So last night I went to the futbol game, championship game of the University here in Quito versus a university in Brasil. It was a crazy game, long, and the room was once again smoke filled with the nervous tension of the situation which I didn´t fully aprehend until later. Ecuador has NEVER had a futbol (soccer) champion in their history. So I am sitting next to men in their 60´s wishing, hoping, for a victory. Although the referees tried to steal a victory from the LIGA, in the penalty kicks at the end, they pulled it out and won.
Imagine my surpise to see tears on their faces and hugs for all present. It was a point of national pride for this small South American country. Finally they had overcome and are champions of South America. Now they will face (England?) for the championship of the world. On the ride home Sr. Gutierrez kept honking the horn along with everyone else and every street seemed to have people on it at 12am and all were screaming, waving banners, and were so full of excitement and emotion. It was really really incredible! I am so happy for these Ecuatorians.
The picture above is from today...where I am tired but got to finally ascend the lift to the mountains above the city of Quito and WOW the views are amazing! We were at around 4400 meters of altitude which is fairly high. It was cold, colder than I expected on this relatively sunfilled day, and windy, THAT was expected. The weird things was to see airplanes lifting off and turning and YEA, they were still lower than us. I also realized that the altitude sucks the energy out of you when you are hiking up. I think we only ascended another 2-300 feet from the top of the lift but WOW....I feel old. :(
This has been one of the most chevere things that I have done so far. I loved it....and wish that I had the time and stamina to continue to the volcano. They finally caught the criminal that was causing problems so YEA...it is safe to hike up here again...as long as you don´t take a big jump! Oh...one interesting thing that I didn´t know...Quito is 70km long. That is a big city!
I will load more pictures soon as this place doesn´t work well with big pictures. Enjoy!
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