by land, by river, by 24-hour bus

(pictures to come, just an update for now)

I am a bit behind. Really I am, I missed my chance at the 24 hour bus from Guayaquil, Ecua to Lima, Peru so Im ¨just kicking it¨ (as PJ would put it) in the highest-populated city in ecuador. All this means is that I spent a good amount of my day in a park with prehistoric looking lizards, giant iguanas, reading and drinking fresh mora (blackberry) juice. A three or four year old girl had one particularly large one by the tail, and drug it behind here like a toy car on a string- this was both horrific and hilarious.

I took a trip to the Oriente a couple weeks ago. This was the jungle, and it took 3 and a half hours on a motorized canoe, after 11 hours on the road, to get there. The huts in the lagon I stayed in with only one other guest were amazing. No electricity, only candles for your room and gas for the kitchen. However there wasn´t a lack of giant insects, and the most amazing frog found on the trip was in my toilet bowl.

My jungle experience was pretty much like jungle book. Me mogley. I ate larvae, stuck my hand in an ant nest, went out in the dark night river to find smal aligators (camens) and finally fished, gutted, and ate a giant pirrahna. I made some videos of some of these events that I will have to dedicate to any family member living south of pennsylvania. (I will post soon) Aside from these native activities, although the ¨natives¨ were much more civilized than the grigo loco, I saw saw beautifully exotic birds and loved every minute I spent on the river.

This past weekend was a fiesta in Cuenca. It wasn´t entirey loco, but we spent friday night in the park listening to Andean music and some fusion (the latter the smooth Jazz of the Latin world) drinking sangria and liter bottles of beer.