Mary Beth arrived after a very easy travel day from Chicago on Wednesday evening. Thursday she and I headed off to see the Middle of the World monument in the morning. We actually started at one of my favorite spots, an amazing Crater viewpoint called Pululahua:
Next we hit the Museum of the Sun for some fun equatorial experiments including the balancing of the egg:
Finally, we hit the great photo op Middle of the World monument, where I neglected to take any pictures, oops.
Continuing on our tour, we headed to the Old City for some historical sites. Mary Beth and I climbed to the tippy top of the Basilica (via a rickety ladder that would never have been accessible to the public in the US - very dangerous) for this amazing photo:
Here's Mary Beth at the beginning of the climb:
Next we headed towards the Plaza Grande to do some people watching and I found this memorial to Hugo Chavez (this was the day after his death and Ecuador had declared 3 days of mourning). It was much smaller than I had expected considering the news out of America was claiming that South America was virtually in hysterics, evidently, Ecuador was handling his death pretty well:
The next morning we headed out early for Otavalo, a mountain town about 2.5 hours outside the city. We chose it for Mary Beth's visit because we could do a wide variety of activities in a small place. We started by visiting a local waterfall:
I continue to get a big kick out of the Ecuadorian's general lack of safety awareness. Here is a woman who decided to completely ignore the "Danger, Do Not Enter" sign and go right underneath it to access the waterfall. And the other picture is Spencer on a scary bridge that moved a shocking amount while we crossed it:
Next we headed to the Condor Park, which was very cool and we got to see some huge and cool birds. But was also a little sad as they just looked like they wanted to fly away.
Yes, this is a Bald Eagle and we were so close! This picture does not do this awesome bird justice.
This guy looks like a pigeon in this picture, but he was about 2 feet tall and much cooler then anything you see on the street in New York City.
They did a cool flight / feeding demo that was entirely in Spanish and we missed most of (due to an out dated guide book, thanks Lonely Planet). But, check out the location!
While walking around the park after, we found this HUGE winged blue bug dragging it's loot, a GIANT hairy spider. We just had to share:
After that we headed back to our hotel, Casa Mojanda, for dinner and a quiet evening before what was planned to be a big day on Saturday visiting South America's largest outdoor market. Here is the stunning view from our little cabin's porch, and a little friend we met on the grounds.:
That night we had a great dinner and headed to bed. Unfortunately, Mary Beth and I both woke up in the middle of the night with food poisoning that took us down HARD. We spent all night and the next morning trading turns in the bathroom before making the sad decision to head back to the comfort of home in Quito without getting to see the market or do the other items on our itinerary. Oh, Ecuador.
Unfortunately, the food poisoning slowed our tourist pace to a complete crawl and for the next three days we were only able to get off the couch for a little while each day. We were able to go up the TeleferiQo on Sunday only to be chased down by a hail storm. On Monday we headed to the Artisinal Mercado for some souvenirs for Mary Beth but had to head back after too long.
Overall, it wasn't the trip that I had carefully planned for Mary Beth, but we made the most of it and accomplished what we could. It was nice to see an old friend and be able to show off our new homeland. And, it was a great reminder that Ecuador is a tough place and it is always in charge!
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