Pululahua

We're back from camping! It was so much fun. I feel absolutely refreshed and re-energized about living in Quito. There are some things only nature can do.



Anyways, here are a few photos of our trip. There's not much to report, other than we camped in an active volcanic crater. There are probably a total of 100 people that live down there, maybe more. But it was exactly what I needed: time out of the city, where the air is clean and the buildings are more like shacks then houses. We did two nice long hikes and a couple nice long walks with the Chukester.

You would have thought Chuki was in heaven. He wasn't on his leash much and did pretty well coming to us when we called. There were two incidents. One when we first got there and two horses rode by (horses are the primary mode of transportation in the crater). Chuki had never been near a horse while not a leash and was very interested. He got a little too close for a little to long and received the horse's hind leg in his chin. I believe he's learned his lesson because after that whenever a horse would ride by he'd move out of the way. The second incident was when we let his off the leash while we were setting up camp and he got distracted by a group of dogs that he decided he'd rather chase then listen to us. Eventually he came back, once he realized we had a stick and we'd play fetch (well, Chuki's version of fetch) with him. It was a great two days.

The crater full of farms

Sebas, Ryan, Me, and Tomas on our first hike

Ryan and I at the top of the mountain inside the crater

Our campsite. Literally a field in the middle of 'town'.

Enjoying the campfire at night

After sleeping in the tent, Chuki was very happy to be able to run around again.

The town of Pululahua

The small pointy peak on the left of the photo is where we hiked to. 

This was the hike on day two, out of the crater.

Pululahua from above.

Us at the top of the crater with all of our gear.

Hitching a ride back to Mitad del Mundo.

We're hoping to bring our camping gear with us when we come back after Christmas. It's such a cheap way to travel and Chuki and I absolutely love it! Ryan's complaint is that he can never get his hands clean enough to put on his contacts. We're going to look into ones that you can sleep in, specifically for traveling situations like these.

MULUB,
Taylor

Only 35 days until we're home!