Last bit of Otavalo

Dear Mom and Dad,

One thing I've noticed about other travelers is the size of their packs. They are HUGE. Ours are 38 liters. The smallest one I've seen so far is a 50 liter pack. Many have packs that are 65 liters but extend to 80 liters. That just sounds painful to carry around. Charlie and I really did a great job in picking our our packs. I love the quick dry towels we have, and I absolutely love my boots. I might just start making dirty looks towards the girls with high heels first, so they know how it feels. I also love our S.A. books. We use them daily when deciding things to do or places to eat. Last night we had a delicious meal that the book recommended. Charlie's trout still was in whole fish form with eyes and all. Disgusted me a little.

Our hiking experience was well an experience. That's for sure. We had to first bus to Quiroga and then taxi to Lake Cuicochi. I don't know how long the hike was supposed to be, but it was sooooo long. I'm not kidding when I say we walked up hill both ways. There was no downhill stretches, and if there were then there would be three more uphill stretches to follow. Here are a few pictures from this experience.

This first picture is terrible of me, but whatever. It's hard to look extra fly without any makeup or a standard shower. I forgot to mention that our water never worked in the morning for some reason and we could only shower at night. This is us in the taxi riding to the lake. It was a truck taxi and was really fun until we realized how fast he would go the entire way. I had white knuckles at the end of the ride from hanging on so tight.

Here are a few pictures of us at the beginning of the hike. We thought it was going to be easier then it actually was. Thank goodness we didn't take any pictures at the end of the hike because all I would have done is flip off the camera. I have never swore so much in my life until this experience. Did I mention we got lost? Somehow we ended up on a dirt road, which was not part of the hike. I thought we were going to die.

I still got sunburned even with SPF 50 on, so now I know even more that I need to re-apply and then re-apply some more. We ate lunch on our hike, and it was the best PB&J I have ever had. It's amazing how good some small things taste when you are famished.

I had my first "homesick" breakdown yesterday morning. The shower wasn't working, I had huge itchy bug bites, my sunburn killed, tired from the hike, and to top it off I was missing S.L. play in the state championship. I broke down and started bawling. Nothing a little shopping at the market couldn't fix. :)

We also ran into Eric, a fellow traveler whom we met in Quito. We ate dinner with him and had drinks afterwards. It was really cool seeing him again and going out for drinks for the first time was nice as well. Don't worry, we still were in our hostel before 12 am.

One minor mishap, I washed our laundry with paper still in our pockets. Even after washing them a second time with just water, there is still small amounts of paper all over some of our clothes. Opps. Nobody is perfect.

We are busing to Baños today and will probably stay there for four nights before going to Riobamba. I'll keep you updated, dad, so you can map us out.

Love always,

Matti Jo