A Traveler's Birthday

Many people have wondered what I did for my birthday, so for those of you wondering, here you go!  It is also another interesting peak into the "normal" happenings of a traveler's life.

12:00 am: First minutes of being 29.  We are attending a Julieta Venegas concert in Quito for my birthday.  If you don't know who she is, you can check out her music here:  http://www.myspace.com/julietavenegas.  In my humble but always correct opinion, she's the most talented musician to come out of Mexico.


12:30 am: Concert ends.  We find a taxi back to our hostel.

6:00 am:  Alarm clock goes off to catch a bus to Laticunga.  We have to get up this early because the onward bus from Laticunga only goes once a day and missing it would waste a whole day.

10:00 am:  Get dropped off by the side of the highway in Latacunga.  We find a taxi to take us to the bus terminal.

10:30 am:  Eat "lunch" in the bus terminal.  When I ask the owner if he has lunch ready yet, he tells me no, but there is breakfast: fried beef, chicken, or beef tounge.  I go with the chicken "breakfast" which also includes rice, potatoes, hard boiled egg in some sort of yellow sauce, a cup of hot water with random particles floating in it, an unknown red-colored juice, bread, and cheese.


11:45 am: Bus leaves Laticunga for Chugchilan.  Endure terrible music while bumping along on unpaved Andean highlands.

2:15 pm:  Look over the edge of a sheer cliff as the bus starts leaning cliff-side.  It appears as if there was a landslide recently making the bus go over the newly fallen earth.  No one seems to panic, but I envision the bus doing many rolls as it careems down into the canyon.


3:00 pm:  Arrive in Chugchilan, our destination, a town of 600 people.  We decide to stay at Mama Hilda's because it is the closest and we both feel like sleeping.

3:00 pm-6:00 pm:  Bessie tells everyone in sight that it is my birthday.  I think she might have even told the horses.

7:00 pm: Dinner at Mama Hilda's starts.  It is delicious and includes vegetable soup and spaghetti.

8:00 pm:  Lights go out and the staff at Mama Hilda's come in with a lemon cake with a candle in it singing happy birthday in English (pretty good English, too...I don't know where they learned it).  I cut and serve lemon cake to another American, a 60-plus year old French couple, a British guy, and the Mama Hilda's staff.  We all say "Mmmmm".


8:30 pm:  Go to sleep.  Not that I usually go to sleep that early, but we are getting up at 3:30 am the next day.

In other words, just another non-regular day in our lucky lives!