Week 6

Week 6

July 9, 2007

Margaret Novak

We got back into Quito early on Monday morning. We spent most of Monday organizing and catching up on things. I translated the statutes of Ecodivers and Econavigators into English and we discussed the creation of a new webpage for the organization. I spent the rest of the week working on the new webpage. We decided to use a blog for now, as it is free and works just as well. This included writing about my experiences, uploading pictures from our trip, loading the videos from our trip onto Youtube so that they could be used on the webpage, and organizing the layout. I also created my own personal blog this week, with links to various pieces of work that I have translated, blogs with my experiences on them, and other sites that I currently deem important.

The other day, two people came in to talk about a new project in a town near Chimborazo. They want to bring in volunteers to help with reforestation, environmental protection, English courses, and cultural preservation. It was really interesting to see how such a project is planned. We talked about how the community, the environment, and Ecotrackers would all play a part in the project. We are will probably visit this site next Saturday in order to check out the location and set up the next step.

This past week, we also made a calendar for what we will be doing for the next two months. It looks like I will be going on a cloud forest expedition from the Andes to the coast, and also an Amazon River trip over to Peru in August.

On Saturday, I went to the Cotopaxi National Park with my Uncle and my cousin. It was a lot of fun! We drove up as far as we could, and then started to hike, but we didn´t make it all the way as there was barely any oxygen up there and I found it hard to breathe. We then had a picnic by the lake, which was really nice. I am so glad that the clouds blew off, so that I could get some great pictures of the volcano! I would definitely recommend this excursion to anyone, it was just beautiful!!