Antisana & the Paramo

Weather: Sunny, chilly in the Paramo. At an altitude of about 14,000 feet.

Between yesterday and today, I completely switched landscapes. I went from being in the heart of Quito at a zoo, to the highlands in the Andean Mountains. The highlands are called the Paramo in Ecuador and it comprises Quito's water source. Bolivia and Colombia also rely on the Paramo as the primary water source for their countries. This may be a problem in the future because climate change is changing the hydrologic cycle. So, they've been noticing less rain in the past couple years. The weather here is virtually unpredictable, it can be totally sunny in the morning and downpour later. We learned that the Paramo is a crucial ecosystem for Ecuador not just because it's a water source, but because it feeds all the rivers that go into the Amazon Basin. The water comes from the glaciers on Antisana, which is a beautiful volcano quite shorter than Cotopaxi.

To start off the day, we got the bus at 8am. Our professor Becky was really sick so she couldn't make the trip as well as 2 of my classmates. So far, I have been able to avoid the cold (knock on wood). It was a bit over an hour and a half drive from Cumbaya. On the way there, we drove through a town called Pintag. This was a very poor agrarian town and stray dogs were running around pretty much everywhere you looked. The buildings and homes were barely standing besides their downtown was somewhat structurally sound. Naturally us gringitos were on a bus that had a tourism company's name on the side so as we were driving everyone on the street stopped to stare at us.

When we got near Antisana we picked up a local guide (we would later have lunch at his restaurant which was in his house..I think). He brought us up the road a bit to an observation deck that overlooked a massive rock formation. Condors are one of the biggest birds in the world (their wingspan can reach 9.5 feet), they live in this area and they have their nests there. They are endangered species (there's about 150 left in Ecuador), but crucial for ecosystems as they are vultures and clean up the mess of dead cattle, and dead animals in different ecosystems. They are the national bird of Bolivia and are prized here in Ecuador. Even though most of the nation looks to them as an amazing bird, part of the reason why their population was suffering so badly is due to retaliatory killings. This is when ranchers see the bird and get scared of them or think they are going to kill their cattle. While we were at the observation deck, we saw a baby condor which was about a year old, and then all of a sudden it's parents were flying overhead. Their wings are so huge so they don't flap them, they just glide through the air. We eventually left the observation deck and went on to finish our trip into the national park. As we drove there were about 7-8 condors flying over head. This is so rare that our guide stopped the bus so we could all get out and look. It was really amazing, even for someone that isn't too into birds.

We finally got into the park and it was absolutely gorgeous. It was a lot of hills and tussock grass. The only part of the area that has been touched by humans is the dirt road that takes you into the park and when you get near the top of the Paramo you can see the water company's facilities. Other than that, it was vast landscape with really cool animals. We saw a lot of interesting looking birds, bunnies, white tailed deer, lots of cows that belong to the government, and a llama that belonged to someone. We got to hike around a bit, but not as much as I thought we would. I guess if our professor was there we would have hiked for another hour. It was still an amazing time and we had time to just soak in the landscape.

After a bit of walking around, we went to lunch and it was fantastic and it offered an amazing view. Lunch wrapped up the day and we headed back to campus on the bus. It was really cool to see the Paramo and Antisana. Most Ecuadorians don't know that Antisana and the Paramo is open to the public. For years, it was closed off because of the water company. My own host family didn't know that it was open and had a trail system. So that just goes to show how much of a treat it was to be able to spend most of the day there.

When I got back for the night, Ines and Penelope had an invitation to dinner so it was just me and Angie. It was so nice hanging with her, we had a complete heart to heart. It felt like I did have a younger

sister which was so cool. I also realized in that moment that it's gonna be a lot harder for me to say goodbye than I thought it would. Angie told me about her dad that lives in Spain with a woman 10 years younger, they share a kid now. She told me about her mom's boyfriend who I have heard about from Penelope. She is absolutely in love with him, but Angie and Ines hate the guy. Apparently, he cheated on Penelope with his ex-wife. Two weeks will pass at times and Penelope won't hear from him at all. Then all of a sudden he'll start talking to her again. It's honestly so sad, Penelope is such an amazing woman and deserves so much better but apparently she doesn't think so. After talking for awhile, Angie asked me if we could take a selfie for snapchat and of course I said yes. She ran upstairs and came down with her entire outfit changed and makeup on. It was so funny but adorable at the same time. It took us like 20 minutes to get a "good one." I've also grown closer with Ines even though there's still a language barrier. I am understanding her better but I'm having a hard time communicating back exactly what I mean. For the most part she understands me which is great. Whenever I get back to the house before her I always say "hola!" when she walks in and she always goes "HOLA!!!" She gets so happy which is really nice, I definitely wasn't expecting her to warm up too much when I first met her.