the excitement never ends.

Hi all,

Sorry its been so long!

I hesitated to write post Galapagos because there was just so much. It started out snorkeling with ten sea lions, passed through blue-footed boobies, red-footed boobies, frigate birds...marine iguanas, land iguanas, Darwin Darwin Darwin, lava lizards, flamingos, volcanoes, sharks.

Theres too much to write there and not enough time, so expect more soon i promise.

We`ve spent the rest of the time playing hurry up and wait. spending two days in the hospital in guayaquil with a student with a potential stress fracture. talking her through her claustrophobia as she had a 2 hr long MRI. playing catch up with the group as we took epic bus ride after epic bus ride across the ecuador-peru border...replete with giant sweaty stomachs, men spitting on the bus floor, bags of live cuy, and our favorite taxi driver javier, who showed us around tumbes to several of the 20 giant mosaic statues that adorn the city...including one of a naked man and woman kissing, and a giant woman breastfeeding her child. we arrived in huanchaco, peruvian coast. we took surfing lessons (i loved it). i cut my foot. we got ripped off by taxi drivers. we took another epic bus ride. we arrived in huaraz, trekking and mountaineering capital of peru. we spent a frenetic four days prepping for our backpacking trip. we headed out. we evac`d a student who couldnt keep down food or water. she and i are chilling in huaraz, trying to plan how to get back to the group. theres a region-wide transportation strike planned for tomorrow to protest the free trade agreements. we`re going to get back to the mountains before then. no worries, we will be safe (thats why we`re leaving in a few hours).

somewhere in there we have had classes, we have prepared delicious meals, we have seen parts of south america we`ve never even dreamed of. the girls finished an altogether crazy amount of work. we worked out at altitude...and we`re all starting to realize that theres just about a month of this wild adventure left and its going by fast.

much love to all of you, my time off is coming up in cusco and i promise i`ll writ emore and with more detail.

heather