Mindo

Wow, I have been getting behind on writing! I still haven’t written about the weekend yet, and there’s already other stuff happening. Anyway, I’ll try to catch up and I’ll start off with our trip to Mindo. Josué, Thad, and I wanted to do something fun this weekend, so we decided to return to the small touristy town, which is about two hours out of Quito. We had a brief stop there after our Santo Domingo trip and this was where we visited the amazing chocolate factory. There are a lot of outdoor things to do in Mindo and it is world famous for bird watching.

After class on Friday we packed our stuff and headed out. I’ve never been much of an ultra light packer, but in my 1000 cm3 Camelbak, I managed to fit a weekend’s worth of clothes and toiletries, along with my water filter, two liters of water, three oranges, and a jar of peanut butter (the only food I had left in my room). I was definitely proud of this packing job and the peanut butter turned out to be a good idea.

Every source on the internet said there was only one bus company direct to Mindo, but all of the locals told us otherwise. They said we could catch a bus every thirty minutes from the nearby terminal and this sounded good. However, we realized that these buses weren’t direct when we were dropped off in the dark at the crossroads about 5 miles out of town. A couple of locals told us to wait for a ride, and soon enough a small pickup truck with blasting salsa music turned at the intersection and offered us one. We hopped in the back and realized we picked the craziest driver. He sped down the winding road recklessly, passing other cars while we huddled in the back against our backpacks. Everyone in the cab was chain smoking and halfway down the hill the truck stopped so everyone could light up again. We were relieved when we finally pulled into town.

Finally we got to our lodging, which was at the chocolate factory, El Quetzal. The place is also a café and hostel and this turned out to be one of the best ideas ever. Our room had great beds and hot showers, and the whole place smelled like chocolate. That night we grabbed dinner in town (huge plates of food for $4) and we returned to relax with a brownie afterward. They were the best brownies I’ve ever had and our teacher always refers to them as the best in the world. Everyone raved about them in the guestbook and they are unexplainably amazing. We ended the night on a sugar high and had some good guy time. Haha, what happens in Mindo stays in Mindo.

Saturday morning we woke up and enjoyed an amazing free breakfast. My pancakes came with ginger syrup and tasted like donuts, and I also had a plate of fresh fruit and a batido de papaya, a fruit drink mixed with milk. Afterward we hit the town and found a travel guide to give us suggestions. There we hired a ride up to the hiking trails and were able to enjoy the outdoors with a variety of activities. We descended a steep slope, hiked along the river, saw some cool plants and wildlife, and went swimming under a waterfall. There was even a concrete waterslide in the middle of the jungle, and whoever had the idea to build that was a genius. But there was a sign in Spanish that instructed people to grab their feet and that confused me. I soon realized why when the slide went fast and momentum brought me on my back during the ten-foot fall into the river.



Top Left: Jungle Waterslide. Right: Our swimming spot.
Bottom Left: Leap of faith! Right: Josué going for it.

My favorite part of the day though was ziplining (in Spanish they use the English word ‘canopy’). There are huge canopy outfits in Mindo, but they are packed full of tourists and for this reason we decided not to do them. However we were lucky to find a privately run canopy in the middle of the jungle, which only charged $3 per run. It included a running leap of faith over a cliff that was super awesome, and the lines took us back and forth across a valley. I ended up doing it three times and the guy running it was super cool and didn’t charge me for the last one. The equipment was a lot less professional than ziplining outfits, but was still really safe to use. I think most ziplines go way overboard in safety measures for insurance purposes.

Afterward we each bought $1 chicken kebobs and fresh squeezed orange juice from a vendor at the trailhead. We were going to go tubing in the river, but once it started to rain we returned back to the hotel. There we split another brownie and found some more cheap food in town. We decided to relax and found a spa to get massages. Josué and I split an hour for $15 each and that turned out to be great. I was so relaxed I almost left without paying. (The masseuse was an American from Washington and I was surprised when I found out that her boyfriend’s family lives on my island and she travels there all the time. What a small world!) That night we each got another brownie with ice cream and mixed them with the peanut butter I brought. That was seriously the best dessert I’ve ever had! Pretty much in a nutshell our trip consisted of adrenaline and sugar highs.


Left: El Quetzal. Middle & Right: Enjoying Amazing Dessert!

Sunday we woke up and went tubing early in the morning. The cost was only $6 each and this included transportation to the top of the river. The tubes were tied together in a honeycomb shape and included two guides who rode with us and steered our makeshift raft. I was surprised how many huge rocks there were in the river, but we still were able to go through some class II and III rapids on our way down. A couple times we got stuck and the guides jumped out to move us.

Afterward we relaxed for the rest of the day and bought our return bus tickets, which was a good thing because we were running low on money. After paying the hotel for our room and brownie tab, we were left with about $8 combined. In our quest to find the cheapest lunch, we found a section of town that served cheap lunches to locals, and for $2.25 we each got a bowl of cow’s hoof soup, a plate of rice and meat, and a glass of juice. Sadly, we couldn’t bring any brownies home, but after our final bus transfer we made it back to campus with 31 cents to spare. Talk about cutting it close!



Top Left: Before the game. Right: Roommates.
Bottom Left: Cheering on the Liga. Right: Game action.

On Tuesday a group of us went to watch a local soccer game between LDU Quito (the local team known as the ‘Liga’) and San Felipe de Chile. This was part of the South American Cup, an annual tournament between the best pro teams in the continent. A few days before, the Liga lost to the Chilean team on the road and this was played on the day of the miner’s rescue. I imagine there was a lot of emotion involved when they pulled the upset. But at the game we went to, the Liga gave them a 6-1 beating and it was a lot of fun to watch. Also, our tickets were only $9 and we could sit near the field! The crazy section of the stadium (known as la muerte blanca, the white death) was so fanatical and passionate and I want to watch another game from there. Yoan and I were originally planning on being there until we decided to go with a bigger group.

Finally, yesterday (Wednesday) we had a field trip to La Capilla del Hombre, a local art museum that showcased the work of Oswaldo Guayasamin who was a humanist and expressionist influenced by Picasso. He worked to promote peace and indigenous rights and he reflected the hurt of misery of humanity in his artwork. The paintings were impacting and we learned about the history behind them. There were also some powerful quotes, one of which has still stood out to me: “I cried because I didn’t have shoes, until I saw a child who didn’t have feet.” On a lighter note, we went to lunch at a Mexican restaurant afterward that had amazing food and served habañero sauce. I ordered the biggest burrito I’d ever seen, and the ‘Super Machote’ was 50 cm (20 in) long and extremely delicious.


Above: El Super Machote!

Later there was a two for one deal at the cinema so a group of us went to see Piraña 3D (Piranha 3D). I was expecting to see a good horror movie about piranha attacks (a good thing to see before travelling to the Amazon), but the movie turned out to be kind of a joke and was more about teens partying over spring break. I found it sad that other cultures get their view of US youth culture from media like this.

Well that’s the gist of what went on the past few days. I also added some more pictures to my Andean Adventures album on Facebook. I will try to not get too far behind on blogging in the future. Hasta luego!