Travel Log - Quito, Ecuador
December 22 & 23, 2007
For nine months or more I had been dreaming about Ecuador - about being in the Galapagos. I even went through SCUBA diving certification so when I flew out early last week from Los Angeles, I couldn{t have been more excited about this three week trip. On the way over, I tried to read the Rough Guide but it just didn´t hold my attention. Landed at Miami and have decided that at least the American airlines wingo f it is terrible. There is not a single decent book store in the entire area and the lounge is so so.. Its crowded and not very inviting at all. My flight to Quito was delayed by an hour and a half - a broken captain´s chair.. >I wonder how it broke since it was the same plane that we took from LAX. Anyhow ' we get a different plane and we finally take off -- I am looking forward to being in Quito.. we arrive over Quito in time only to be put in a holding pattern by ground control because the fog (neblina) is too thick. Our very Gringo captain´s admirable efforts at spanish are quickly deteriorating and he is mixing in English words with his very American accented spanish. After circling for nearly an hour we get diverted to Guayaquil because we are low on fuel. All indications seem to be that we may spend the night in Guayaquil.. at this point I realize that my phone is working on roaming but who knows how much it is per minute. I try to call the numbers I have for Cristina who is supposed to be picking me up at the airport but realize I have the wrong numbers. Then amazingly we take off from Guayaquil at about 1am and land in Quito around 2am.. so now we are over 4 hrs late and guess what - yup one bag does not make it -- by the time I go through the American airlines lady to report this and say that I am at hostal Arupo (which I thankfully remember having discussed with Cristina) -- its nearly 2:30 am! And when I walk out - there is no one to pick me up - no Cristina. I panick slightly - the person in the seat next to me '- who by the way has given me this nasty cold that i am still fighting - is also without a ride. We are standing around like deer caught in the headlights fumbling with my phone to make a call when a kind person asks in english 'Can we help you?¨' these are a mom and her son who has just flown in from houston i think and they offer to give us a ride to La Mariscal area where my hostal is supposed to be. At 3 am when you are desperate you will clutch at anything.. so my row'mate and I get into the car.. it has a Yale sticker so it can´t be that bad right? Anyways - how awesome of these people to take us to our hotel - I am very excited abouyt Ecuador - so nice of these folks to be so kind!
I ring the bell at the hostal - a man opens the door and in my broken spanish, i tell him i have a room reserved by cristina vallejo - he doesn¨t even ask for an ID - just takes me to a room and goes to bed! I sleep very poorly - dream about getting in touch with Cristina with a mixture of made up signals and diving signals.. i wake up around 7am.. after having only slept a few hours. Cristina, in the meanwhile has called and left her numbers. i call her and we connect finally and make plans to meet in a couple of hours. i eat a sumptuous breakfast and have a nice conversation with an english woman, camilla, about their travels in Ecuador. I am excited to see and experience all that is Ecuador..
Cristina and I meet up around lunch time and head over to old town. Plan for the day is to do some shopping, see some of old town and then go to her younger sister{s for a xmas dinner. We go to old town and walk around - its a fantastic experience - see photos and captions. We have a loverly 3 hour meal at this cafe near Plaza San Francisco and do some shopping and head to her parents place - from there to Carmen Marie and Jose´s place in the valley of Cuyamba.. past the University where Cristina and her sisters studied. Its an awesome experience at the party - reminds me a lot of India as there are like 20-30 people in this small townhome all having a good time - eating and drinking - although the food is not as central to the party as it would be in an Indian event. I catch about 10% of the conversations in Spanish ' its incredibly difficult because there are so many people talking and I make up my own stories in my head - which are funny to me and I laugh along, perhaps out of step but its even funnier when Kitty explains the real story to me.
So then we return back to Quito.. its nearly 11am. I am dead tired and hungry - after Kitty drops me off, I start walking to the hostal door and promptly trip at a tiny step that I didn't know was there. I fall hard and jam my hand, esp. my index finger on my right hand.. it is still sore! Worse yet, but I don't discover till later, the fall damages my Mac and its dead.. it works but the screen is 75% white.. anyways I discover this when I return from getting a quick dinner around the corner at this fantastic place called casa de boca or something.. its a litle pink house with really fanatastic food in gringoland that is La Mariscal.. so I come back - discover the computer is dead and just give up on the day and go to sleep. My cold is getting worse..
December 24th, 2007
