The Final Trip

       What. A. Month. I feel safe to say that April was one of, if not my best month on exchange.  Where to even begin. It started with vacation for Semana Santa where I went to the beach to see a friend and get some quality sun time. After a fun week of vacation I had a week of school and then started the final Rotary trip of the year. All the other trips from the year were usually only 4 days or so, but this trip was 10 days. Theres the famous rotary trip in Europe called Euro Tour where the exchange students from Europe go on a bus for 3 weeks. Ours isn’t quite three weeks but we’ve adopted the name EcuaTour for our trip. And this time it was all 140 exchange students in Ecuador together again. And when we’re all together it’s bound to be a fun time no matter where we go. We went all over the Ecuadorian Sierra region in bus. 4 buses actually. We started in Quito, and then went north to Ibarra, Otavalo and Cotocachi. We then came back to the famous historical center of Quito. From there we went south to Baños then Riobamaba. Later to Guayaquil, Machala, and finished in the beautiful city of Cuenca. I’d love to tell you what I did everyday but that’s quite impossible because we did SO much. I mean a big part of the trip we were on a bus, but still that was fun because we were all together. Some notable things were that I was on the trip for my birthday, which was really something special. We were in Baños that day, which is one of the biggest tourist attractions in Ecuador. It’s a small little town that’s right on the boarder where the amazon jungle starts and the sierra mountains stop. It’s home to Ecuador’s most famous waterfalls.

Pilon del Diablo

    

 
On this one road you can see a dozen at least. Probably the most famous, El Pilon del Diablo, is the biggest in the amount of water that rushes over this cliff. You can walk down on this nice trail and then hike up right under the waterfall and behind it. It was really cool to be there on my birthday and take a waterfall shower. The next day we went to Ecuador’s tallest mountain, volcano actually, Chimborazo. 

Chimborazo

     

first snowman in ages

Its at 6310 meters, or 20,702 ft. We climbed until 5,000 meters which is about 16,400 ft. I had already done this with my family back in November or so. But what was so special was that we hit the perfect day to go. Not only was it perfectly blue sky with no clouds covering the volcano, but it had snowed the day before so the normally snow capped mountain, had snow quite far down. So I got to touch snow for the first time in a year and a half. So that was really fun. Later on in the trip we went to a llama farm where I got to eat llama. Not all that good, really really chewy. We also went to a banana/cocoa/ostrich farm. I got to try ostrich meat, which I was kind of hesitant to eat at first but turned out to be really delicious. We stayed in a different hotel every night, except for the last 3 nights we stayed in the same. In Machala we went to dinner and while we were there it started to rain and when we went to leave later on all the streets were flooded and it was coming into all the stores and hotels. Its quite typical I learned. So we walked back to our hotel in knee-deep water. We got to the hotel and were like screw it, lets have some fun. So we took off out cloths just to underwear and then went into the streets and just went swimming. We were running up and down the street yelling and kicking water and having so much fun. It was such a cool moment that’ll I’ll never forget. The whole reason of this trip was to get to the national Rotary conference in Cuenca. So we got to Cuenca and we were there for 2 days. 

Right out of Willy Wonka's factory. Cocoa forest

       The first day we went to these Incan ruins that were soooo cool to see. The precision of building and constructing what they did is out of this world. The fact that we can hardly replicate it now with the technology that we have is so mind blowing to me. That night was talent show, like the one we had way back in October at the beach trip with everyone. I played drums again with my friend Kelcey who wrote a new song about Galapagos. Heres the link to that http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NhthybZmoCU&feature=youtu.be . The last day was the conference and it was a really special day. We had a tour of the city in the morning and then later in the afternoon we went to the conference. Everyone wore their Rotary blazers with all the pins and everything. It was so cool to see all the people so proud of their countries as they were waving their flags and singing songs in their languages. We then walked into the conference by country as everyone applauded. There was probably about 300 or so Rotarians at the conference. They had asked Kelcey and I to play again because they loved the song form the night before, so we played. Then a friend of mine made a speech and slideshow about her exchange in Ecuador which was really cool because we could all relate to it. As that wrapped up the final thing that we had planned for us to do was sing We Are the World. So when that song came on all 140 exchange students went to the front of this giant room and just linked arms and we all sang We Are the World. Again this was an incredibly special moment for everyone I think. We all started crying because for a lot of us its the last time we’ll see each other possibly ever again. We’ve spent this incredible year together and all have become so close that I can’t picture living without them. They’re such a big part of life and I love them all so much. That night we all stayed up all night together until we ate breakfast in the morning and then boarded the buses to leave. We all stood outside the buses for about an hour just saying goodbye to everyone. A lot of them live in Quito and I’m still going to see them but it was still so emotional to even think about saying goodbye. I consider these people that I’ve only know for 8 months my best friends. Most of them better than the friends back home that I’ve know for years and years. There’s no possible way to describe in words the connection and experiences that bring together exchange students. Something about all going through the ups and downs of exchange together and just experiencing the world and what it has to offer together is a bond stronger than any other and the only way to describe it is if you live it and are part of it yourself. We all bought Ecuador flags and all signed each other’s. It brought me back to senior year and year books, everyone wanting and asking to write on your flag. But how special this flag is, it has all the names and messages from all the other exchange students. I’m never going to lose this thing and will cherish it for the rest of my life. Standing outside the buses hugging and saying goodbye to people was maybe the hardest thing so far on this exchange. Everyone was crying, yeah because we were sad, but they were mostly tears of joy. Joy to have met all these wonderful people and share an amazing year with them. If it was that hard to say goodbye to these people I can’t imagine how hard it will be to say goodbye to my family and friends from school. With only a little over a month and a half left on my exchange I’m freaking out. Where did time go? I still feel like it was just yesterday that I was getting of the plane and seeing my host family for the first time. And when I got here it felt like a year would be sooo long, but here I am 9 months later and it’s passed in the blink of an eye. I still have so much I want to do, so much to learn, and so much to live. And I know that the next month and a half are going to pass by even faster, and it completely scares the shit out of me. This is my life here and I honestly can’t imagine my life without these people I’m surrounded by; my wonderful friends that I’ve made both in school and out, all the exchange students, but most of all my spectacular family. They mean so much to me and I feel so incredibly lucky to have gotten them, and even more that I didn’t have to switch families like everyone else. It’s going to be hardest to say goodbye to them. Not many people in the world can say they have two families, and even less can say they have two wonderful families. I can. 

streets of Machala

 

Incan Ruins

Blazer Update!

So with the last Rotary trip only a few days away I had to take out a dust off my Rotary blazer. On the trip we are attending the national Ecuador Rotary conference so blazers are a must.

Las Islas de Sueños, Los Galapagos

This is in fact real

Is it possible to dream for 4 days straight? Cause I’m pretty sure that just happened. I still can’t believe where I just was. So basically 4 words describe Galapagos. Out. Of. This. World. Just like the amazon, there are literally no words that I can use that really shed light on these magical islands. Just incredible. So the first day we got there in the airport San Cristobal which is on a smaller island right off of Santa Cruz, where we were staying. So took a little ferry across the way and then a bus ride, about an hour, to the hotel. On this one small bus ride though the vegetation changed drastically. It started off desert like, a lot like Arizona. 

Then slowly the shrubs turned into bushes, which turned into trees, which turned into tropical palm trees, then into Vermont-like trees and plants, then into amazon like rain forest, and then back again. It was ridiculous. We stayed in Puerto Ayora, this popular harbor town on Santa Cruz. The town was quite nice, very touristy with all the tourist shops and diving tours of course, but cute. The marina was really nice as well. Tons of boats, lots of sail boats, which I was happy to see. You’d expect more motorboats with all the different tours and that being the means of transportation between islands. But it was about even. So we settled into the hotel then went to the other side of town to see the Charles Darwin research center, which was where a lot of the land tortoises live. They are HUGE. Its amazing. We got to see Lonesome George, who’s the last of his species and between 110 and 120 years old. After that we had free time on the town which is ride on the water so we all just found a spot to look out over this majestic turquoise water and right away saw sting rays, sea lions, crazy looking crabs, and tons of birds. The nightlife of this place was really fun as well. We went out to a salsa bar that night which was so much fun to just dance with all these people that have truly become life long best friends. 

Penguins!

There were 40 of us in my group. Saturday morning we got up and walked about 40 minutes to Tortuga Bay. Which I guess is the nicest beach of the Galapagos, and my god was it beautiful. It literally just looked like the pictures of paradise, only I was actually there. A white sand beach that just stretched on for so long, with rolling turquoise waves. So beautiful to be there. After a morning and early afternoon there, we walked back and then went to the lava caves. Galapagos has lots of volcanoes with 6 of them active. 

Tortuga Bay

There’s been over 50 eruptions in the last 200 years which is quite a lot. So from the lava flow beneath the surface it creates these massive tunnels. The look man made but they are only from the lava cutting away at the rock to make them. So we walked through one that was like 600 m. Pretty cool to be somewhere where absolutely no sunlight could reach. Galapagos islands are actually moving a few centimeters every year because of the activeness. The next day we were split into smaller groups, got on a boat and were off to island Isabella. It’s the largest of all the islands and has 5 of those 6 active volcanoes. We went snorkeling in this little bay which has some of the best in the islands. It was spectacular. The water is soooo incredibly clear. Could see so far. We saw sting rays, crazy fish, all weird looking sea urchins, and the sea iguanas. There are TONS of iguanas every where, but the ones that can swim and dive under water are my favorite. In the water they look like Godzilla the way they swim. To see them from under the way was pretty cool. Then we found a family of sea turtle on the bottom. It might have been 10-12 ft deep and there were four or five sea turtle just chilling on the bottom. My goal for this trip and always had been to ride a sea turtle like in movies or cartoons. 

Lava rocks

Well with my opportunity right there I dove down and came in really slow and then ran my hands along his shell until I got to the sides and had a grip. He then started swimming slowly and got faster and faster. I let go when I didn’t have any more breath. I surfaced and was completely speechless. I literally couldn’t speak a single word. All I thought was how special that was. Then I hear my friend from behind say “Koda! I got a picture of that!” It was one the specialist moments for me of the trip. After an hour or so of snorkeling we got out and went for a walk through the lava rocks. The rocks look really cool and are all formed from hardening lava. We later went to another tortoise center where they bread them. So that was cool to see that. We went to this little pond where a bunch of flamingos were which was cool to see wild flamingos. After we went to another incredible beach. Again, out of this world. Went back on the boat after and saw a big whale, a massive manta ray (around 10 ft across) and tons of other life. Monday we got up and took the boat again but to the island Santa Fe. This island is known for the cactus vegetation it has as well as the rocky shore with spectacular cliffs. Here went snorkeling again in this cove and you guessed it, out of this world. This was the best day snorkeling. Tons of tropical fish, again stingrays and this time we got to swim with sea lions. They are the cutest things in the world. The babies were all swimming around us and playing with us, but then the mom kept coming by and she was big. Shed come at us with her mouth open like trying to bite but you could tell it was more just to scare us and protect her children. What an adrenaline rush though. To see these animals that you usually only see on tv shows or in zoos, are right here in front of me in the wild. I had the biggest high as this moment; I was high off of life. Such a special moment for me. 

Catchin a ride

 

cliff jumping

       After we went back to Santa Cruz and the hotel to eat lunch. After we walked about 30 minutes to these cliffs where we could jump. It like crack in the earth with these big cliffs and the sea water came in and its so deep but soo clear. So of course I felt right at home cliff jumping, as that’s what I do all summer long in Vermont. So that was really fun. That night was the last night and there was a farewell dinner at this ranch and it was so much fun. We sang karaoke, played pool, swam in the pool. Then my really good friend Kelcey and I played together again. She plays guitar and has the most beautiful voice, I love it so much, and I played some bongos that they had as this place. It was really fun. 

sunrise

       The next morning I got up at 5 to watch the sunrise. I walked across the street, to the end of the pier, and sat on the railing next to a pelican and settled in for what was to become the most spectacular site in the world. I watched the morning bustle of the harbor as all the fisherman were heading out and all the tour boats getting ready. As the sky got brighter the horizon got prettier. Now this sunrise had some pretty tough competition, going up against that in the amazon, which was unbelievable. So I kept an open mind, not expecting anything amazing incase I was to be disappointed. But I was in for a treat. All of a sudden the rays from the sun shot up into the sky and it looked like a bunch of spotlights in the sky. That was just the pre-sunrise, as those rays started to fade and the sky got brighter I thought that was it. But then the horizon became more of a fiery orange and I knew it was about to get even better. As the sun finally crept above the horizon at 5:43am a family of sea lions were passing by right below me. The sun got higher and higher and I just felt this amazing warming sensation come over me as the rays just washed over my face and body. I was in such a meditative state.  I keep saying how I get these feelings of joy and love for where I am and they always come as such cliché moments. For instance, watching the sunrise in the Galapagos. I would say very few people in the world have or ever will see that, and the entire time the only thing that was going through my mind was how I’m the luckiest kid in the world. I’m only 18 and look where I am and what I’m doing. People would do anything to be where I am and work their wholes lives for things like this and I basically have it given to me. Yeah I worked hard with things to get here, but in perspective to others, I’ve barely lifted a finger. I mean don’t get me wrong this year hasn’t been all rainbows and lollie pops, to learn a new language, live with a different family, make new friends, and to discover who you really are is no easy task. But at the same time, our problems are miniscule to those of others. I just wish everyone could experience what I’ve experienced. I literally consider myself the most fortunate kid in the world. All of us on exchange are. To be doing what we’re doing at such a young age is mind blowing to me. If we keep this up where will we be in 10 years? 20? When were 60 what will we have done by then, where will we have traveled? Who will we be? The questions are endless and will only be answered with time. This is what hits me the hardest, and all of that is what was going through my head as I watched the sun come over that magical horizon. I will never forget this trip and I will never forget watching that sunrise for the rest of my life. The things I am doing and living right now are what are shaping me into the person I’m to become. And to be honest, I absolutely love who I am and the direction I’m headed. 

 (If you click on the photos you can see them bigger)

 

so cute

Carnival

Oh wow. This past week was carnival. Yes the same carnival that's so famous in Brasil, they also celebrate it in Ecuador. And its crazy. I went with my really good group of friends to one of their farms down south in Patate. They have like a second home out in this beautiful setting in a valley right at the base of a volcano. The volcano is the most active of all the volcanos in Ecuador. There's been two eruptions in the last 10 years. And at night you can see the lava at the very top, it was really cool. But as for this farm, it was amazing. Just when I think I see one of the most beautiful places ever, Ecuador shows even more beauty. This place never ceases to amaze me. This farm was about 200 acres and the majority of it was clementine trees. There was some other fruits and vegetables but tons of these clementine trees. So as you could imagine it was clementines for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and in between, they were so delicious. They also have a good amount of cows for milk, as well as a good amount of horses. So I got to ride horses again on this farm with all my friends and played games on them. We would go bareback riding in this field and then just try to push each other off, it was so hilarious. We also just rode all over this breath taking farm. As for the carnival part, they have a game called carnival. Its where you get everyone as wet, dirty, gross, and cold as you can. We played on teh farm with each other and other family members that were there. But the more fun is when we loaded up with a dumb amount of water balloons and buckets of water and got in the back of this truck then drove through town. When you go into town EVERYONE is wet or about to get wet. It was a massive water fight with random strangers, it was so much fun. When we were in the back of the truck we were trowing water balloons left and right and at the same time getting hit from balconies or from other on the street r other passing cars. It was so incredibly fun. They also have this silly string stuff but only its like shaving cream but shoots really far and thats really popular as well. And you play this all 4 days of carnival. When you go out in public on those days you wont come home dry, I promise you that. When we came back to Quito I don't think I had one set of dry cloths. It was too funny. Such a great thing to experience and be part of. Especially with my best of friends here. It made me realize how much Im going to miss them when I leave. As for some exciting news, my moms flys in tonight and is staying for 2 weeks. I'm so excited to see her. We're going to travel all around Ecuador for those two weeks and I'll finally get to show someone my life here and where  I live and what I'm doing. Its going to be a great time.

La Amazonia

This guy will kill you if you touch him

The Lagoon

 If this year isn't already life changing by itself, I had a life changing trip. I just got back from another Rotary trip (yes another) and this time we were in the Amazon for 4 days. I feel safe to say that I’ve traveled quite alot all over the world and seen a lot of beautiful places and special things. With that being said, this was the most incredible trip I've ever been on. Yes only 4 days, but 4 days of enchantment. We went to Cuyabeno which is the very north part of the amazon in Ecuador. It's on the border or Colombia and Peru. Its a nature reserve as most of the Amazon is now, so all the animals and wildlife was so incredible. I literally have no words to describe what happened. It was just a really special trip for me because i finally got to get back in touch with nature. Oh how I've missed her. Coming from vermont where I'm outside all the time in nature and the mountains, and then being put in a big city is hard. Don't get me wrong i love Quito and living here, but i do miss the nature aspect of life. So where better to experience it again than the place with the most amount of organisms and life in a square meter than anywhere else on earth. ANYWHERE! Where we were was pretty much right on the equator, and its true, in one square meter theres more wildlife of all forms than anywhere else. Also in one square kilometer it has the most amount of tree species than anywhere else. So needless to say it was breathe taking. We saw tons of different types of monkeys, (actually got to hold one) tons of insects, spiders of all different sizes, including the largest tarantula there is, boa constrictor, crazy looking birds, toucans, macaws, crocodiles, piranhas (we fished for them), deadly frogs, caterpillars that if you touch them you die within a few hours, and most surprisingly was dolphins. Did you know there are dolphins in teh Amazon? Me neither until our guide was like oh hey look, its the pink dolphins, and yes they’re actually pink. So crazy.

Scorpion Spider

Rainbow Boa

As well as all the different trees and plants that look from outer space. The lodge we stayed at is on a lagoon, so everyday to get anywhere was in these small little boats and it was truly my dream come true. Now all the animals and wild life was out of this world, and with me going to college for marine biology and wanting a profession that deals with wildlife, this was actually my dream, no joke. But one of my favorite parts (which is really hard to say because it all was my favorite) was we got to go to a Shaman. They’re the “jungle doctors” of the Amazon. Its like a medicine man with Native Americans. They’re very spiritual beings that help others with sicknesses or illnesses with the knowledge of the jungle. They use hallucinogenic teas that are made from different things from the jungle, to see within you and see their visions that help you. It’s a very cool practice. Anyways so we got to meet with one and hear his story of becoming one, which was very interesting to listen too. We then had the option of having a spiritual cleansing by him if we wanted. I’ve always wanted to receive one of these, so when we were able I was overly joyed to have the opportunity. It was so relaxing and such a special moment for me that I will never forget for the rest of life. So anyways coming away from this trip I have no doubt I will return. I fell in love with this place and am going to try my hardest to go back and study or just live in one of the villages there.

            This first week back was tough. The whole time in classes or anywhere I was just day dreaming about being back in the Amazon, I still cant get over the feeling I have within me. There are no words to describe it but it’s such a wonderfully incredible feeling. But life goes on for now, I still love where I am here in Quito and love my life here.

Sunrise in the Amazon

           Well they say a pictures worth a thousand words you go. enjoy