It was cool to visit the historic part of Quito again and it was a different experience at night. The old city has a lot of charm and the buildings date back to the 1600s. We started off with carriage rides through the plazas and historic streets. I sat up front next to the driver who had trouble getting the skiddish horse under control. He was interesting to talk to and kept swearing at the horse. There were a lot of people taking pictures when we rode by and I couldn’t figure out whether they were photographing the horses or the gringos. There aren’t many carriage rides here, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they were taking pictures of us.
For dinner we went to Café Mirador, a really nice restaurant in the heart of town. Before eating we climbed up to the roof to Vista Hermosa and saw a beautiful panorama of the city. I’m really starting to like Quito and it’s cool to live in a historical city like this. In the restaurant everything looked good on the menu, but I ordered a type of spicy steak. It’s good to have meat when I get the chance because Ecuadorian cuisine tends to be carb loaded. (Seriously, we’ve been served rice, noodles, and potatoes before.) When I asked for the steak to be medium I was warned by the NILI staff that meat is cooked really rare down here. I decided to go for three-quarters, but the steak still came back pink and bloody on the inside. This was suprising at first, but I didn’t really mind. I know throughly cooked meat is empasized in the US, but I think there might be more risk back home with our mass produced feedlot cattle. If the organs and scraps are safe to eat here, the cows are probably safer too. At least, I hope so. The steak was delicious though, and the texture reminded me a lot of sashimi (raw fish sushi).
Afterward we drove up to El Panecillo, a hill in South Quito with the famous virgin statue that overlooks the city. We hiked around the park and admired the 150-ft structure (same height as the copper part of the Statue of Liberty). Later I learned that it was based off of a smaller statue and made from 7,000 pieces of aluminum. It’s possible to go inside the statue, but it was closed by the time we got there. The Madonna is really iconic in Quito and it was cool to see it up close.
Saturday we had our 10k race and I still wasn’t feeling well so I rested all morning. I hadn’t really run in two weeks and I was a nervous with being sick, but it turned out to be an awesome experience. The race was part of the Nike We Run series, which took place in 16 cities around the world with about 142,000 runners. A few of us decided to run it last month after seeing ads and promotions all over the city. Since we signed up early, the cost was only $15 and we got a Nike Dri-Fit running shirt that was flourescent yellow.
Above: Before and after the race! (Photos from Jen's camera)
We knew we arrived in the right part of town when all we could see were people in these bright yellow shirts. There were runners all over the place, warming up and stretching so we joined them until everybody lined up at the start. Quito was set to have 6,000 runners and the area was packed. It’s funny because there were no public bathrooms by the starting line and in countries like Ecuador public urination isn’t looked down upon. (There were a ton of people using the walls and sides of vehicles in the dimly lit streets.) But other than the lack of bathrooms, the race was really well put together with a good route and hydration stations. Thad and I ran together and we didn’t see any other gringos. There were hundreds of people watching and cheering from the sidelines and we even got some cheers in English like “almost done” and “good job”.
Running is interesting at high altitude and I’ve grown to really like it. At higher elevation there is less atmospheric pressure and therefore less oxygen to breathe (up here it’s about 2/3 of sea level). The body has to increase a bunch of functions for the brain and muscles to get enough oxygen, and this makes endurance activities difficult. But ironically since the air is less dense, it is easier to run short distances. With sprints I feel really explosive, but long runs can be really draining, and this contradiction is still mindblowing for me. The race site was 9100-9200’ elevation, but by now we are pretty well acclimated. Our running pace tends to be slower this high, but we still broke an hour (59:13) which I was proud of for how I was feeling.
(Here's a historical note for people who like trivia: The idea of altitude preformance was discovered after the 1968 Mexico City Olympics (held at 7300’ elevation) when the endurance times were below average and all the short distance and jumping records were shattered).
Well that’s about it for the weekend. Sunday I went to church with a group and relaxed for the remainder of the day. I’m still feeling sick today, but I’m trying to rest up. I want to be healthy for this coming weekend, which is a five-day break. (Next Tuesday and Wednesday are national holidays, and Correa decided to designated this Monday off as well.) Thad and I want to do more hiking and we’re planning to head back to into the Andes. But this week is the last week of our third block, so I have to focus on school before I get my head in the mountains. Hasta luego!
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