After working at 7:30– a busy day with lots of eggs and coffee for hungover guests– we took a fresh new Canada boy around the neighborhood. Carmen bought yarn (!!!!! Look how happy she is) and I bought 1/4 lb of peanutbutter (maní molido) in a bag for 50centavos. Also we bought pink roses for Leticia y Lolita porque hay muchas personas on the weekends and they are visibly more stressed.

Met an incredible artist on one of my favorite streets, Calle Galapagos. His name is Oscar and he has been painting for 26 years. We had a significant conversation about the influence of technology en la naturaleza, his daughters, using art as a method of communication, and las indígenas de Los Andes y Amazonia. I want to buy all of these for everyone I love!!!!

Rooftop terrace at Secret Garden Hostel, Quito. We serve dinner, alcohol, breakfast and have information and reception at the top of 4 flights of stairs. So far I haven’t missed a sunset. It’s such a joy to meet guests from all over the world and speak Spanish with the two cooks, Leticia and Lolita. They call us mija and we call them mamá.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gwo4036LOls

This link is a short video about our 3-day adventure in the Cotopaxi National Forest. The Secret Garden Hostel that we are volunteering for in Quito has a sister hostel in el Parque Nacional Cotopaxi where we were gifted one free night so that we could come back to Quito to promote this package deal for all the guests. We ended up loving el aire libra, dramatic peaks, and 24-hour river fed Jacuzzi so much that we extended our trip to Cotopaxi. There was a fire every night with 6 resident dogs, llamas, cows, horses, birds… You could pay to hike some of Ecuador’s highest peaks including the recently active Volcán Cotopaxi. Carmen and I are stingy as hell so we decided to do two free treks: a jungle climb that ends at two mossy waterfalls (we swam in snowmelt runoff), and Pasachoa (4,200 metres extinct volcano). They provided sweet mint tea and banana bread at the summit. The altitude was intense but a refreshing break from the bustle of Old Town, Quito.

We swam in this icy boy

Carmen and I walked to this cathedral one afternoon to talk about God and soup