When I logged in to start writing this, the first item was my stalled letter from last year. Oy Vey! Yes, well, sorry about that, but 2023 was too hard to sum up and not sound depressing at the same time. Dad unexpectedly punched his express ticket out in April, and things did not improve from there. Enough said. The main lasting bright spot from last year is Sarah's new cat. Meet Helga, a ball of the softest fluff I have ever met. Given how tumultuous her life was before she arrived here, she is surprisingly at ease with her new life. Hopefully, she finds it refreshingly peaceful, and not too quiet. She loves to watch the action, and doesn't even hide when the vacuum cleaner is running. The shelter told us she was about two, and she was seized with her kittens from an 'unclean' home by the health department and then evacuated through 3 shelters because of the forest fires last year. When Sarah got her to our vet to clear up a lingering case of ear mi...
Karen's travel tips If you arrive in Quito on a Sunday evening, better have snacks with you! The carpets roll up and the metal doors come down at 6. Well, at least they do in the neighborhood where we are spending the night. There are a lot of restaurants close by, but nothing open. Add to this that apart from a tuna wrap at Dorval airport the only thing I could eat on the plane was the fruit salad (the steward kindly gave me two), and the pineapple juice, by Monday morning we were both feeling somewhat light headed when we set off down the many, many, many steps down to the commercial district (visualise Mount Royal, only steeper, no hand rails, and a descent at least twice as far, with your head spinning). Needless to say, we were a bit early for breakfast in the commercial district, but a cafe kindly opened early for us, and I essentially inhaled eggs, avocado toast, fruit salad and an almond milk cappuccino. Serge, who had ordered a larger breakfast actually ran out...
February 5, 2022 Wednesday, we wandered around Otavalo, finding high places to look at the town. Even our own hostel has a terrace up on the roof. I managed to take a panoramic view of about 25% of the skyline from Cotacachi to Imbabura. Thursday we did a real touristy thing, we took an organized culture tour around some local artisan workshops/villages. The distinction is a bit nebulous because often location dictates what a village will specialize in. For example, the village on the shore of Lago (lake) San Pablo specializes in woven mats and baskets made from a rush or reed that grows in the shallows (we were told many names in both Spanish and Quechua, and I remember none of them). We even got to try some things, weaving mats and narrow bands in the traditional way, and watched someone put together the bamboo pipes that are very popular in indigenous music here. Cutting and tuning the pipes is done by ear. We were also taken to some spots impo...
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