Sorry that it has been a while since I posted anything! I´ve filled up the amount of free space on the blog, so I had to pay to get more storage space. But it´s worth it to be able to share my experiences and pictures! Thanks for reading!
Liga vs. Independente game on Wednesday, February 23
On Friday February 25, I spent a great day enjoying different and unique parts of Quito. First Maya, Vanessa and I hiked up Pichincha again after riding the Teleferiqo skytram! The last time that I´d done it was way back in September, and it was super fun to go on a hike from Quito! We also met up with Geoff and Mike from our program and Joe from the Minnesota program, they´d gotten an earlier start than us and literally run up to the top in order to train for a climb to the top of Volcan Cotopaxi.We hiked back down and road down in the gondola with some crazy Canadians, one of which has traveled to over 30 countries, I think!
The four of us, (Maya, Vanessa, Joe and myself) had delicous sea bass for dinner at the market and stopped at a really neat natural foods store before meeting up with Olga at Cine Ocho y Medio to see "Muchedumbre". It was an interesting documentary made in Ecuador about the police riots adn temporary take over of the government that took place on September 30, 2010. Afterwards we headed down to La Ronda at night to see an amazing Andean Folkloric Dance show again. We even got to go up on stage and dance this time!
Hiking up Pichincha
Lunch break with Maya and Vanessa
View of sunny Quito
Andean Folkloric Dance show on Friday night...so amazing!!
The whole group of dancers!
The next morning, Marisol, Olga, Maya, Joe and I met up and took the bus for about 4 hours to Riobamba. Once there we met up with our couchsurfing host, Fausto and he showed us around the city! We ate some street food for dinner and saw a few of the historical buildings and churches of Riobamba. Then we bought Olga a $1 cake and sang and celebrated at Monica´s house (Fausto´s friend and neighbor). We went out dancing for a bit that night and found out that Riobamba is pretty hopping at night!
On Sunday morning we got up early and took a bus from Riobamba to Alausi, a picturesque town in the mountains. We intended to ride the Nariz del Diablo ("Devil´s Nose") train ride that runs down a very exciting series of cliffs and affords some amazing scenery. Unfortunately the trains were all full on Sunday and we found out that it cost $20 for a 2.5 hour ride and they don´t even let people ride on the roof anymore! So we hung out around Alausi for a while and enjoyed the sunshine before catching a bus back to Quito. I think that Olga still had a fun birthday weekend even though we were unable to ride the train!
View of the Illiniza Volcanoes in the bus on the way to Riobamba
In front of a church and El Altar mountain in Riobamba
Couchsurfing in Riobamba...our host Fausto is on the far left
Giant San Pedro statue in Alausi
View of the valley surrounding Alausi
Alausi...a town where we supposed to get on a train, but weren´t able to, so we had a really fun time anyways!
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