SUPER VIAJE 2009

I have been on the go the past week. There are far to many great stories and adventures to describe in detail so I will summarize briefly in a list some of the highlights.

Viaje de Observacion for my track of microfinances:
-Visited 5 different cooperatives in rural areas north of Quito and learned all about how they function and the impacts they have on the communities
-Sat in on a planning meeting with the indigenous women that manage one of the cooperatives which was unexpected and lucky timing.
-Met up with the education students in an ecoturism site in San Clemente where we all stayed and ate with indigenous families.
-Saw a quinoa plant and learned how to pick and process it!
-Cooked bread over an open fire with our host mom for breakfast.
-Found a different place I may do my internship mostly because there are going to be a bunch of students around Otavalo and I don't want to be by so many people...I have to get this figured out soon...ahhh!
-Lots of good conversations and laughter with the 5 students in my track who are all awesome!

We got home late from our trip, grabbed backpacks we had left at CIMAS and met up with another friend at the bus terminal. I finally got to travel with my closest friends here: Ashley, Erin and Julia. We missed the bus we wanted so had to wait for the next one to Tena...

Tena
-Arrived at 2am and rode in the back of a pickup taxi to our hostel.
-Explored a park with monkeys and other animals on an island between two rivers.
-Ziplined for free in the park!

From Tena we took a bus then a canoe to Liona Lodge...

Liona Lodge
-Swimming in the river, sinking up our knees in mud and mud fight!
-Delicious food and coffee!
-Loooootttss of laughter.
-5 hour hike through the rain forest in rain boots.
-Eating ants off a tree and smelling delicious leaves and seeing random jungle things.
-Swinging Tarzan style on vines...and falling.
-Wading through a crystal clear river.
-Eating potato salad off leaves.
-Seeing some pretty sweet animals in a reserve that recuperates injured or captured animals.
-Rafting back down the river to our lodge.
-Loooootttsss more laughter!
-Making friends with our guide and getting him to take us out on the river on a tiny canoe in the middle of the night then swimming and having water splash fights aka "CARNAVAL!"

to be continued because I have to go to class now...oh and i figured out how to post pictures on here so sometime in the next week i will get some up but i have a bunch of papers to write so it might not happen right away.