Papallacta, Cotopaxi, and La Hesperia

It has been quite a while since I've posted but that doesn't mean that life here has been boring. Over the course of the past two weeks I've seen some of nature's most magnificent creations. :)

Just above the Andean Cloud Forest you can find the "Elfin Forest" named after the stunted Polylepsis trees that characterize the area. These trees were named 'paper trees' by the natives because the bark is so thin and smooth it can actually be used to write on!

Standing in front of Cotopaxi. It may not look like it but that mountain is 19,342 ft taller than me! 

Higher up along the mountain, the view is breathtaking from every direction.

I also had the pleasure of visiting Las Termas de Papallacta. Literally the most relaxing place on Earth and all natural :)

At La Hesperia, an ecotourism hotspot/fully functioning dairy farm and 814 hectares of protected cloud forest, I saw some amazing animals ranging from quetzals (a fairly common but beautiful bird) to some of the most incredibly strange spiders (even a tarantula!) and caterpillars.   The cloud forest is also home to an immense variety of epiphytes, bromeliads, orchids and heliconia (those pink and green things above are the flower casings/bracts of a heliconia).

Mitad del Mundo

Today we went to the middle of the world! Quite an experience being in both the North and South Hemispheres at the same time :)

Corbinita (sea bass) trying to walk down the Equator. So much harder than it looks!

A view of the equator from on top of the museum.

Herman intently trying to balance an egg on the head of a nail on top of the equator, not as hard as it looks!

And then I ate tomatilla de arbol, just one of the many fruits I've had here that I have never even heard of.

Overall a great way to spend a day in Ecuador!

Some things about Ecuador

The Sun is incredibly strong. Check out the UV index, on Long Island we rarely hit 8 or 9 during the summer. 

At an altitude of 9000ft and pretty much on the equator the sun here in Quito is scorching (see my arm below- it looks much worse in real life). So after having one 3 hour class outside unannounced  I was toast- literally.

The mountains are surreal...

Ecuador exports all of it's coffee and leaves behind "Nescafe" aka no es cafe

But they keep some of the flowers so 25 roses cost 1$!!

Ecuadorian moms are a wee bit overbearing. "How are you? Did you sleep? What did you eat? What color are your socks? Did you make your bed? Wash your hands. Put on a sweater."

And Ecuadorian men can be very forward.

Luckily, I guess, I don't understand much so its very hard to be offended!

Orientation

Today at orientation, a man from the US Embassy scared us all to death with horror stories about our chances of get robbed and drugged etc. Despite that, my first day at USFQ far surpassed my expectations.

 First off, the campus is absolutely beautiful!

 And surrounded by the Andes mountains!

And there are tons of fruit trees!

The food on campus is spectacular and raspberry desserts seem to be a recurring theme, but I can definitely live with that :)

28 hours deep...

After 18 hours of traveling and 28 hours of having no idea what's going, on I'm exhausted. BUT I've never been so excited to be somewhere. My host family Paty (mom), Jose (dad), their three daughters Belen, Maria Jose and Daniela, and the three perritos, Pria, Gazpar and Georgina are incredible (pictures to come). Today, Paty and her best friend Davita took me on a shopping adventure and to my surprise the Megamaxii shopping center had everything we have in the states (buttered popcorn, digorno's, tropicana) and more. But mascara costs $15 so I was amazed that all of the women still wear make-up.

Tomorrow we have orientation at USFQ and I have to wake up in about 6 hours so that's all for now but more to come! :)