Hi from Otavalo

---

Hi everyone!

Apologies for the lack of messages over the last week, unfortunately I had my first brush with dodgy food and was very poorly over the weekend! However you will be pleased to know that I am back on form and ready to up-date you all on my activities of the last two weeks, so sit back with a cuppa as I think this will be a long email!

So I got back from a good weekend at the beach (except the mossies!) The week was a short one the main activities of the week were weeding the vegetable patch and making a new area for new veg and then moving the compost patch which wasn´t overly pleasant! Ramiro had to meet a group of mountaineers in Otavalo on Friday for the Yamor festival and they were going climbing the main mountain here Cotapaxi. I joined them for the festivities and the food on the Saturday night (13th September), another fab evening with more "Firewater" and slept in whilst they went climbing snow capped mountains.. the crazy people! Sunday was pretty quiet, I mainly looked around the market on Otavalo, the town is lovely and the locals still wear traditional dress, every day of the week, its nice to see people in non western clothes, as Quito is very westernised Otavalo is not and the market was lovely to look around and I bought myself the obligatory wooly jumper!

I hitched a lift with Ramiro on Sunday back to reserve, another evening of making bracelets and beaded necklaces to pass the time! The week went quickly, Ramiro put me in charge of building activities... patching the kitchen walls (again with mud and straw) and making bricks (yes more mud and straw) for the new extension that we will build next week! Diana another director joined us on Tuesday so more necklaces in the evenings! On wednesday (17th September) it was announced that we would be going to Quito on Thursday as there was a music festival in Quito over the weekend, myself and Vannessa were going to BAnos anyway for the weekend as it was her last week at the reserve, sniff! So we took advantage ofd the long weekend and spent Thursday and Friday morning in Quito (got the chance to go up the TeleferiQo which I had been promising I would do since my first week here, the altitude at the top of the mountain was 4100m, so didn´t go far but the views were fantastic of the city and mountains. We then had some lunch before going to Banos on the Friday afternoon, another mega bus journey, it took 6 hours to get to Banos, so was absolutely shattered and went to bed as soon as I got there! Then disater struck... was ill all Saturday and so sunday morning I was just able to venture on a two hour bus trip around banos before saying goodbye to Vanessa (miss you!!)and getting my coach back to Otavalo! (another fun packed 7 1/2 hour bus ride!) So from there I spent two days recovering in Otovalo before going back to the reserve on Tuesday.

I´ve been on light duties all week lots of cleaning and cooking, started to feel 100% again on Friday so I was building more bricks for the new extension. We have two new english volunteers the reserve who arrived Thursday, they helped with the bricks and I think we will be building the wall next week! So this weekend I am taking another quiet one in Otovalo, (to be honest just having a hotel room with fluffy pillows and clean sheets and en suite with hot water is fantastic! Next week is my last week here so it is a chance to have a final look around before I go. I will be going to Quito next weekend and hopefully catching up with Nia, the girl I met in Quito on my first week, and seeing how she got on in the Galapogos Isles (lucky thing!!)

So there we are thats all for now, I am going to see if I can find some lunch soon and then look around the shops for some pressies!

Hope you all have a good week, thanks for all the messages that keep coming in it is lovely to hear from you!

Take care,
Lorna xxxx

---

Photos

The local shop
This is the shop in the village where we did painting of the school two weeks ago.. the mist is coming in..

A $2 lunch in Quito Market
The hugest meal I have ever had for 1 pound!

Yamor 2008
A local festival in Otavalo held each year!

My first fire!
OK I was pleased!

Banos scenery
In a cable car over the valley in Banos

Comments

[Annie Northcote]

Hi!! Can we see a picture of you in your new wooly jumper?! xxx