Eastern Slope of the Andes

We embark today on a 10 day ministry trip to 4 locations to the south of Quito. We will be sharing this team experience with several of the Latin students from the seminary, as this week coming is a "ministry week" for all students here. I spoke with Gustavo last night who is headed over into the "selva" or jungle region to minister at a church in a small town for the week. So, this is part of their training here. We'll eventually end up in Quenca, Ecuador's fourth largest city, with ministry and outreach to children and youth as the primary focus. I have learned this about Quenca from a bit of reading. It is the home of some beautiful Spanish colonial architecture, and also is "the" place or the area where Panama hats are made. Then why not call them Ecuador hats, or "Ecuador Jack" instead of his more famous Panamanian counterpart? Darlene says that it's because that during the years of the construction of the Panama Canal many of the workers wore these hats that were made in Ecuador. So, people started calling them Panama hats. She did the research when I was buying one such hat a month back at a market in Otavalo. She's so smart.

Before we leave, I think I'll write a bit about our trip last weekend over to the eastern slope of the Andes. Darlene and I, along with 3 university students (Kyle, Jessica and Sarah-ONU students) traveled about 3-4 hours over to the beginnings of the Amazon region, and visited a retreat area in the mountains. I had been inquiring about a great place to see some of the over 1500 species of birds that make Ecuador home, and this option came open.

We traveled over a road that is the paved road that travels at the highest elevation of any road in Ecuador, over 13,000 feet. When we reached the pass, both coming and going, we stopped for some photos of Antisana, one of the tall volcanic peaks. We could only see the base and lower 1/3 of the mtn. going east, but returning to Quito on Sunday, we snapped some photos of the snow covered peak as well. We stopped and viewed/touched "paper trees"....the bark feels like very thin paper. We stopped in the small town that was at the epicenter of a devastating earthquake in 1987. They built a new town just a few minutes to the east, but had restored some of the original town. We saw men leading horses with wooden frame packs strapped to their backs, loaded with 2 large old fashioned milk cans, taking their product to the collection center to be processed before heading back to their mountain homes.

At the cabaña, the retreat house, we were hosted by Susana and Marco Silva. She's worked for Peace Corps and he is an engineer who's also taught math. The log cabin in the jungle was wonderfully rustic and lovely. The meals were simple, and very tasty. They have their own little hydroelectric operation from mtn stream water to provide some of their electricity. Marco led us on a couple of jungle hikes, where we saw some "first growth, or primary forest, with some trees being as old as 1300 years. We saw a couple of bear caves, which actually are under the roots of these giant trees. They were home to a spectacled bear that has white around it's eyes. A very timid bear, Marco has seen one, but 6 people in the jungle gave the bears, and the curious but timid pumas and tapirs that live in this area plenty of advance notice. We wore high rubber boots, because it was so boggy at places along the trail that we'd sink up almost to our knees in places.

We took a late night hike in the jungle and it had been raining, so when we turned over our lights for some of the walk, it was fun to hear the night sounds without being able to see anything of yourself or anything nearby.....we held hands and walked on as we heard raindrops splattering on the leaves nearby. We head two little headlamps (Marco and me) that we eventually turned back on so that we could find our way along.

The next morning we were up for the "bird watching" experience. (My phone/alarm woke me up an hour early, as it apparently changed due to the time change back home. I went around waking everyone up at 4:30 a.m, thinking it was an hour later. Darlene and the students let me know of my error fairly directly, quickly, and with an absence of malice.)

I know that birds of a feather flock together, but in the jungle they can be easy to hear, but difficult to see, especially at daylight with a slate gray sky. Eventually, we were able to see some beautiful birds with yellow chests/belly, green wings and white head feathers, and some hummingbirds, a little brilliant blue fellow, and a couple of large parrots flying over on a walk to/from the river along a gravel road later.....but largely I didn't get to see the volume and variety of birds that I'd hoped for....but it's like fishing, in that patience is a virtue as well as enjoyment of the act of searching/seeking to spot colorful critters. My quest to see a toucan continues.

We had a couple of river hikes (Jessica fell in, soaked) that led to seeing some exquisite red orchids. The mountain terrain reminded Darlene and me of Papua New Guinea, her childhood home. She enjoyed seeing that so much.

The area was much less populated than we expected, which was a delight. We had a great experience, one that was "natural" and relaxed, and are grateful for the memories.