A second day in Quito

As plans go it was a good one, as we did indeed manage to wake up earlier than we had yesterday, and after a great breakfast of pancakes with bananas and syrup, we were ready to go to another absolute must, the small tourist city that had been built on the sight of the exact equator line, and where the french explorers declared the centre of the earth once they had circumnavigated the world in order to prove it scientifically.

The little town was a great place to visit, warmer than Quito and only about an hours bus ride away, plus with enough good photos opportunities, restaurants and tourist traps to keep even a jaded traveller busy for a few hours. I have no idea why a group of four Colombian dancers were putting on a show, but their high heels, skimpy costumes and dancing routine drew a bit of a croud, but I felt that it was a bit of a cop out to watch Colombians in Ecuador, so instead I just settled to take a few pictures of me holding up the world and having a personalised postcard created, complete with Ecuadorian costume.

After a couple of hours we met up with some good friends of C's and together we all visited a nearby volcano, still technically active despite not erupting in the last 2000 years, with the biggest crator in all of the americas, big enough for the land to be used by local farmers who have created an entire community in the recess. Sadly the fog / clouds up that high were so thick that I could barely see the guide standing in front of me, let alone the base of the volcano, but in a gesture of good spirit after the half hour talk where we all froze staring into the gloom the guide said that we should return and that he would ensure that we all received back 50% of the ticket price ( which was only about US $2 each anyway ) for the zero visibility tour.

It was quite an eerie feeling to know that the weather could change so drastically only a few minutes away, and by the time we were back in the tourist town we were back in the baking sun again. Here we all grabbed a bite to eat before heading off back to C's where her daughter was due back any minute and she was eager to see her agian and help her with her homework.

I was quite impressed by the fact that C' had chosen to send her daughter to a school where they teach half the day in Spanish and the other half in English, and so as she was growing up with it apart from the slight accent her understanding and pronounciation was very clear and once again shows that English will soon become the main language used in just about every big town and city acros the world.

After a movie and my updating my blog we ordered in a Chinese, my choice as I was beginning to get thin from all the typical foods that were just strange to me, and I ravenously tucked in and finished almost all of both of ours, which C' never minded.

As C' had work the next day we called it a night around 11pm and I half packed my stuff before I went to bed, all except my clothes that C' had been washing and ironing like crazy as she had been reading my blog and wanted to be sure that I arrived in Colombia with as many clean clothes as possible.

On a slightly different subject, Reventador volcano in Ecuador has erupted ash and lava, after a weekend of heightened seismicity. Ecuador’s Instituto Geofísico does not currently regard the activity as dangerous. Reventador’s last eruption was in July this year.

I asked C' about this and she said that it was a fairly common event and they are used to having to wear face masks for a few days whenever it happens.