The Ecuadorian Andes are unimaginably beautiful. Most of the people living here are subsistence farmers and while thatÃ?¢ââ??‰â??¢s tough on the forest and the animals, it makes for very little pollution or material excess that usually clutters up the land, like shopping malls. I never thought I would like the Andes as much as I do. Perhaps it is because I havenÃ?¢ââ??‰â??¢t been in any serious mountains in many years, or perhaps it is because it is amazing here.

We have been adjusting to the thin air here at about 11,000 to 12,000 feet. Today we went on a trip to a second growth forest that was about 12,000 feet high. There were many plants and mosses that we often saw in the rain forests near Seattle.

The village we are staying in has only one store that carries staples and no restaurants. Luckily the Cloud Forest Hostel has been extremely accomodating and two meals are included in the price of our room.

It gets very cold at night and we usually wear three layers of clothes. There are no heaters in the rooms, but occasionally we have hot water. This is really a world away from our boat and our little kitties, whom we hope are behaving themselves.

This picture shows one of the hundreds of valleys and farming tracts mixed in with the clouds.

I know we are lazy about updating our slog. Here are the basics.

We bought two mountain bikes and have been riding them around looking for good trails. It`s nice to not have to walk everwhere too.

We also dumped $700 into a new stainless water tank. Our old tank was coughing up whitish
oxidization at an alarming rate. We had to stop using it all together which cut our water supply in half sometime back in Costa Rica. Well, our nice new tank is now installed and it is really beautiful, but no one will ever see it. The real pain was installing it. We had to empty the fuel tank and pull it out first and the fuel tank sat in the middle of our cockpit while we delt with the water tank. After a heavy amount of work we finally got the new tank in and the fuel tank back in place. Of course after everything was back together the water tank leaked. Fortunately it turned out to be a loose gasket and was easily fixed.

We switched out our new anchor chain for some 1/2 inch chain and some 1inch rope in hopes of saving our chain for more than just a mooring.

We still haven`t been able to move to Saiananada where we would muchperfer to be. There seems to be a dark force at works in the politics here. So the only time I have been able to write is 4am to 8am, turning me into an angry zombie. The rest of the time, the bar is too noisy to focus on anything.

We helped batwing move to the tidal grid so they could replace their shaft.

We`ve cleaned the bottom of our dinghy about 3 times now, and the mechanic has our outboard while we are out of town in hopes of fixing the small oil leak and replacing all the rusted out bolts.
For the first time in a long long while we have left our boat and our kitties to travel for 2 weeks in Ecuador. Batwing is watching /feeding them while we tour. It is weird. The longest we`ve left Jordan is 3 days. Hopefully they won`t go too feral.

Right now we are at 9,000 feet in a town called Quito, the capital of Ecuador. We scored Indian food our first night here and today we are going out to see some sights. Photos will follow.

We had quite the party. About 30 people and two small cakes! Do I look any older?
Here's a crowd shot from the party. I suffed myself with veggie food.
Ryan from Sonrisa was in town for only about 7 days, but he somehow he magically managed to show up just in time for the party.

At this cool place called Saiananda they have two sloths which roam the property and are used to being around people. They would rather hide in a kitchen cupboard than up in the tall trees. It's fun to watch them creep around and feed them snacks. This is the male sloth wallowing in a tasty pile of lettuce.

Here's Hopper, Desidarata's dog, facinated by the sloth's creepy crawling movements.

Yesterday we had a great party for my Birthday and I managed to milk it for what it was worth. Everyone brought a vegetarian or vegan dish and we tried to stretch 2 cakes to feed 30 people!

Caraquez is an interesting place with places to hike and great people. Some friends let us borrow their bicycles and weÃ?¢ââ??‰â??¢ve finally been getting some regular exercise. The veggie market here is pretty amazing. They have really good quality stuff and itÃ?¢ââ??‰â??¢s hard to shop for a week and break $10.

Here's a shot of our friend Ryan and his crew on Sonrisa coming into the narrow entrance channel that is close to the breaking surf. We took this photo from the beach.

Sarana sailing upwind to Ecuador, before the breakdown. We had two very fast days at the start of the passage. Just checkout the sunset and our pretty boat about 200 miles offshore.

Here we are towing 12 ton Batwing upwind (as seen from Batwing). This was one of the calmer days when the seas weren't too bouncy.

On this day we transfered our tow to Leonidas. We had 400' of floating line that we would spool out behind us with a float (you can see the float). Leonidas would approach the float, snag the line and then tie off the tow. Then we would begin the slow process of rewinding about 300-350' of rope. This was made a lot easier by the flat seas that allowed us to sleep a little better and improved our spirits around Day 5. We also had do to a similar techique to pass fuel to Leonidas (in the dark!).

Yesterday we managed to get Batwing inside the harbor with a panga side tied to them to provide thrust. The swell was fairly small, but it was very shallow, about 8 feet in some spots. The crew on Desidarata cheered us in from the seawall as we went by. All three of us managed to stay in the channel and we're all safe inside the protected bay.

We were relieved to get Batwing tied up and ourselves anchored. Then we met the officials, and eventually made it to shore where our friends where there to show us around and buy us a cold beer. We certainly don't plan on going anywhere for a while now!

----------
radio email processed by SailMail
for information see:

http://www.sailmail.com

We had really good luck with the weather and were able to regain another 40 miles or so south and anchor in the bay outside of Bahia. It's a relief to get here. Tomorrow we have to negociate the bar entrance with Batwing, but a bulk of the trip is over. We have the end in sight!

----------
radio email processed by SailMail
for information see:

http://www.sailmail.com

We had about 24 hours of calm weather allowing all of us to catch up on some lost sleep. And after 3 1/2 solid days of towing Batwing 250 miles, Leonidas took over this morning. So for the first time in about 72 hours we were able to shut of the engine and sail along side them. We're beating into a SW wind at about 2.3 knots and have about 40 miles to go. We think this wind is land generated and we can actually see the land again!

In about 8 miles we'll be crossing the Equator, which isn't really that significant but traditionally it's a big deal. We brought some Champaign for the occasion, but it's a bit bouncy for a party. Perhaps it will settle down tonight and allow us to make better headway down the coast. We might be able to make it into Bahia Ecuador in time to catch the high tide at 4:30pm into the entrance. Sleep!

----------
radio email processed by SailMail
for information see:

http://www.sailmail.com