Saturday, May 18, 2013

A day in paradise

One of the 300+ species of orchids in Mindo
Twenty-eight years ago I had a day in paradise when I married my best friend, Michael Reed.  This anniversary, like 5 out of the past six years, we spent apart, as I have been with students in Tonga and Ecuador during the month of May and our anniversaries.  Today we went to Mindo, in the Ecuadorian cloud forest.  While I missed Mike a lot, it did help to know that he has been here--to Ecuador and Mindo--before.
Ready to zipline!

Yeah, that is me midair.

Mike, one of the students doing the "marioposa"

That is me, doing the "Superman"

The group, after ziplining
 Mindo is paradise.  Low hanging clouds crowd the canyons. The green foliage is everywhere, with ferns, moss on the trees, butterflies, birds, and flowers.  There are over 300 different species of orchids alone in Mindo.  We drove from Otovalo through Quito and then on to Mindo, staying overnight in a bed and breakfast called "Mindo Real".  Today we went ziplining, on a course my family has been on before, with 13 different lines.  It is amazingly exhilarating to zipline over canyons carpeted with palms, ferns, plants and trees.
The group, swimming at the falls

Susie, the other instructor, and I

The canyon as seen from the overhead trolley

Some of the beautiful flowers

After our hike we had a very late lunch, and then took the bus back to Quito.  What a great day!

3 comments:

Alison said...

Mindo is seriously one of the most beautiful places I have ever been to in the world. It was so much fun going ziplining there. I am glad you get to go lots of times!

Pao-Ho said...

Wow, this look so cool! Zipline looks fun :)

Annie said...

That was so much fun.