Sunday, day of rest

On Sunday I attended church with Aaron and Kelsey. Don stayed home to rest. We spent a nice quiet day at the apartment so all could rest.

Here are more random pictures of Cuenca.

day 2 in Cuenca

Dad trying on hats.

Because of the flight hassle this is Saturday.

Day 2 started with a Grandpa Evans breakfast. We walked around did some window shopping and tried some local snack shops. At 2:30 P.M. we took our candy and walked to the boys orphange, ages 5-12 years. After some fantastical stories about different colors of M&Ms turning the eater into certain animals, we caught a taxi and went to the older girls' orphanage where the same stories were told with slight variations. We also had blue raspberry "blow pops" which dad told them if they eat it too fast it will turn their noses blue. One of the youngest girls (maybe 8 yrs.) asked Kelsey, who was translating, if it was a joke (she thought it was but just in case, Kelsey of course said it was). Dad then sang the 'frito bandito' song which the girls enjoyed immensely, even when he lunged at them.

first day's activities

The first morning in Cuenca we walked the block and a half from Aaron's to the cathedral. We walked through the plaza and the cathedral then onto the next block where the market is. The market has vendors selling flowers, sweaters, shoes, trinkets, clothing, jewelry, etc. but no food. After the market, where the men bought their wives flowers, we took a taxi to lunch. After lunch we came home so Aaron could take the flowers up to their apartment. We then walked a few blocks the other direction to another market that sells fruits and vegetables and sidewalk fastfood vendors, of qhich we did not partake. Side by side was a market that sells tinkets, clothes, jewelry, furniture, and lots more. We did however purchase some delecious fresh fruits.

These are pictures of our sightseeing in Cuenca near the restuarant where we had lunch and a new friend found walking to or from the fruit market. After the market we came home for doggie-bag leftovers and back to bed.

Friday cont'd.

The market has stalls selling flowers, clothes, trinkets, shoes, housewares, jewelry, etc. Except that the items were new it reminded me of flea markets in the states, everything crowded together. Dad has more of things on the video camera than I got on the digital camera. We stayed home for dinner and ate the leftover meats and rice from the first night's dinner.

picutres of the cathedral and roses

arriving in Cuenca

Here are some pictures of our arrival in Cuenca.

It was Thursday afternoon.

Upon arriving in Cuenca we rested at Aaron and Kelsey's apartment and then went to dinner with their friends the Roseros. Then went to bed.

The next morning we walked to the plaza and walked through the cathedral just a block from Aaron's apt. Dad bought me some orange roses and Aaron bought Kelsey some gladiolas.

Nita

more pictures

This is a picture of Quito as we are taking off and a picture of a volcano plume coming up through the clouds not to far from Quito.

pictures from Quito, Ecuador

These are images at the Quito airport. Notice it is day time, we were supposed to be there 9:35 the previous night.

Our trip began in Libby, MT. We drove to Spokane on Monday, the 14th, and stayed the night at a hotel that let us park the car and then they drove us to the airport - much cheaper spending the night at a motel than paying airport parking for 11 days. The flights from Spokane to SLC to Atalnta were fine. We had 16 hour layover in Atlanta so stayed at a hotel with an airport shuttle service. The 15th of Jan. brought a winter storm to Atlanta just before our flight was scheduled to take off. The airport decided that the planes needed to be de-iced before take-off. The flight from Atlanta, GA to Quito, Ecuador was to be 5 hours. However we waited over 4 hours for our plane to be de-iced.

Some of the passengers that are familiar with Quito's airport became worried because they knew that Quito closed at midnight, remember the 9:35 P.M. arrival has now been delayed by 4+ hours. The pilot was consulted by the crew and said they (Delta) had contacted Quito and they would wiat for us to arrive. At this point no one was upset because who could be angry with the airlines because of the weather.

The rest of the story is that the pilot/Delta lied to us about Quito from the start. They planned on skipping Quito and going straight to Guayquil so they could count the flight as completed. Nothing more was said about our destination by the crew so we (the passengers) were patient with the delay. Many of us were worried about those meeting us having to wait so long in Quito but were not yet angry at Delta. The flight seemed to be taking a little longer than anticipated and suddenly we were informed that we had skipped Quito and were landing in Guayquil in a few minutes! The pilot assured us that someone would be at the airport to inform us of our options and that the same plane would return us to Quito in about 3 hours time.

So we arrived in Guayquil about 1:40 A.M. After we disembarked from the plane we saw no Delta personnel as promised. The only people there were security and cleanig crew. The Delta crew vanished by leaving another way than the passengers. Security personnel let into the airport and locked us in the waiting area. There were no vendors or ticket agents there to get any information or water from. The 3 hour wait turned into 5 hours because the airport in Guayaquil also closed at midnight and didn't open until 7 A.M. (may be 6 A.M., at this point I was so tired I'm not sure). We had only the airport chairs to sit or try to lay on. Nothing was offered to the passengers, no water, no comensation, no honest information.

The pay phones, which had pictures of credit cards accepted on them, would not accept anyone's credit cards. Fortunately we had bathrooms available. Also a blessing that I had my laptop computer and was able to connect to the internet and send emails to several family members. I hoped Aaron and Kelsey would check their email but didn't have their computers in Quito.

Meanwhile, Aaron and Kelsey were unable to find any info about the flight but their taxi driver called someone he knew and found out the flight was cancelled. They had no other information! A kind man, an American who lives part of the year in Quito, loaned dad his cell phone and he was able to contact Aaron and let him know where we were.

Oh yeah, Delta never unloaded our checked baggage so we only had our carry-on bags. At this point a native told us that we were only half the distance from Cuenca as Quito is. But we couldn't change any plans because we didn't have our luggage and had a difficult time contacting Aaron. If Delta had just let us know that they planned to skip Quito we could have made other arrangements with Aaron and Kelsey.

We were so tired by the time we got to Aaron and Kelsey's in Cuenca. Dad thinks Delta's slogan should be "airline of the frequent LIARS!"

Flight to Ecuador

We are in Ecuador after a terrible flight down. More to follow.
Nita