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Published: July 10th 2006
Hello!
Sayard and I have been in some more remote areas of Ecuador, sans internet, so there is a lot to go over.
We started off by being a bit more touristy and visited the equator. And though I had been raised to believe that this was an imaginary line, it is very real. Painted right there on the ground for all to see and for all to marvel at it´s significance.
Later we went off to the small village of Yungillas, just Northwest of Quito in everyones favorite hemisphere. From there we went on a two day trek through cloud forest dropping a vertical mile to the Maquipucuna nature reserve. Cloud forests are created when moisture laden hot air meets high mountains. As the air rises and cools it can no longer hold the moisture and you have clouds and precipitation.
Preparation for this trek was a bit of an adventure in itself as we had to first get a map of the area. We went to Ecuador´s version of the USGS, but everyone was busy watching a World Cup soccer game so naturaly, we were out of luck. Fortunately, we found a map of the
The Equator
Here I am eating chips in both hemispheres. Which way will they go when we part ways?area in another place. Unfortunatly, it was a black and white copy of a color map. The river lines looked the same as the countour lines so I spent about an hour looking for where contour lines seemingly intersected (which they can´t) to find the rivers. Of course, had I thought for a second about what the visibility in a cloud forest is probably like I would have known that the map would be of limited value anyway.
After a night´s rest in Yungillas we set off for the trek which is described in a Trekking book we bought in AK. The book describes the trek as "Easy" so we thought it would be a good starter for us. Much had changed since the book researched the trek. Namely, only about half the trail is regularily used. The rest is an overgrown, spider infested jungle. No problem, Sayard and Maciek are smart enough to have gotten a machete, right? Nope. And it sucks to be dumb.
Everyone hates walking face first into a spider web. In Alaska this is exceedingly rare and of no real concern. When you walk into a spider web in a jungle. FREAK OUT
MAN! These are some mean looking spider with spikes on their asses and big fangs. You don´t want these mean looking bastards on your face. Fortunatly we were not entirely helpless against this eight legged army. We had a map in a Zip-Lock bag. Which was used to cut the countless webs out of the way. Later we found out the spiders are harmless, hmm.
The cloud forest is beautiful. We saw countless butterflies and humminbirds along the way. The dense fog only adds to the bizarre mistique. Plant life is everywhere and there is a mind blowing myriad of species. Trees are ecosystems in of themselves. They are covered in moss, vines, insects and every branch point has it´s own plant growing from where a bird left a seed in its droppings.
After the trek we went to another cloud forest town named Mindo. It was a great place to see birds and butterflies. We even went to a butterfly farm! At night we went to a lake and listened to a chased after frogs. Sayard even caught a bullfrog! We also saw this amazing glowing log. Yup. It was covered in biolumenescent bacteria (according to a
local) and when examined by flashlight looks like a normal log, but in the dark it has a healthy green glow.
At the moment Sayard and I are back in Quito before heading to San Lorenzo, a town on the Northern coast. We are a little under the weather and will hopefully be feeling up to the seven hour bus ride tomorrow.
We hope you are all well and warm wherever you are,
-Sayard and Maciek
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Craig
non-member comment
Sayard / Maciek, this is a great bog-looks and sounds like a your having tons of fun-can't wait to see you when you return-keep sending more-Dad