MINDO!!!

The last week had been very relaxing while fun and exciting at the same time!!! I was busy with all my classes which are going well. We learned how to do some things in the dark room for photography so that was pretty exciting! I cant wait to actually get to develop film, not like today where you just have to plug in a cord and you have all your pictures!

Anyways it has taken me soo long to write my next post because a few friends of mine and myself went away this weekend to a small town called Mindo. It was soo amazing, I actually think i liked the town better than Quito because i felt alot safer and the people were a little bit more layed back!

So we left Saturday morning and took 2 busses to get to the bus to take us to Mindo. We bought our tickets for the two hour ride and got on the bus. Being Gringos we all sat together and were waiting for the bus to take off when some people said we were in their seats! We had no idea that there would be actual seats on a bus so i got out of the seat, found my ticket and was all the way in the back away from my friends. It was the longest bus ride due to a strange man who kept having the need to fall on my shoulder while sleeping. but we finally got to our stop and all that was around was a small general store and lots of chickens. We asked a man near a truck what to do next and he simply told us for 50 cents a person he would take us so we climbed in the bed of his truck and discovered a small town hidden in the midst of the jungle!!! While he was bringing us into to town though because it was such a small town everyone was stairing at us and it felt like in the olden days when a stranger would arrive to a town and evryone would know about it in 30 secs! lol.... On our first day we went zip lining in the canopy of the jungle! it was extremely fun, although very scary at first! after a while though i get to do fun rides with the guides, one called superman where my legs were wrapped around his waist and i was soaring like superman and the other was called mariposa (butterfly) where i was ziplining hanging from the guide upside down! its kind of weird to explain but there will be pics on facebook soon!!! It was really cool though to glide over the trees and vegetation and see everything!!! That night while we ate our dinner at this small place the towns very modern catholic church had there service outside! they pulled all the benches outside and lined them up in the street and the pastor preached from the front porch! Then after the mass everyone in the town migrated to a concert that was going on in the street as well. It was some famous women who was pretty good. We went to the concert and caught poster that she threw into the crowd and then later got them signed! It was pretty fun!!! After the concert we went back to the hostal and attempter to go to sleep but there was about 100 rooster in the town of Mindo including many in the back yard of where we were staying and they liked to cock-a-doodle-do every minute which really affects how you sleep!!! so as of now im not a huge fan of roosters!

But the next morning I got up early and took pictures for my photography class and then we all went to this area where we went hiking through and swimming in 5 different waterfalls! Not only the waterfalls but it was sooo neat and interesting to see all the different flowers and vegetation! I took lots of pics!!! But the waterfalls were also extremely gorgeous, we climbed up smaller ones and small under others! It was such a great experience! After seeing all the waterfalls we hiked back to the cable carrier that brings you across a huge dip in the jungle and somehow it had broke! But thank goodness that after waiting for 45 minutes it got fixed and we didnt have to hike back! but because we had to wait we were late for checking out of the hostal but they didnt care at all!

It was a great weekend and we had tons of fun exploring the jungle and all its midden adventures! Next weekend the entire Kalamazoo program is going to a town called Otavalo! I will tell you what its like after i have experienced its wonders!!!