Day 6

 

We were met at 8 by Andres, our guide to the Mindo valley region of Ecuador. This area is opposite to the Andean highlands we visited on Monday, and the climate there is very is different.  We were descending to low altitude of about 4000 feet, and it became hot and humid with very lush tropical vegetation. The first stop was at a humming bird sanctuary where we saw many varieties of birds, not just many kinds of hummingbirds, but also tucans and others. Mindo valley has an enormous variety of bird species and is very popular with birdwatchers.  We drove another hour to a little town of Mindo, but we didn’t stop. Instead we took a dirt road for about 20 minutes and arrived at the cable car terminal.  The cable car was a little cage for 4 people that took us across the river valley to the other side. The ride was short – maybe 7 minutes, and then we embarked on a hike to a waterfall. The hike was steep down for about 20 minutes and then steep up took a bit longer. After the hike we drove to a butterfly garden. I (Bo) recently read a great book about a butterfly farm in Belize so I wanted to see the butterflies they had and the process of farming butterflies. It was quite interesting. It was surprising to find out that this butterfly garden started as a butterfly farm about 20 years ago and they were still shipping pupa to various countries. Afterwards, we went to a chocolate factory and were given a great demonstration of the production of chocolate. We also tasted a lot of their products and of course had to buy some. The drive back to Quito was pretty tough because 90% of it is on narrow mountains serpentine road, which is also used by many trucks carrying produce from the mountain region to the coast and back. There are no passing lanes so it’s easy to get stuck behind a slow truck for a long time. We arrived back in Quito around 5 pm, right in time for cocktail hour and the opportunity to use some of our coupons. Dinner was again at Segundo Muelle because we couldn’t resist their amazing seafood. Yesterday we had all uncooked fish (ceviche) so today we tried something different and cooked – a Peruvian dish called tacu tacu (a roll of rice mixed with beans and some spices accompanied by a seafood medley in light sauce) and tuna teriyaki (tuna grilled medium rare with teriyaki sauce and sesame seeds and veggies). Both were fantastic.  










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