Greetings from Ibarra!

Hello again,

Posting this from an internet cafe in Ibarra, a bustling city in the shadows of the Imbabura volcano, on whose slopes we are currenly living & completing our community service project.

I do not have a whole lot of time at the moment, so I hope to add to this post at some point soon. Internet access has been hard to arrange, so who knows if that will actually happen.

Our expedition is going exceedingly well. The Pinan Lakes trek was fantastic, taking us through some truly gorgeous, stunning wilderness. Backcountry backpacking supported by a horse team and caballeros, over 50 miles by foot. Pretty good and cold, rather wet at times, trails often a muddy slop, reaching up and above 13,000 feet.

muddy tracks were the norm on the Pinan Lakes trek (click for larger image)

These kids are an amazing group, excellent attitude throughout everything the mountains threw at them. We ended up in a cheesy little tourist town with hot springs and rejoiced at the receiving end of three-inch shower pipes gushing torrents of beautifully hot water. We were kind of a sodden, muddy mess at the end of our trek.

Now we are encamped in San Clemente for our service project. High up on the slopes of Imbabura, this is a sweet little community of about 500 people struggling to reclaim their traditional culture and way of life. They have been wonderful hosts. Yesterday we came to town to shop in the fantastically chaotic central market. We had a breakfast of beuatifully fresh cheese empanadas in a food stall there, then the kids were paired off and given lists of specific items to find & buy in the big, narrowalleyed marketplace.

whole roasted pig sizzing in its own juices was a favorite in the Ibarra marketplace

Back at the house we then prepared a traditional meal, followed by Andean pipe music and dancing in our adopted home.

Delicious in more ways than one.

Today the group heads up to the summit of Imbabura, then we have two more days of project work before we head dow to the jungle.

Sorry but I have to rush. If I miss the bus, I´ll need to walk about three hours straight uphill.

SL