Day 5 – The Valley of the Bears

June 8th – 3:06pm

Back again! Ecuador is amazing! If you ever want to go somewhere and just be in awe of your surroundings, Intag Valley is definitely the place. The amount of untouched land compared to cultivated or human-impacted land is incredible. From what I’ve seen so far, it’s probably about 10% cultivated or used land and about 90% untouched land. It’s the most beautiful place I’ve ever been.

My day started at about 6:30am, when I got up out of bed and got ready for the day. It’s pretty funny trying to brush your teeth while watching people milk cows. Then I got dressed and packed my bag for the hike. Here in the Bear House, you pack your lunch before eating breakfast. So, I packed an apple, a papina dulce, sweet biscuits, and a Nutella sandwich. Breakfast was alright. We had fresh-baked cornbread and hard-boiled eggs. I’m not a fan of the yolk in hard-boiled eggs, so I really only ate the whites. The cornbread was very good and reminded me a little bit of home.

Today, we split into two groups. One group would go with Kerry, the volunteer coordinator, and the other would go with Alberto, the Andean Bear Projects Guide. Here’s the thing, Alberto doesn’t speak very much English at all. So, because Sarah and I speak the most Spanish, we were grouped up with Alberto. The boys don’t know any Spanish at all. Haha.

Alberto, Sarah, and I did the trail called the “Vuelta de Oso”, which in English translates to the Valley of the Bear. This is an awesome trail. It’s basically a four hour hike down a mountain range. So, after breakfast, we had to either catch a ride or take the bus to the top of the mountain (which is about an hour drive and a 5 hour walk).

We stood on the road till 8:45am waiting for a ride, when finally a Community Truck (which operates as a school-bus, a delivery truck, a livestock transporter, and many other things). The truck we caught was a beer and grocery delivery truck. In community trucks, you stand in the bed which is kind of like a open-top box trailer. For an hour, we stood on crates of empty beer bottles while driving up the side of a mountain. It was absolutely terrifying. Roads in Ecuador are pretty much the scariest thing in the world. The roads are just wide enough for one vehicle and they are super twisty (due to being cut into a mountain) and they are often wet. You are almost waiting for the truck to go off the side or get a tire stuck. Oh and then there are the tree branches you have to keep and eye out for so you don’t get whacked in the face. Overall, it was an incredible experience that I will never forget. Who rides up the side of a mountain in a beer truck that can tip over any minute? This girl! That’s who. We got off at the top of the mountain and started our trek back down to the stations.

Vuelta de Oso has 14 stations. The stations are called:

1. Vuelta de Oso – this is gorgeous! You can see a magnificent waterfall on the mountain across from you.
2. Pendo – this is also quite stunning, with views across the entire valley.
3. Postes 267 – I believe I found an incredibly larger worm at this station.
4. Laurel
5. Lastre
6. Kilometro 25
7. Entrada Azavi
8. Delicia
9. Casa Curva
10. Jose Maria
11. Piedra Grande
12. Delphin
13. Picacho Santa Rosa – Santa Rosa is a very small town near Pucara
14. Richard

Don’t ask me who named the stations, but we did listen at all of them. So, we did the entire trail (all 4 hours). We only heard a bear at two of the stations and they were stations at the top of the mountain, so really the bear could have been anywhere in the valley. The bear we heard today is named Enrique and no, he’s not named after Enrique Iglesias.

1st Signal – Station 2 – Pendo – 10:00am – Enrique – Collar 947 – Activo – T5 – 10^o

2nd Signal – Station 4 – Laurel – 10:42am – Enrique – Collar 947 – Activo – T4 – 337^o

We stopped at Station 9, “Casa Curva”, for lunch. I don’t think you can beat this. We hopped a barbed wire fence and climbed down the mountain a bit and sat over looking a huge green pasture and mountain valley. What better way is there to eat lunch.

Another great thing about this trail is there are tons of animals around. Horses, baby horses, cows, baby cows, pigs, baby pigs, dogs, puppies, alpacas, and a few sheep. I probably saw around 15 horses today and 3 foals or fillies.

Awesome.

After finishing up the trail, we ended up waiting for the 2:00pm bus at Alberto’s house. Alberto is very a nice and respectful Ecuadorian man. He even listened for the bus very closely so we wouldn’t miss it.

We got to the bear house 2:30pm and waited for the other group to get back from the La Colonia trail in Pucara.

Today was a very long day, because Armando Castellanos was coming for a visit. Armando is the owner and founder of the Andean Bear Foundation and is likely the leading authority on Andean Bears. He arrived around 5:45 and dinner started at 6:15. Immediately, he began asking questions about my project and I gave him the full spiel (which he appreciated).

Armando is a very busy, busy man. When not studying bears, he also studies Mountain Tapir. The Ecuadorian Government asked him to head a project in tracking Mountain Tapir. Apparently, the Mountain Tapir is much more endangered than the Andean Bear due to the Tapir being a food source for Andean People, Bears, Pumas, and what not. The government figures they don’t need to help fund conserving and studying Andean bears because Armando and the Andean Bear Project is already doing it pretty much for free (with the exception of volunteer/internship fees, grants, and donations). So, the government funds the Tapir Project instead.

This is a good thing in some ways because, in recent years in the projects history, the Andean Bear Project has acted as test guinea pigs for various GPS and radio tracking collars and the companies who make them. What ends up happening is the company donates a collar(s) for free, but then there’s a catch. Ecuador has a 100% importation tax on these kinds of things. So, he might be getting a $3000 collar for free, but he ends up paying $3000 anyway just to get it into the country.

And then, there’s the problem that not all collars are good collars. Some of the GPS collars he has received are not made to operate in the Andes and the only way to learn this is when it’s on an animal. So, he captures a bear, puts the GPS collar on the bear, lets the bear go, and then never receives any data on the bear due to collar/technology issues. We are currently tracking 3 bears who have had GPS collars put on them and we have yet to obtain readings on them. In order for us to hear these collars, the bear would literally have to be about 5 kilometers away (that’s a little over 2 miles). While this is a big distance on flat land, when in the mountains, this could mean the bear is on the mountain side directly behind you. In that case, the bear would smell you way before you saw it and it would obviously run away. This is especially a problem because most of the GPS bears are male bears who have a much larger home range.

In talking to Armando, I also learned of other research the Andean Bear Foundation is interested in. He has collected blood samples and hair samples from all his captured bears, but lacks the money to have them genetically analyzed. This is perhaps a place where I could come in. If the Ministry of the Environment does not give me permits to get scat out of the country, Armando could get permits to export his samples to me in the states where I could analyze them at Wilson on my Senior Research budget.

Armando is interested in seeing the familial relationships between the bears living in Intag. Based on his home range research, there is strong evidence that the female bears like to stay in the valley where their home ranges overlap significantly. He believes these could be mother bears and their cubs staying in close regions. He calls this “Valley de las Chicas”, which means “Valley of the Girls”.

Also based on his research, there is strong evidence that the males live on the ridges and visit multiple valleys (each with their own set of chicas) in their lifetime. The male home ranges also overlap, so it is believed that Andean bears are not territorial.

I’ve learned a lot about Andean bears today over our dinner of Shepherd’s Pie which was delicious. With a long walk and lots of talking and learning, I am exhausted.

So, here we go again.

Love and Andean Bears,

Ashley

Day 4 – Cazapamba Trail

June 7th – 9:46pm

Buenos noches!

Today was the first real day. We were up at 7:30am, eating breakfast by 7:45am and catching the bus to the trail by 8:15. Breakfast was pretty good. We had scrambled eggs with peppers and onions, fried green plantain chips, rice, and beans. I did not partake in rice and beans for breakfast. However, the eggs were good and the plantain chips were awesome with a little Nutella on them. We also had fresh-made Guava and Pineapple Juice. Which was also very good. Juice here is so much heavier than what we call juice in the US. Ecuadorian juices are almost more puree than juice. Haha.

Cazapamba is a village about a 30-minute drive from Pucara. Kerry claims it is one of the easier trails (but, it wasn’t, or I’m just in terrible shape). I’ve never walked uphill for 6 hours before, so it was quite difficult. Definitely need to work on that. I think my choice in shoes was also a negative and made it worse than it actually was. I have blisters out the butt.

However, it was absolutely stunning! I’ve never seen so much untouched mountain before. You could literally walk to the one side of the road and see down into multiple plush green valleys. It was pretty much the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen.

We were listening for bear signals at stations along the trail. Cazapamba has 10 stations on the trail. We did 7 of the 10.

1. Entrada Cazapamba
2. Mirador Santa Rosa
3. Las Ninas
4. Las Rocos
5. Casa de Teja
6. Portilla
7. Gato
8. Cazapamba
9. Quilca
10. Tanque

We listened at 6 stations and were successful in 3 stations. So, what I’m saying is, we heard a bear on the very first day. The bear we consistently heard at the 3 stations is named Frida and she lives on the side of the river that the trail was on. In total, we heard her signal at 4 different times of the day in 3 locations.

1st Signal – Station 6 – Portilla – 12:38pm – Frida – Collar 951 – Activa at >1 bps – 303^o – On Tune 4

2nd Signal – Station 6-2 – Portilla Dos – 2:05pm – Frida – Collar 951 – Activa at >1 bps – 318^o – On Tune 4 - 17N [0783052] [0043898] +/- 8m

3rd Signal – Between Stations 5 and 6 – Entre Casa de Teja y Portilla – 2:30pm – Frida – Collar 951 – Activa at >1bps – 296^o – On Tune 4 –        17N [0782773] [0043822] +/- 8m

4th Signal – Station 5 – Casa de Teja – 2:58pm – Frida – Collar 951 – Activa at >1 bps – 77^o – On Tune 5

I’ll explain this better when I have more time. On our way back down, we were lucky enough to catch a ride on the way back down. It was a short-bed (like 4 - 5ft), white pick-up truck and all 5 of us had to fit into the bed. The bed was lined with pieces of wood and was not the most comfortable thing to bounce around on. But it was a hell of an experience. Like I said, Ecuadorians drive like crazy people.

The dropped us off in Pucara where we saw the store and walked down some steep mud steps  to a gazebo that looks out over a ton of mountain range and valleys. Stunning.

We returned to the bear house and kind of got into more comfortable clothes and then walked 5 minutes back in to Pucara so that Jack and Dan could play futbol with the locals. While in Pucara, I got a chance to call home and let my mom know I was safe. She was happy.

After some futbol, we returned to the Casa de los Osos to eat dinner, which was very strange. Fettuccini with vegetable and tomato sauce that had cut up hot dogs in it. Haha. It was pretty interesting and tasted good after a long day.

After dinner, we triangulated our signal points and then took showers for bed. It is very strange having a cow grunt at you while you’re showering. HAHA.

On that note,

With Love and Osos de Andino,

Ashley

Day 3 – Welcome to Intag!

June 3, 2011 – 9:18pm

Buenos dias, mi amigos y amigas!

I’ve made it to Intag Valley finally after a long day of traveling and unpacking. My day started bright and early with a 5:30am wake-up call. After that, I proceeded to check-out of my hotel at 6:30am and then caught a taxi at  6:45am for a 15 minute ride across town to meet up with the other volunteers. This went well enough and I got to my destination. No problemas.

From there, I met two of the other three volunteers, the volunteer coordinator and Sarah Clifford (one of the project heads). The volunteer coordinator, Kerry, is around my age and has been in Ecuador for 4 months. She’s also from the states, only on the west coast, in Northern California near the Redwoods and Half Dome. So far, seems like a pretty awesome chick. She speaks really great Spanish and is a favorite among the locals. She’s also very well-versed in traveling through Ecuador.

Sarah is the secretary of the project who I’ve spoken to many times over e-mail, but I never once expected her to be British. She speaks in an awesome accent and seems to be very fond of the Andean Bear Project. She has been in Ecuador for well-over 9 years and has been traveling the world since graduating college in England. She’s spent time in Egypt, Greece, and wherever the wind may take her. My favorite kind of woman: Independent.

The two volunteers I met were Dan and Jack, who are both conveniently located on the East Coast of the US, just like me. Dan, is 6-Year college student in Maryland. Small world, huh? He actually knows where Shippensburg is! Can you believe it? I also learned that he has traveled to Costa Rica where he worked with sea turtles and jaguars (so jealous! Haha) and he has also done work with North American Black Bears in Maryland regarded their denning behavior. So far, a very nice guy! Haven’t got his full story yet.

Jack is a London college student who actually lives in New York between semesters. Again, pretty close to home. This guy seems a little more lost in the world- scatter-brained if you will, but overall very nice. He forgot hiking boots, his iPod, and a number of other things. More on that later! He’s here in search of ideas for his dissertation. Very interesting. He’s also a vegetarian (only for a year so far, I’ve learned). He’s traveled abroad before, obviously, to London and Tunisia. Excited to hear more on that later. He seemed pretty well versed in the humanitarian effort and in global, environmental issues. Also, more on that later.

After getting everything set up at the meeting spot, we waited about an hour for the last volunteer to show. At 8:45, we couldn’t wait anymore, so we went ahead to the Quito Bus Station where we caught a very crowded, 20-minute- long bus ride through Quito to the Carcelan Bus Station. Once there, we purchased tickets for a charter bus to Otavalo. This ride was really nice. I didn’t even mind that it was two and a half hours. Each of us volunteers had two seat rows to ourselves, one for us and one for our bags. The scenery was absolutely breathtaking! We were practically traveling up through the mountains, with views of both the valleys and the peaks. Muy bonita.

When we neared Otavalo, I also got an incredible view of San Pablo Lake and Vulcan Imbabura. Not long after, we arrived in Otavalo which is home to one of the largest markets in all of Ecuador. We arrived around 12:30 in the afternoon and had to go grocery shopping and eat lunch before our bus to Intag left at 3:00pm.

During our ride to Otavalo, we received news from Sarah that the last volunteer, also named Sarah, had made it to the meet-up point and was about 45 minutes behind us. In order to kill time, Kerry decided to grocery shop and then come back to the bus station to meet up with Sarah. About a 10-minute walk away from the bus station, there is a grocery store called “Aki”. Apparently, you can get some but not all things in Intag, so we had to stock up for the month. While Kerry shopped for our supplies, she recommended we pick up anything special we needed. So, I purchased a jar of Nutella (for breakfast stuffs) and a couple extra bottles of water.

Following our grocery shopping adventure, we went back to the bus station and met up with Sarah. Sarah is a 25-year-old college graduate from Australia who has been traveling through Central America and the Northern countries in South America for about 4 months now. She still has 2 months before she plans on returning to Australia. I’m interested to hear more of her story as this month goes on.

After meeting up with Sarah, we went to an Ecuadorian Restaurant in Otavalo, where we ate the set lunch, called Almuerzos in Ecuador. It was about $2 a person and included some kind of beef stew with potatoes, peas, celery, and a bone-in spare rib (or that’s what it looked like). It has some kind of butter sauce in it, but overall was very good. Following that, we had the entrée which included a piece of lightly fried chicken (I had a chicken leg) on a bed of rice and beans, accompanied by a salad and a slice of avocado. Overall, it was also very good.

After lunch, we went to the fruit market in Otavalo to get the fruits we couldn’t get in the grocery story. We walked through the vendors, looking for apples, oranges, guava, tree tomatoes (which are not a tomato at all), papina dulces (which are a fruit that tastes like a sweet cucumber), and another fruit whose name has completely slipped my mind. It was pretty fascinating, honestly. I’m excited to try it all. We also had to hunt down a machete, which wasn’t too difficult.

We then had to return to the Grocery Store to pick up the meats and dairy products that would’ve have gone bad had we gotten them earlier. Once that was done, we went to the bus station and boarded out bus to Intag, which was the most crowded bus in the world. Just when you thought, “Oh, it’s completely full! They can’t stuff anyone else in here!”, they stuffed about 4 more in. This bus ride was about 3 hours long and was pretty terrifying, because the road looked like it belonged on IRT: Deadliest Roads, but I survived and we arrive at the Casa de los Osos (the bear house) safe and sound.

Once at the house we started unpacking and then ate dinner (quinoa soup, salad, and rice and beans). After that, we washed dishes and then continued to unpack. While unpacking we heard the most amazing thing! HOWLER MONKEYS. Here! In Intag. It was amazing. I can’t wait to hear more wildlife.

Tomorrow, we set out on our first hike. So excited.

With Love and Many Andean Bears,

Ashley

Day 2 – Finally Finding Freedom

How do I spend my last day and night in Quito?

I ventured out of my hotel room and explored the hotel a little bit. The Grand Mercure Alameda Quito Hotel is a beautiful hotel with a lot to offer. Consider this my personal review of the hotel. Wonderful Staff. Beautiful Hotel. Good Food. The hotel staff do their best to speak English for me or they allow me to give them my best Spanglish. My most successful strategy thus far has been to write down my Spanish instead of trying to say it and sat it wrong.

On my exploration of the hotel, I found their décor to be very patriotic. The have large prints spanning across much of the wall depicting both natural wildlife (including a beautiful portrait of Jaguar and another of a Galapagos Tortoise) and the indigenous people (my favorite is of young Ecuadorian girls holding two kittens as if they are the most amazing things in the world). The lobby televisions have videos streaming of the national bird, the Andean Condor, which is a beautiful and incredibly endangered animal. Also, in the lobby, there are two large cow-skin covered chairs.

There is also a bar inside that has a world map covering the bar. In the bar area, there is a beautiful sit down space. Right outside of the bar, there is an entrance to hotel’s personal casino. I did not venture inside considering my aversion to gambling but I’m sure it is lovely. In addition to the bar, beautiful photos, and the casino, the hotel also has a lovely, but limited library. Yay for reading!

Following my adventure through the hotel, I returned to my room to order dinner. I even ordered my dinner completely in Spanish. At some points, I had no idea what the order taker was saying, so I just said, “Si. Si.”, with no idea what I was saying yes to. Haha.

I had Consome de Pollo y Pasta for a starter, which was a delicious and incredibly light soup with peas, celery, onions, carrots, large hunks of chicken, and spaghetti noodles. For a cold $5.76, it was very good.

For my main course, I had Costillas de BBQ which is the hotels version of BBQ ribs. Surprise here is! The ribs had no bones in them and I ate them with a fork, They came with fries and a similar salad to the one I had last night with my Lasagna. I got this all for $11.53. Can’t get baby back ribs for $11.50 at home. Haha.

AND the best part, of course, was desert. I ordered Crumble de Manzana, which is like our apple crumble, but not really. It’s very spiced apples topped with a crunchy-something (I don’t know what it is, but I’d bathe in it) and served with a thin-strawberry sauce and vanilla ice cream. I ate this first, so this is especially delicious. My desert was $4.48 and I’d pay it again.

Since eating dinner, I’ve spent my time watching TV and doing something many would consider stupid. I felt the need for some sort of symbolism or peace with this place that has become my temporary nesting grounds. Every meal I’ve had here has been accompanies with a beautiful rose in a small glass bowl with white rocks in it. I felt as though they’d throw them away if I sent them back with the room service tray, so I kept them on my little table in my room.

You’re probably wondering why this is important. Tonight, I took the red rose, I received the first night here and separated 30 petals from the stem. I then took them out onto my balcony and tossed them into the wind, watching them soar through the little bit of Quito I can see from my balcony. Each petal represents one of the days I will spend here. The rose itself represents Ecuador (the Rose is Ecuador’s national flower). And why would I toss them off my balcony? To represent my journey to finally finding my own freedom.

Tomorrow marks the true beginning of finding that freedom.

Anxiously finding my freedom, it’s all about:

Love and Andean Bears,

Ashley

Day 1 & 2–A Very Welcoming Quito

June 5th, 2011 - 11:36am

Fast Fact! - So, I’ve learned I’ve been saying Quito all wrong. The Qui makes the sound of the word Key. So it’s actually said like Keyto.

Last time I wrote, I was flying over Florida and Key West. Not long after, about when we were flying over Cuba, we had dinner on the plane. The food on the plane was actually not as terrible as most plane food. We had the choice of Chicken or Pasta. I chose the Pasta, which was a type of Mediterranean Tortellini with a basil and garlic-butter sauce. It was pretty good. It came with Salad, a Roll (that was as hard as a rock), Cheese and Crackers, and a Chocolate Chip Blondie (that was too sweet for me to eat). Overall, it was good enough, to keep me over till I got here.

My flight mates were pretty nice. I sat in the same row as two of my fellow young travelers who I mentioned last post. I learned that the girl I mentioned doing a language internship was named Jennifer and that her mother is from Mexico and her father is from Japan. I also learned that she was coming all the way from Tucson, Arizona and that her first language was Spanish. She is also on her first solo trip by herself.

I sat next to mid-thirties divorce’ who was flying the whole way to Quito to meet someone he had been speaking to on the phone for 5 months. I guess the city of Quito brings people of all purposes.

The flight landed at about 10pm and it took about an hour to get through Migration and Customs. My bag was found within minutes of getting to baggage claim, much to my relief. AND none of my straps got chewed up on the machine.

It seems the Quito airport is pretty organized as far as taxi service. As soon as my bag got through customs, I went straight to Ground Transportation and within about 3 seconds, a nice Ecuadorian man asked me, “Taxi” and I said, “Si”. He then said, “Un momento.” and pointed to the open window where I could show my hotel reservations and they would call my hotel to tell them I’d arrived and was on the way. For a cool $10, I got an entire passenger van to myself. Just my rucksack, backpack, and I.

Now, the drive to the hotel was a completely different story. Ecuadorians drive like crazy people. I swore my van driver almost hit about 13 taxis and almost ran over 3 pedestrians. Quito is definitely Ecuador’s NYC.

I felt much safer once I got to my hotel and the hotel staff has been very helpful in both speaking as much English as possible and helping me use the phone to call the US. Getting to my room, I was excited to order some food, get a shower, and get to bed.

I ordered Lasana de Carne from room service and it was pretty delicious. The Carne was spicy and the Queso was very fresh. It was great. It came with a side salad which included julienned peppers and a small amount of lettuce and cheese. Delicious.

After that I had a shower in my gargantuan bathroom and then I had a wonderful nights rest in a very comfy bed with breakfast delivered this morning at 10:45am. I had a small stack of pancakes (with syrup that was far too thick and sweet for me) and a fruit plate with papaya, pineapple, melon, and watermelon. Again, quite good.

I then spent a moment on my balcony, looking out at Quito. I was suprised by how cool the weather is here. There is so much wind here that whips over the mountains. It's quite beautifuul and honestly, it reminds me very much of home in Shippensburg. <3

I better be careful! This is starting to feel like vacation! I have to remember I’m here on a mission. Haha.

Love and Andean Bears,

Ashley

Day 1–The Adventure Begins - Continued!

June 4, 2011 - 6:21pm

As I write this, I am sitting in the plane taking me to my final destination, Quito and we are currently passing over Florida and about to fly over Key West and Cuba. We are also experiencing a good bit of turbulence.

The reality of what I’m going to be doing for the next month has finally started to settle in and I can’t help but be both excited and nervous. We are supposed to arrive in Quito at 9:50pm, but I believe our flight was delayed due to boarding complications. So, the arrival time is tentative.

So far, the flight can be described in one word: warm! It seemed to take nearly an hour and a half for the AC and fans to kick in. But, who am I to complain? If a warm plane bothers me, how will torrential downpour or scorching heat affect me? It’s just time to suck it up and deal.

I’ve met a couple other young Americans so far, who are all heading for adventure in different parts of Ecuador. I met a guy about my age from Minnesota who is headed to Ecuador on a 3-month-long internship involving eco-tourism on the coast. I also met a female English major who is headed to Quito for a month-long internship involving English education. Another girl about my age is headed to Cuenca to preview an internship she would like to participate in next year.

So far, it seems that Ecuador has a large number of young Americans who flock there during the summer, for internships and traveling. I was honestly surprised by this- I didn’t know Ecuador was a large tourist destination. As well, I’m sitting in a completely full flight- packed in like sardines with not one empty seat anywhere.

Well, that’s all I got for now. More on the flight later. Still have about 3 hours of soaring at 35000 ft, before landing in Quito.

With Love and Andean Bears,

Ashley

Day 1–The Adventure Begins

Well, here goes nothing! Currently, on June 4th, 2011 at 3:37pm, I’m sitting in the Atlanta International Airport, having arrived about 2 hours ago. My next flight, which takes me to Quito Mariscal Sucre International Airport in the capital city of Ecuador, begins boarding in an hour. It is approximately 2 hours till my adventure begins and approximately 7 hours till I arrive in EC.

The journey officially started this morning at 7am as my mom and my future husband and best friend drove me to the airport. I will miss them both very much and even, as I type this, it’s difficult to quell the tears, but this is a journey I must take on my own to truly learn who I am as a human being. Ben and I have not been separated for more than a week since we moved into together approximately 2 and a half years ago. With our wedding approaching this coming year, I feel that this is an important time to learn who we are as individuals without the pressure and expectations of one another. And, as they say, distance makes the heart grow fonder. Now, with only a thousand or so miles between us, I already love him more for being man enough to let me do this. I can only imagine what a month and over three-thousand miles will do for us. It is the make or break moment in our relationship and whether were ready for it or not, it’s here. Take it or leave it.

I’ve been reading guide books and travel books catering to the solo female traveler- books filled with stories of adventure to far off places with love they both lost and found. I plan to keep these stories with me to help me remember their strength. The first thing that comes up in these stories is why they go alone and it brought me to thinking of why I’m doing this alone. The obvious reasons pop up first, 1. I was the only one invited. 2. It’s an internship, not a vacation, and then the not so obvious pops up: 3. This is my passion, not my family. The only family members and friends I know that would chase after bears, would be chasing with a gun. 4. If you wait for other people to commit, you’ll never do all the things you want in life. Sometimes, you just have to do it alone. So, I’m going it alone and proud to do it.

Even after my bug spray got confiscated and the airline made me check my rucksack, I’m still so excited that it feels like there are 2 billion butterflies flying around in my tummy. And yet, the real adventure hasn’t even started. This is just the beginning…

But, it’s just me, my back pack, and nothing but a journey. Here I come! Ready or not!

Love and Andean Bears,

Ashley