We had the chance to go to Ecuador for 3 weeks, and talking about it will take a million posts. So here we go!
Originally we were going to fly out for about 2 weeks. My parents had a mission presidents' seminar the second week of November, so I was going to fly out November 3 and then fly back the 17th. But, then we realized that Brandon had the entire week of Thanksgiving off. So why not just extend our trip and have Brandon meet up with us for a week? All I had to do was cancel my half marathon which was supposed to be November 19. But that was a small price to pay (especially since they gave me all of my money minus $10 back) to spend 3.5 weeks with my family in Ecuador.
Flying with Cora was not too bad. It was a redeye flight, which means with customs and everything we got in at about 1:00 AM. We had a porter offer to take our bags through customs for us (which I was prepared for), and when I tried to tip him he grimaced at the amount. Even though it was $3 (about a day's wages) for 5 minutes of help. Ugh.
The view is AMAZING!
We got there right about Dia de los Muertos, which is a bigger holiday than Halloween. They have a bread and juice that are only available around Dia de los Muertos. The bread is guagua bread, which is a sweet bread shaped like a swaddled baby (creepy). The juice is colada morada, and it's like a delicious smoothie of all sorts of fruits. The yogurts are also WAY more watery than I was used to, so we needed to improvise a bib.
Look at Cora's first pair of boots! We were worried about her freezing to death, and walking on the sketchy Quito streets in her moccasins so I bought these. She finally fit in them.
We found a Christmas outlet store, which was like heaven for Cora.
Since my parents don't have any kid toys at their house (obviously) we went to a toy store to pick up a few for Cora. She went straight to the biggest, fluffiest toy possible. Sorry, kid!
We tried some barbecue from a new restaurant. My dad says if they have tile floors they're probably safe to eat from. I hope he's right!
Since they live on the 7th floor of their building, it is stunning. Even if the balcony is terrifying with a not-totally-stable walker (so we just kept the balcony door locked at all times).
The first trip out of town we took was to the Teleferico. It takes us up into the mountains just outside Quito, which was an even more amazing view.
It was also nice to have my dad there with us. Even if Cora was ambivalent about Papa.
We also got to go to the National Basilica. It was beautiful and terrifying to climb.
We climbed up all the towers, and it was so scary. On the way down, people were yelling "Ya! Ya!" ("Already!") because I was moving so slowly. But there was not even the slightest feeling of security that you have while climbing scary things in the U.S. There were no security lines, and barely handrails. Add that to my somewhat crippling fear of heights and it took a VERY long time to get down.
A very large KFC. Apparently it's a big deal down here!
Cora and Grandma got along after church just fine.
Cora discovered how cool these stools were, which was very scary because she was not very stable on it!
And to have a personal piano player just for you? Perfect!
Cora showed off her new trick of talking to Siri. Of course Siri didn't understand her.
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