Arrival

El Paramo, the wet highlands

I’m here bumping along on the road to Tena. We drove through flat lands of farms and now we are going through those mountain roads that follow a river up through the wallowing hills.  It’s all the browns and greens of moss and heather.  Clay- the ground is saturated with water.  And we feel very high up.  And Welcome graciously lent me his iPod so I’m listening to Iron & Wine, and I’m so at home that I hardly noticed when Resurrection Fern came on. 

And the little rivulets! Mitch says the soil up here is soaked.  It is the sponge for the filtration of all the water that goes back down to Quito.  I am so in awe that I can’t help taking in giant breathes of the fresh air despite the cold.  And the lake! Giant green lake.  And there are hot springs to chill at.  Andi says we’re stopping to lunch where the truck drivers eat.  High up but now we’re descending in to the rain forest.  And I know this is the honeymoon phase hitting hard. 

The vegetation is about to change.  The mama cows watch their calves every few hundred feet.  Little stucco stone houses over bridges of rushing lush rivers and the bamboo foliage is starting to show.  I am feeling better now despite the thoughts that have tormented me the past few days about people, and sadness, and jealousy.  This is where I am going to live.