Cloud Forest

I got very very excited on Saturday when Pilar said that there might be a squash court at the Academia, where I'll be learning Spanish for the next month. I've just had the tour; there isn't. There is a tiny indoor sports hall with a volleyball net in, so it has potential, but definitely not for squash. After blogging and lunch on Saturday (during which I stupidly decided to stir up my diet coke with my straw and made it explode all over me in a quiet little cafe) I went into the park in the bit of the city I'm based - mainly to dry off. Everyone was playing football, volleyball and basketball, and running or cycling! I got such a craving to do some exercise. I decided that I'd go for a run round the park on Sunday. But then Pilar invited me to go out with "la familia" in the morning, so my plans fell through. I ended up spending most of the day sat in the back seat of the car as we went on a big road trip.

It was fab though. The family, it turns out, for that day at least, was Pilar, Maria-Belen, and her gorgeous "friend", Carlos - or Charlie as he seems to prefer. Charlie is an ex-boyfriend who has been studying in Argentina for 4 years and got back a month ago. Pilar claims they're just friends at the moment but they're clearly together, they're very cute! We spent about 2 hours driving around Quito: picking up Belen and Charlie from his flat, driving back to the house so Belen could have a shower, driving to a shop for some picnic material (where, having been left to melt in the car, I succeeded in setting off the car alarm by trying to open the door for some air - a story Pilar took great delight in recounting to Belen and Charlie), and driving back to the house to pick Belen and Charlie back up. Finally, we were off. I thought we'd be going to a cafe or something, but an hour later we were driving through mountains of dense forest - the "cloud forest". It was spectacular - misty clouds swirl around mountainsides and valleys, every inch of which are covered in lush green vegetation. We arrived in a touristy cloud forest town called Mindo, and stopped at a lodge retreat. It's prime attraction, it seemed, was the "frog concert", every night from 6pm till 8. It turns out that hundreds of little frogs that live in the pond find that dusk is the best time to make themselves known to potential mates, and they do it by "singing". Sadly we were too early for the live spectacle, but the manager of the lodge had it recorded on his mini digital dictaphone! The lodge consisted of several log cabins and a restaurant surrounding a little pond in the forest, with butterfly and orchid enclosure attached. Pilar asked lots of questions about the place, suggesting she was interested in staying here (was she pretending?), so we got the full tour - and some speciality ice-cream! I managed to supress my fear of flying insecty things in the butterfly enclosure; I impressed myself. The best bit was the hummingbirds - loads of them, beautifully coloured, flying freely around the retreat, hovering silently around some nectar pots. Hopefully I'll get to go back to Mindo one weekend; there were adverts all around for rafting, kayaking, tubing, and that thing where you go on a wire between trees. And next time I'll bring my camera!

So right now I'm sat in the computer room of the Academia Latinoamericana. I've just had my first day. I'm definitely being thrown in at the deep end - everything is explained en español! I did a little Spanish test (verbal and oral), which confirmed how bad my Spanish really is, and then we were taken into the old colonial centre of Quito. We visited museums and churches and watched some traditional changing-of-the-guards type ceremony outside the presidential palace. All described to us in Spanish, of course, so I have only a vague clue what we were actually looking at. It was very pretty though, and I took photos, so will try and figure out how to get them on the net. The nuevos estudiantes all seem really cool - there are 6 of us: 2 career-breaker English women in their 40s, as well as a cool Swedish girl, an Icelandic girl and an American guy who are more my age. Not sure who'll be in my class, I shall see tomorrow! Because I signed up for super-intensive classes, I've got 4 hours of group lessons in the morning, then an extra 2 hours of 1-to-1 in the afternoon. No-one else seems to be doing that! I'm going to be so sick of Spanish, and I'm getting that way already!

Right, I'd better be off to have my meal cooked and presented to me back at the house by my maid. She gives my my food and just chats away to me in Spanish. I've got no idea what she's saying, and I'm sure she knows that, but she rambles on anyway. I really have to learn so I can at least understand her!