Some Kind of World Traveler: August 2018

Fuya Fuya Framed by Clouds

As usual, the hikes continued. On July 20th, I walked out the road toward Imantag and explored a canyon.

Orange-patched crescent butterfly in the quebrada

Spiny-backed orb-weaver spider. Pretty bizarre, no?

Ecuadorian Ground Dove - pretty in pink.

After I climbed up out of the canyon, I followed a dirt road that took me by these residents of the pueblo of Perafan hoeing a community field planted with corn and beans.

Little tree festooned with bromeliads below the road.

Selfie in front of a gorgeous bougainvillea on the way back to town.

Back in Cotacachi, I enjoyed the pastel colors in this view of an arupo tree blooming in the yard of Rancho Santa Fe

That weekend I enjoyed a bit of culture: Friday night, a concert of romantic South Americans songs; Saturday afternoon the movie "Professor Marston and the Wonder Women"; and that evening a lovely concert for piano and flute.

On the 22nd I took a walk way up above Topo Grande. The clouds were low, so the views were limited - but it was still a lovely walk up onto the lower slopes of Mount Cotacachi.

Bringing corn stalks for the cattle down from the upper fields

Vemilion Flycatcher (a favorite of mine) by the road

On the next day's walk I saw some lovely wildflowers:

Thunbergia grows rampant here.

On the 25th, my anticipated career in cinema came to a close. On the 23rd I was at Luis’s little store by the bus terminal, waiting for him to get relieved at the cash register so he could take me to see an apartment - the one I ended up renting. As I was standing by the doorway, a gringo came out laden with bags of groceries and a big flat of eggs. When I joked with him that that was going to make a heck of an omelette, he responded that he often had a lot of people at his house - and then got into a taxi. I wondered what he did that brought lots of folks to his house - and continued to wait for Luis.

A few moments later, the guy got back out of the taxi, walked up and introduced himself, and asked me if I’d be interested in being in a movie. He said I had the look he wanted for a certain character. He even gave me money for cab fare to come to his place on the outskirts of town and talk about it. The problem was that he lived in a gated compound, and I would need to phone him from the gate to have him come open it - and I don’t have a cell phone. Things were a bit rushed because the taxi was waiting for him, and I was focused on heading out with Luis to check out the apartment, so I gave him back the cab fare and said he could contact me via the Cotacachi Hikers page on Facebook so we could arrange a meeting.. After he left, I realized I could have given him one of the cards I had in my wallet with my contact info on it. Darn, I thought, that might have been interesting - but I doubted I’d hear from him.
I was disappointed that I didn’t hear from him on Tuesday. Then today I wanted to get out for a bit of a hike - and decided that I’d go by the condo development where he was staying and see if I could get in to see him; he had told me which building he was in. Luckily an Ecuadorian man was standing outside the compound and he was able to signal to a buddy working on a building inside to come open the gate. I went in, walked up to the door of the condo and knocked, not sure if the guy would be home.
Well, he came to the door and seemed very happy to see me. He said he had gone into town yesterday hoping to run into me. He repeated that he thought I had the right look and voice for the part, and hoped I wouldn’t be offended that the character was a gringo nick-named Grizzly, with an Appalachian accent, who was the watchman at a quarry outside of Quito (I wasn’t). It was a minor role, but with a prominent presence in a couple of scenes - with lines!. He told me a bit about the movie - it’s about the filming of a movie in Ecuador - and read me the scenes that I would be in. I was totally intrigued, and thought would be fun to do while i’m here. And he was very pleased that I seemed willing to do it. But then I asked about the timeframe, and it turns out that the filming probably won’t start until September 1st - and I leave for the States on August 31st.
I was disappointed! The film is a comedy, and I could picture myself doing the scenes he read to me. Ah, well. I thanked the guy for his time - and for thinking I’d be good for the role - and headed out for a hike. So you won’t be seeing me on Netflix after all......

On the 27th, my day started with sunrise light on Mount Cotacachi:

Shortly after that sunrise I set out to walk up to Laguna Cuicocha again - a nice 5.5-hour stroll.

A decorated fence post along the road

A family planting potatoes behind the two oxen plowing the field

Bird in the Bush

Flowering Bush

Another Field of Gold

That evening there was a great concert in the municipal theater with 3 choral groups: from Cotacachi, Ecuador; from Mendoza, Argentina; and from a university in Poland. The Polish group seemed to be the biggest hit of the evening, singing a couple of Polish songs, a fun choral version of the William Tell overture and classic rock songs - in English - such as Yesterday and Dancing Queen (now that brought back memories!).

On July 29th I believe we broke a record for Cotacachi Hikers when 19 people showed up for a walk back to Cotacachi from Loma Negra (some hikers are hidden behind others in the photo that I took).

On August 1st we finally got a clear morning, so I headed by bus to Otavalo and climbed up to where there are gorgeous views in every direction. Plus afterwards I stopped at a supermarket and bought 6 packages of my favorite and affordable dark Ecuadorian chocolate, Leyenda.

Rolling fields

Clouds piling up over Mount Imbabura

Lago San Pablo

That morning, the little fruit store across the street had gotten a banana delivery. This is one of the places where I can buy a bunch of 6 or 7 bananas for 25 cents:

August 5th was my last full day house-sitting for my friends, so it was nice to have such a glorious view of Mount Cotacachi to start the day with:

That morning I finally saw the lady who sells quimbolitos from a doorway on Leather Street at a time when I was in the mood for one. It's a light, slightly sweet pastry with raisins, made from a mixture of corn meal and wheat flour, steamed in a leaf. I enjoyed it with a glass of iced coffee.

On the 6th my friend Clare was returning, so I moved into a little one-room penthouse on the roof of a 3-story building next to Parque Ornamental in the center of town. It's simple but totally sufficient. I've placed the chairs for the best views of the mountains, plus I have a table and chairs out on the roof terrace - with even better views.