Que pena. I’ve been horrible at keeping this thing going, and for the wrong reasons. I have the time, the pictures, and the thoughts, but as soon as I get behind, I’m faced with the too overwhelming task of editing photos, selecting the best ones, uploading them slowly and individually, and then writing about them. So a week passes and the thought of undergoing this process frightens me, so I let another week pass and the cycle continues. But that is not to mean I don’t think about writing (I do all the time, every minute of every day), and I haven’t forgotten about the few of you who read this thing. I even had a dream the other night that I renamed my blog “One Post a Week.” On its face that doesn’t sound too ambitious, but in truth it’s still woefully inaccurate of how frequently I’ve been checking in. So, I’m going to take that dream to portend one of my New Year’s resolutions, and will strive to keep at such a (not so) rapid clip.

So alright. I last left off claiming I would be moving to Bogota. For a variety of reasons, but mostly because of my inability to make up my damn mind, I have called that plan off. I still spent a great two weeks there, including a three-day Christmas side trip to Guatavita, a nice little town an hour north of the city. However, after that I realized the magnitude of the inertia I had succumbed to and it got to be too much. You get comfortable staying in the same place, in the same city, in the same country, because it’s easier that way. You aren’t faced with a whole new city plan, a new public transportation system, even a new and unfamiliar vocabulary. To stay in Colombia would have been easier and more comfortable, but I know with my limited time and resources I just needed to keep moving. So I bought a plane ticket to Quito, Ecuador, and decided to head there for the New Year, and I’m very glad I did.

Quito in itself has been a bit of a mixed bag. As someone who once wanted to be an architect and still completely salivates over charming colonial architecture and romanesque cathedrals, this place is heaven. The “Old Town” section of Quito seems to have the magical ability to transport you to an earlier time, and for maybe the first time on this trip, I felt a real connection with the continent’s indigenous past. And the people I’ve met here (mostly travelers) have been great, and they made for a really memorable and excellent New Year’s Eve. But I think I was spoiled by my two amazing months in Colombia, with everyone so warm and friendly, things a bit more “developed” (but not to a fault, more like just developed enough for my first world needs), and how secure I felt my whole time there. Ecuador has garnered a bit of a rougher reputation, and I think rightfully so. I’ve already seen an attempted robbery right in front of me—a guy I was heading out with one New Year’s Eve had his really old, medium format camera that happens to look like a professional digital SLR but in reality is more like a box made of plastic strapped around his shoulder. Two guys on a motorbike approached us, one jumped off and tried to rip the camera right off his arm, then jumped back on the motorbike and they rode away. They completely botched it in that the camera just fell on the ground completely undamaged. But even if they had succeeded, they would have been sorely disappointed. Still, though, it was pretty surreal watching this thing happen before it was even dark out, with dozens of people around, right outside our hostel. I have heard of other similar situations happening here pretty frequently, but I myself haven’t experienced anything like it yet firsthand. This is all just to say that Quito has a lot a lot to offer, but it comes at a higher price.

I have been working out the details of my next few weeks, a process I love almost as much as I love doing the actual things I plan. It’s such a nice feeling, having a completely open slate in front of you, with the option to go just about anywhere and do almost anything. Do I want to go on a four day trek through the jungle? Or shall I take a day trip to Cotopaxi? And when can I fit in La Mitad del Mundo? These are the kinds of decisions I’m faced with nearly every day, and it’s fun to just map all of them out in my notebook. I think this may officially be the point where those of you reading this from your office desk chair want to kill me, and for that I apologize, but if it’s any consolation I spent way way way too many hours doing the same thing the last two years, all so that I could be doing what I’m doing down here.

So, with my few remaining days in Ecuador I will be packing a lot in. Today I headed up the TeleferiQo, an amazing gondola system akin to the Metrocable in Medellin, but with more of a focus on tourism and less a focus on public transportation. Heading up the (active!) Pichincha Volcano was amazing, and even better from the top. Quito is the highest capital in the world, so we are already at quite the altitude (about 3,000 meters), but the TeleferiQo brings you up to 4,000 meters, where you can see all of Quito and its thousands of “casas juguetes, casas chicititos,” according to the little boy on the gondola with me, stretched out before you.

Tomorrow I’ll likely head to the actual equator, “La Mitad del Mundo,” a 45-minute journey outside of Quito, if nothing else than to take the obligatory “Look at me I’m straddling two hemispheres” photo. On Friday I’m going to take a day-trek to the volcano Cotopaxi to do some hiking, biking, and whatever else you do around volcanoes. Then I’ll be off to Los Banos (“The Baths” or according to a Google translation “The Toilets”) for a couple of days before I finally head down to Guayaquil. From there I’ll be flying all the way down to Arequipa, Peru, and from there who knows!

In keeping with the spirit of updating more frequently, I am going to hit “Publish” and worry about posting photos later. Ciao!