Wild and Wacky Festival of Cuenca

This is one of the biggest festivals in the city and commemorates Cuenca's freedom from their Spanish overlords (so to speak). The festival draws in large amounts of visitors from Guayaquil,Quito and further afield and the city is literally buzzing with activity.

There's a huge mix of cultural activities highlighting local dance, music and food, as well as inviting the other Latin American countries to share the fun. This results in a wide selection of street food, music and art, not to mention the prerequisite parades.

Variety of Dancers

We went to a concert that discussed (and played) the history of the tango from the 1880's to the mid 1970's. The odd thing was that there were no dancers. The Argentinian man who was host for the evening played the piano beautifully, but his accent was too much for my fledgling Spanish. I did get the gist of the music history part, but the anecdotes about the composers were beyond me. (Maybe one day...)

Mexican dia de los muertos shrine

Yup, those are all real rose petals around the cross

Mask of the Dead

This doesn't even begin to cover the stalls that line the walkways of the Tombebamba River. There are several types of vendors, those that you would normally come across in the mercados, traditional artists from Ecuador and other South American countries and then the "premium" fine artists. There is everything from fine crafted jewellery and clothes, to paintings and sculptures to hand made, one of a kind furniture.

Wood works & furniture

Carvings from the Amazon

Ponchos

The loom they're made on

Adorable little knit/woven dolls

Amazing ceramic llama

Wooden sculpture

Semi-traditional Indigenes Dress
(I think they took some liberty with the skirt)

If you also attend some of the stranger sort of activities like waiter races, laying a bed challenge (which is, I believe a bed making race), the great donkey race and other novelties, there is truly something for everyone.

Waiter Races

They do know how to finish off each of the days with a fairly decent fireworks, but they take the end of day literally...meaning midnight. We forgot about them the first night until they woke us from a dead sleep, even with the sound machine going. The second night we stayed up and watched them from the other side of the river.

Add to that some stunning weather (except the late afternoon) and it makes for a pretty amazing experience. We also got to see some of those things that we call "only in Ecuador" moments, which is probably not even near correct, but here's an example. An intersection was blocked off to set up a stage for a music concert that evening. Were the roads blocked off/redirected? Heaven's no! Here's what happens when you have a wide enough sidewalk:

We're thinking: "Okay, so how do WE get by?"

Safely crossed, the view from the other side

Why let a huge stage interfere with your communte?

We'll leave you with a few more tastes of the fiesta in no particular order. Perhaps it's time that you thought about coming and checking it all out for yourself!

I may eternally regret not buying this pillow!

They added a "food" section this year.

Beautiful women of the Amazon - she is a ceramacist

She is a weaver

She is a wood worker

Puente Roto Art Kiosks

Amazing dragon sculpture

Painting and sculptures

Hormigas (Ants) in an pretty neat installation

Snow cones!!

I know, you're all wondering if we resisted the huge temptation of buying anything once again, and the answer, in short is...no. Here's the amazing sculpture that we picked up. (Isn't it Steam Punk-ish?) We think it will bring in a whole new texture to our new digs once they're ready. Until next time, be well.

The artist Luis Moreno

El Caballo

 

He is NOT eating a small child...despite what it looks like.

The Yogic Pratice of Learning Spanish

I found it interesting that as I've advanced through my Spanish lessons that my classes have gotten smaller and smaller. The administrator of our course basically said that most people just want to be able to talk to a cabbie or hair dresser and that's good enough for them. This is a concept that I can understand, but refuse to settle for.


I've been studying a tense called subjunctive, which we don't have in English. It's the mood of the heart, what we wish, hope, doubt etc. which is a lovely sentiment and really, it's not that hard to put in to practice, but subjunctive has four different tenses, add to this the standard tenses (present, past (Spanish has two basic variations), future, conditional, and the compound tenses that form all the perfect tenses) you have yourself a mess of options to choose from every time you open your mouth.


This brings me to the yoga part. In yoga practice you learn very quickly that some days are amazing; you're flexible, your breathing is focusing your postures and you come away feeling taller and awesome. Then there are the other days; you know the ones, you feel stiff and awkward, you seem to have forgotten that breathing is actually a natural act and the new person in class makes like a pretzel and you feel like a failure. So goes the experience of practicing Spanish. (I assume any other language as well.)


Today wasn't the best day. It's bizarre to understand things in theory and fail to execute them in reality, but it happens. So I have a choice, accept my limitations today and not worry about how amazing my classmates are or beat myself to a pulp, crippling my self-esteem even further. The choice seems pretty obvious and I'm working on acceptance.


I've only been studying Spanish (in a dedicated manner) for around a year, so given the theory that it takes 4 years to learn a language, I should only be about 25% there, right? At least I can have a half decent conversation, if given some context. So for now, I'll be okay with where I'm at and leave the poetry and heavy prose for the year 2018.

On the Road Again...Cuenca's southern environs

Ron met a very nice man named John in one of his Spanish classes and since then we've gone out with John and his wife Cathy on a couple of occasions to enjoy a meal and each others' company.

Pre-juice delivery

This week they very generously invited us to come on a road trip with them to Giron and some waterfalls and a lake nearby. Giron is situated south of Cuenca and is a fairly easy drive, despite the town not being available on their rented GPS. The falls are up near El Chorro and there are a couple of hikes that you can do, one to the lower falls and one to the upper falls. The upper falls hike is any where from 3-6 hours depending on who you talk to, so we decided to skip that one this time and went to the lower falls, a 10 minute walk/hike through some lovely green scape and forest to a fairly impressive little waterfall with a green pool, surrounded by rock, pines, eucalyptus and tons of bromeliads and air plants.

Upper and lower falls

Upper falls

Lower falls

There is a fee to get in to the park (not sure about taking the long hike as the entrance isn't as far down the road, but it's a reasonable $2 for visitors, $1 for residents and citizens and $0.50 for children and seniors. (Affectionately called Tercera Edad or third age.)

Note the "thee" not "the" ;0)

The path is steep, in parts, and not recommended for people with balance problems, weak knees or vertigo. As you hike up, you get tempting glimpses of the lower falls (the higher falls being up and to the right of the lower ones and not visible as you hike). There are strategically placed viewing platforms which provide excellent places for photos. You can also hike down to the beach of the lower falls and enjoy the fine mist that comes off the thrumming falls. Unlike other water falls that I know, this one has obvious changes in flow, as you stand there admiring the cascade; like someone is further up the river opening and closing a lock of some sort. The flow never stops but has definite surges. (I hope the video works.)

Trails are definitely Ecuadorian height.

 

It's hard to be tall here!

Translation: "Only for killing hunger." Our juice place.

We had a lovely jugo de tomate de arbol (tree tomato juice) at one of the conveniently located restaurants at the base of the park and then hopped back in to the rental car to carry on to the lake. The GPS lady became belligerent when we followed the street signs and not her directions, so we turned her off. We wended our way through the village of San Fernando and on to Laguna de Busa, which has a community that abuts the lake.

Stunning countryside

On arrival, we discovered a rather breathtaking Tor that dominated the vista above the lake, as well as a small green lagoon surrounded by a walking path. The path ran through a pine "forest" and as well as a Cypress stand (or so I assume "cypres" is the Spanish for Cypress). There is a playground for the kids with some questionably safe equipment and little cabins tucked in the woodland as well as very interesting wooden platform on which you can erect your tent. (Interesting concept, I guess they're trying to protect the land.) A goodly part of the trail is a raised wooden walkway that takes you through the aforementioned "forests", by a huge stand of marsh grass, past a field of cows and under the watchful eye of the mountain.

Reminded us a little of Black Tusk on the Sea to Sky Highway

The whole set of crags

Ron being crazy; that thing was wiggly!

We were shown the "right way" after the fact!

Thought it was a bee...nope, it's a fly! Chevere (cool)!

The Laguna

From the far side of the lake.

Flora

Fauna...he looks impressed, doesn't he?

Once we discovered the beauty of the natural landscape we stopped and shared a beer and then headed back to Cuenca. We stopped at a Mexican restaurant called Agave on the far outskirts of the city, which seemed like an odd location, but we figured they got a lot of lunch traffic. The food was actually very good, but we were the only people in the place and I think that family was ready to close up when we walked in the door. Despite that, they served us graciously and didn't scrimp on the food quality or quantity. (My chicken fajitas were $8.50 and I didn't have enough room to eat the included rice and refried beans.)

Ron and I are looking forward to some more day trips and multiday discovery tours in the future. Thanks John and Cathy for a great day! Until later, be well and happy.

Ode to the Simple Life

We can tell you one thing that is very special about living in Ecuador (or perhaps living the expat life, but as this is our first experience, we can't speak for other countries). What is that thing, you ask? Learning to appreciate the little things.

As we've mentioned before, things take time here and not all crises are created equal. Our building has been struggling with hot water - it was never there when you really needed it. I took to showering anywhere between 11am and 1pm, in hopes of actually having warm water, which is fine, unless you need to be somewhere or your hair takes 5 hours to dry (like mine). Often breakfast dishes would be washed in tepid water, or we'd have to fire up the kettle if you wanted good hot agua.

This is a minor inconvenience, but the owners decided to address the issue and have a second hot water heater installed. Wonderful, we thought! And it really is, but like many things in Ecuador there is a process to the installation. Week one: the new tank arrives. Week two: grade the space where the hot water heaters are to ensure proper drainage should the lines blow. (This entailed taking BOTH hot water heaters out of the space, setting up an on demand water heater (yes, one for the whole EIGHT suite building) and pouring cement, letting it cure, laying tile and reinstalling both water heaters.


Good on them, for making sure no flooding would ensue in the suite below, but the process took a week. Most of you will have little familiarity with on demand water heaters. They are awesome, environmentally friendly things that are mostly designed for a single residence. (We have friends that have two for their house alone.) So we went from mostly having hot water to do what we needed to not having any hot water at all. For us spoiled gringos, this is not fun. Lukewarm showers, boiling water to wash dishes...it was a long slog.



But the point is that we now have reliable hot water and it is BLISSFUL.

Yes, THIS blissful.

The same goes for the lights in our refrigerator. Indurama is a brand name of appliances here in Ecuador, and I hate to say it, but they are notoriously unreliable. The fridge had little low wattage bulbs, likely of a fluorescent nature, but these weren't bulbs that you just unscrewed and replaced, no.

What our refrigerator was like without light.

You needed a whole little mini-fixture (and a repair man) to fix the problem. This also took a week and when we could finally see in to our fridge again, without cracking out our hiking head lamps, it was also a wonderful thing.

Yup, that's me, looking for a bottle of pickles.

Who knew that it would be possible to wax poetic over such things, but this is what happens when you slow down, smell the flowers and make the monumental leap to a whole new country. Our advice? Enjoy every minute of the quirks and quandaries of the simple things.

On a side note, we are heading in to spring here (not that there's a lot of difference, but the sun is out - it was 23 degrees (Celsius - just embrace it) and, wow, is it gorgeous! Chau for now!

Social Butterflies - a whole new world.

It's hard to believe that we've been here for over 10 months now, unless you subtract the time we were back in Canada and how different life is!

Our children are suspect of our increased social life. We do go out to meet friends several times a week which is a definite departure from our solitary status back in Canada. It's likely that we just have more time, but it's also likely that we've found more people with a similar mind set to our own, which makes it easy to make friends. (This is a pet theory of Ron's, and I can't say that I disagree...there's something about coming to a foreign country that is, well, adventuresome and others who come have that same spirit of adventure.)

Susan & Linda making supper for us!

Be this as it may, it can really get exhausting. (Maybe, like amateur athletes, we just aren't in good enough shape for it! Our advice? Pace yourself. I know, I know: people are heading north for a stretch and you may not get to see them for a while, or they got back from somewhere exciting and you want to hear about it. (Or BEST case scenario, they have hard to get goodies still neatly packed in their suitcases, with your name on them! Yes, dark chocolate Reese's Peanut Butter cups are a luxury.) There are a hundred and one reasons why you should probably go meet that person for coffee or have them over for dinner, but seriously...limit it.  We've had weeks were we were out EVERY SINGLE NIGHT. (Conveniently, or not, depending on your view, our apartment can only service 4 for dinner, which for us, is occasionally vexing, but in some ways a blessing.)

Bike Trips

Some of you are thinking "hey, that sounds like my kind of action." If that's you, pack your bags immediately and head to Ecuador. I won't lie, it takes time to build up a network of acquaintances, but if you work at it, your calendar will be full before you know it. If you're thinking "dear heavens, no!" well, don't come or learn to say "no". (Which is much tougher to do here than you might think.)

Lunches

Dinners

Even with all of this overwhelming social "stuff" we're thriving here in Cuenca. And since we've never been shy of taking on new adventures, we're taking to it like ducks to water. Despite all our roaming it's possible that much like Goldilocks, we feel as if we might have found something "just right" finally.

 

Day trips with visitors

 

Dinner with family

So if you're thinking of coming here, make sure you're ready to get your social on...I guess it's completely possible to NOT do that, but why the heck wouldn't you?

Until next time!