paganism. One nice thing is that after a road accident crosses are erected on the site and a blue heart painted on the road, we noticed our taxi driver crossing himself as we drove by - we crossed ourselves too but that was from fear. Taxis drive mostly on their horn, drive within 3 or 4 feet of the car ahead and ignore most signs and regultions - this is in spite of police everywhere.

We have had trouble getting travellors checks cashed so we tried cash machines - mostly in Spanishalthough we have found one English one. Banks are very safe - there's an armed guard at the door as well as inside - they look pretty friendly but serious.

We must work on our Spanish. Jim and I went to the animal market on Otavalo and had to crow like chickens to tell the taxi driver where we wanted to go. He didn't understand crowing but he did get "oink, oink" 'porquo' he shouted 'pig' we yelled and we were friends. As you can imagine the market was awful - thin, mangy cows, terrified chickens, unhealthy puppies, guinea pigs, fighting cocks and screaming pigs. We almost brought home some piglets but Bruce said 'no, we're already overweight!'