This post features student writing.
On Friday morning, we got up nice and early to participate in a minga, or a community work session. In this case, many members of the village banded together, along with the Putney crew, in an effort to improve the conditions of the main road leading into Iltaqui. After a short downhill walk to the bottom of the road, Dan, Fedora, and the President of Iltaqui began to delegate jobs for us to accomplish. These jobs included removing overgrowth from the curbside, replacing rocks that had been torn from the road, and using machetes to cut down branches that were leaning into the paths of oncoming cars. After about three hours of hard work, it was finally time for lunch, and the short downhill walk from before turned into a long, uphill trek. Back at the village, we feasted on steak, rice, veggies, and french fries. We had previously planned to hike to a waterfall, but decided it was best if we took the afternoon to rest, as we were all exhausted from the morning’s hard work. With this new free time, many decided to take long naps, while others played basketball, soccer, chess, and guitar. Dinner shortly came along, and afterwards we decided to get some sleep in preparation for our travels the coming morning.
The next day, we started off right with an extra hour of sleep and a big breakfast. Once everyone had finished packing, we took two trips in the truck to the local town of Quiroga, and from there we packed into taxis and headed to a lake just outside of Otavalo. We had a picnic lunch of bread, avocados, yogurt, cheese, and pineapple. Then, we all piled into a boat and cruised around the lake, giving us a better view of our beautiful surroundings. We docked at a waterfront resort, where the group split into many activities. Some got to snacking at the lakeside restaurant, some played mini golf surrounded by rabbits and parakeets, and the most daring took part in various aquatic activities, including being pulled in a giant hamster ball by a speedboat. A few cups of hot chocolate later, we were all dried off and ready to head to the hostel we would be staying at in Otavalo. After arriving at the hostel, we were greeted by hot showers, and again headed out for a pizza dinner. A long wait proved worth it for the delicious food and even better smoothies that we were treated to. Being later than we expected, we decided to head back to the hostel, and climb into our nice, warm beds.
Today, we head to Parque de Condor, an avian rescue facility where we hope to see birds of prey that have been rescued from the wild. We cannot wait to see what adventures await!
— Sophie & Jack
