Week Three

Jan. 12, 2020 Sun-what Sunday would be a Sunday without church. Having texted on face book to someone from a ex-pat church group we attended San Francisco church on the info the said person gave us that it would be a bi-lingual service. It was not. But the church was beautiful and i partook in communion where the host was dipped in the wine first. I hadn’t experienced that before. From there we walked around. Bill bought me roses,and we had some pastries. Reading on the roof top and a nap. Football on the computer as the satellite was acting up, late afternoon walk to the market and more football.

Jan. 13, 2020 Mon- Walking this morning in search of a pastry shop we had seen on Sat that had chocolate “bowls” filled with chocolate mousse. Bill was sure he remembered where it was. After a while some of the streets all start to look the same. Well, no find. I got my nails done, quite a process here as everything is done by hand. NO ELC. tools. Filing itself took 27 minutes for the first round. I did get three different hand treatments tho so that was a nice addition. Did a load of wash, the cleaning lady came. We went out for dinner and an evening stroll. We really haven’t been out much after dark yet, so seeing all of the lights was nice.

Jan. 14, 2020 Tues-This morning’s walk took us downstream (east) to find the building where the dentist is located. Going to get a cleaning in a couple of weeks. From there we stumbled upon an art gallery. The owner/artist of the gallery works only with metal. And almost every piece of art has musicians in it. Pretty neat stuff. Very colorful. From there on to find the elusive bakery Bill and I had spied on Sat. BINGO! What a wonderful collection of local and traditional baked goods. The one I had spied on Sat. is a chocolate “cup” filled with mousse, cake, and walnuts, topped with a strawberry and oreo cookie. Wonderful!! We bought five times and a juice for $3.80. That’s right for all!!! Our afternoon walk took us across the river to check for a bus stop and ended up walking thru the university. Very nice. For dinner we headed upstairs to the Local market/vendors for whole fish, rice, and potatoes and gravy. $2.00 per plate. I am so glad to have lots of area to walk in especially after eating so much. The portions here are huge.

Jan. 15th 2020 Wed-I am continually grateful for all of the opportunities traveling bestows on us! And today was no exception. We are truly blessed for having a knack of “stumbling onto things”. We have passed by a building that is open to the public but until today we hadn’t gone inside. Something told me today to peek inside. We stepped into the foyer and saw a nice red carpet and “roped off” area. So we stayed on the parameter and took pics of the courtyard. We were then invited “in” by a high ranking officer. There were many exhibits and photos of the “wars” that the Ecuadorians have fought, including 1942, 1981 and 1995. Very interesting. It was a catered affair for the upper echelon. Many young people in uniform. As we were leaving, a Lt Coronal. took Bill by the arm and took us to an exhibit. Turned out they had a young man that spoke English and he wanted us to hear the presentation. This was a sniper unit. We then talked with a General who walked up to us. He had trained for artillery in the U.S. I think he was so proud that the young man could talk to us. The official even insisted on taking our picture. I should have gotten his pic.

I know I posted this picture before but this time I went in and asked the lady how much the dress was. I was flabbergasted when she told me the price. To make sure I wasn’t getting it wrong she wrote it down for me. Are you ready for this, $65.00!!! Holy crap. I couldn’t believe it. Dresses like these are bought for a girl’s 15th birthday celebration called Quinceañera, (Spanish: “15 years [feminine form]”)also called quinceaños or quince años or simply quince, the celebration of a girl’s 15th birthday, marking her passage from girlhood to womanhood; the term is also used for the celebrant herself. I don’t think you could touch this dress for under $500.00 in the U.S.

Next we decided to go back to the market where I had found local pottery. Not really up to Spain standards, but you get what is available. A huge plate and bowl for $11.00. A little late lunch and nap as we had an evening adventure planned. We took a bus ( what a ride for $.30) up the Western foothills into the community of Banos. We walked about 10 minutes to our destination. Piedra De Agua, The thermal spa. This is in a hillside built on an active volcanic thermal spring. Wed. after 5:00 is two for one. $35.00. we partook in – a steam bath, shower, blue mud, red mud, turkish bath, cold shower, warm pool/ cool pool, and finally a Japanese pool. We spent three hours there and my skin feels amazing. what a wonderful evening under the stars. Some of the best $15.00 I can remember spending. We even got a vanilla milk shake delivered to us on a little “boat”. So cool.

For more info and pics on the baths, visit this sight. https://piedradeagua.com.ec/

Jan. 16, 2020 Thurs-A little slow start today. Neither Bill nor I had slept much on Tues night so this was a catch up day. Took our morning walk and met a man who is an artist in Cooper. His crafts were everything from a tiny little basket to a cooper shirt. He was more than willing to share his crafts with us. as we toured along some “new streets” we found a gallery that had all tile art. This was a first class gallery owned by the artist, Fabian Alvarez. His stuff was really pretty, high gloss paint and firing. Lunch was now in order and we hit a place that had just opened up. We had a nice Cuban sandwich with the best fries I’ve had so far. Our evening walk, still being a little tired, was just over the river to the large shopping mart. We stopped into the little bar/restaurant that we were in the first night we were here. Monday Blue. We had a lovely conversation with our waiter, Daniel, who is from Venezuela. His parents and sister fled their country five months ago due to the unrest in their country. Daniel hopes to go to college here and get a degree in Computer Engineering. His dream is to go to the U.S. At 18 I think he has a bright future.

Jan. 17th, 2020 Fri- Another day of Pee Wee’s big adventures. We took the bus across the river to the FERIA LIBRE. This is a 17 acre gathering and selling place for those all over Ecuador. Wed. and Sat. they come from near and far away. Thank goodness we weren’t there on on of those days. So much stuff. Everything from bras to zucchini. And so much! There was a barn just for potatoes, and there were more potatoes for sale in other places. Many Andean people/farmers. I still can’t believe how much of everything there was. About five acres was clothes and shoes alone.

It was a lot of visual stimulation and we earned a nap after lunch. Bill said he would buy me some more roses as the ones from Sunhad started to peter out. We had talked about eating sometime in one of the prime views in the city. We at at The Confessions properly named as it is in the shadow of the cathedral. The reviews for the three cheese and mushroom ravioli and the french onion soup did not disappoint. Thank god for having to walk back to the apt. Then embarking off to the local store for an afternoon walk to get a roll of plastic wrap we “hit the jackpot” yet again. There is a Panama Hat museum/store that we have passed nearly daily. I said to Bill, “hey, let’s pop in there for a min. A min turned into and hour and a half. We got talking to a man who had a little trinket store in the front stall. Make a long story short, he plays the drums and piano, and asked if we would like to hear him play. He is a little mentally challenged and thought it might make his day. Up stairs his family has a coffee shop that we had seen from down at river level walking trail. The piano is housed in the main old family dining room. Our new friend Juan Carlos played for over an hour. Including one song he wrote himself called “summer’s first rain”. A beautiful tune. He then proceeded to play the elec. drums for us. I couldn’t help thinking what an honor and privilege it was to be sitting there, so surreal.

Jan. 18th, 2020 Sat.– Another slow start this morning. This sleeping in late stuff has got to stop. I will never be ready for fish camp at this rate. It was 10:00 before we left the house. First stop would be to the amazing bakery found earlier this week. That’s right, the one with all of the yummies. Time to stock up again. We “met” a couple from west Texas along the way and showed them the bakery. They had been going elsewhere. We walked north on our little city map til we walked right off of it. I had spied a land mark that I wanted to check out. I saw it blocks away still, but Bill was running out of energy so we headed back downhill for some amazing fried chicken. Ouch! WHAT’S THAT!?!?!?! I think its a pin feather starting to stick out of my back. LOL.

below are random pictures of murals around the city.