Living For the Weekend

This weekend was just fabulous. I’ll let the pictures do the talking as I haven’t had any in quite some time.

So we didn’t go out Friday night because we had to be up bright and early (6:30am) to go to Otavalo on Saturday. It was totally worth it though because it turned out to be one of my favorite days here so far.

On the way there we stopped at one of the many equator lines in the area.

Otavalo is a huge market where you can find anything you would ever want and then some (eg. blow-dart guns, indigenous masks, guitars made from armadillos)

Ryann and I in the market. She didn't end up getting that hat despite strong persuasion by me and the vendedora.

After the market we stopped for an indigenous lunch that left us all ridiculously full and may or may not have also left Ryann and Jungen slightly ill.

Sunday some of the girls decided to climb the Basilica, one of Quito's largest and most beautiful churches. Here's Leila crossing over, more than a little nervous.

And here's Emily, oh so excited about climbing the steepest and scariest ladders of all time.

Girls at the top of one end. We later climbed up the clock towers you can almost see in the back (I would apologize for the blurry quality of this one but that's what you get when you ask an 8-year-old Ecuadorian to photograph you).

Bueno, this week I have a very important list to leave you with.

Things I wish my best of friends Drin (who turned 21 yesterday!) could have been here for:

• The world of scarves, shoes and purses that is the indigenous market.
• We visited a waterfall after Otavalo and were already running behind on time but our bus driver, Santiago, persuaded us to literally sprint away from our screaming director, Amanda, and hike up to the top of the waterfall. Very vale la pena (that’s for you, Daddio).
• As soon as we got to the bell-tower of the Basilica I rang the bell as hard as I could, scaring the other girls a bit and perhaps misinforming some local residents of the hour.
• Catching up on Grey’s Anatomy in my bed. Erin Marie MacNeil would have been, without a doubt, the perfect person to cuddle with. Miss you baby girl.