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Morning view of Cayambe with a Condor supervising the valley below!;

This week’s update, I regret to say, will be a short one due to the packed nature of expedition life. That being said during these past seven days we have lived through several incredible experiences so key to our Kroka experience that it would be a shame to overlook them.

First and foremost, we spent three and a half days following the last update at German and Carmita’s home in the small community of Zuleta. There we treated, dried and worked oxen skin and finally fashioned sheaths for our machetes and covers for our main lesson books. We also had the immense pleasure of spending some time with Joaquin, German’s father, one of the few people that still work with rawhide. With his help we were able to fashion clasps for our book covers out of this tough but amazing material.

Learning from Joaquin…

On top of leatherwork, the group shared something that was new for many and intense for all: a slaughtering. Using some of our group funds, we purchased a large female pig from Mama Pito (one of the pillars of the community). We all gathered in a circle while Taita Jose, her husband, took a knife to the pig’s heart, a very accurate and difficult task at which he is extremely practiced. We hurried to put the pig in boiling water in order to pick off the hair, and then spent the night and early morning in shifts, removing the intestines and tending the large, adobe oven where our chancho (pig in Spanish) was prepared for eating. The whole process was disturbing to some, but, once the meat was ready, even vegetarian Raina decided to eat it. Undeniably, we had all developed an immense respect for the animal and the reality of slaughtering, which is merely the way of life here in Ecuador.

Last pull to the glacier

After saying goodbyes to our hosts, we headed off to Cayambe, or rather the path to the base of Ecuador’s third largest glacier-covered mountain. We trekked all day and arrived, tired, but ready to take on two days of glacier school. We climbed the difficult terrain twice, and ended up making it to the glacier on the second day, several of us affected by living at such a high altitude. Although the arrival was late, what we saw was not less beautiful. Tired as we were, the group took time to learn how to hike on the snow and ice, use ice axes and crampons, and bring one another out of crevasses.

Again, sorry for the lack of detail, but I’ve got to run! We’re off to the hot springs!

Thanks for checking in!