Day 10 - Cotopaxi to Mindo

 The floodlights did not turn off as expected and so after forcing my tired self to stay awake until 11.30, it was a bust. 

Up at 5.30am for sunrise, and this time, the mountain was totally clear of cloud.  This was quite the sight, but we didn't get the same colours as the previous day.  It was very cold, zero degrees, with a biting wind.

Cotopaxi clear of cloud

We had breakfast at 7.30am, and loaded up the bus and left by 9am.  We drove down into the valley, pretty much back the way we had come, through lush green farms, people working in the fields, small herds of about 20-30 cows milked by hand. 

Traffic jam

The roads went from terrible unpaved potholes to eventually smooth tarmac as we got close to Quito. 

Back to sealed un-pot-holed highways

We were all amused by the power lines and don't envy the electricians that have to figure out this mess.

We stopped for petrol and a toilet break, the bus is left idling while refueling despite signs requesting the engine be turned off.  

We stopped for coffee to go, and this was the first place I got something resembling a flat white.  It was scalding hot,  and filled to the brim. Thankfully I had thought to get a lid for it, but there was no way I could drink it, the bus was too erratic and the coffee too hot.  I managed to not spill too much until we conveniently stopped on the side of the road to meet someone who had clean laundry for Kenny.  I was able to scoff enough to drop the contents to a drinkable-while-in-motion level.

We whizzed past a guy on a motorbike, doing I would guess about 70kph, with a small child in front of him.  This kid had no helmet and was holding the handlebars.  Imagine the outcry, and rightly so, if you did that in NZ.

The drive continued into the Mindo valley, to the north west of Quito.  At some point, we crossed the equator, so were at latitude 0.  There is a monument in the nearby town, and we stopped for Kenny to use the ATM but they couldn't get cash out for some reason.  

Latitude 0

The terrain is very steep and the roads very windy, but thankfully it is fairly new and un-potholed, so we were going at a good clip when possible, though slowed by trucks and buses on the steep hills, with limited passing opportunities.  

We must have been running late by this stage, as we seemed to be going quite fast. After one particularly hair-raising passing maneuver, Guy had a word with Paulo who had a word with Frank, who told the driver to slow down a bit.

We arrived at about 1.30pm in time for lunch.  This place is the most luxurious of the three, it's called Septimo Paraiso Lodge and is set in a valley surrounded on all sides by steep rainforest covered hills.  It is only about 20 degrees but feels very humid, 83.9% humidity and we are at 2100 metres above sea level.

Pink is the colour

We had a very nice (huge!) lunch and checked into our rooms. The afternoon was spent exploring the grounds and trying to catch humming birds in flight.  

The guys arranged two flash setups to try and capture humming birds on flowers.  

Flash setup

Despite there being loads of birds before setup, they immediately disappeared once everything was in place. They set times for groups of two to have 20 minutes to use the setup, but were delayed by an issue with one of the flash triggers. So they messaged everyone to say their time would be delayed by 20 mins.  There was still a bit of faffing to be had, and as Ali and I were the first rotation, our time was cut short to only 10 minutes to keep the schedule on track.  Another Ali tantrum ensued, not helped by the fact that my flower had attracted a bird enabling me to get some shots and hers didn't.  She is very much used to having it all her own way all the time.  

Guy skipped his turn to allow both Ali and I 10 mins each and Ali was placated.  The afternoon continued with varying levels of birds and success, but eventually, we all had something to show for our efforts.

This is a phone photo of the back of my camera screen so the quality is not great, but you can see the sort of shots you can get if you are lucky enough to have a bird visit your flower. 

Humming bird flash setup

For the first time on the trip, we all sat tonight for a pre dinner drink and chat, this place has a really nice covered courtyard for that purpose.  The owner likes pink, so lots of furnishings are so themed.

Dinner was delicious, fish and vegetables.

Time for another night walk and once again, I suck at it. Despite trying a different approach and using live view on the back of my camera instead of faffing with my head torch getting in the way looking through the view finder, I have trouble holding the camera still enough in the low light to focus.  I got some snaps of frogs, moths, caterpillars and a lizard.