My trip out of Cuenca

Let`s get outta town!!!! At least that was my feeling on talking a quick vacation away from Cuenca. A sister in my congregation invited me to go with her to visit her family in Quito which is up north about a 8 hr car ride. Well, we took a charter bus ride to Riobama first and it was great. We talked about everything under the sun for the majority of the ride there. When we arrived, we took a short cab ride to Cecilia`s house. We were received well. Cecilia introduced me to her sister and her family, all of whom were very nice. We were given a quick tour of the town since we were only going to be there overnight. When night came and it was time to go to sleep, I had problems. Hmmmm. what could it be. Well, my feet were ice cold and I could not warm them up by taking a nice hot shower, because there was no hot water. However, I was nicely tucked away in bed with my cold feet and inhaling ciggarette smoke. At least, it must have been the residual escaping from upstares. So, I was sucking on my inhaler for the majority of the night and sleep somewhat after my feel defrosted.
We left at 4:30am the next day to go to Quito. Cecilia`s newphew was kind enough to drive us there since he was heading in that direction. I was very greatful that he smoked outside of the vehicle instead of inside. We made it safely to Quito with no problems.
In Quito, I meet more of Cecilia´s family. Everyone was very kind and hospitable. No smoking there. Whewwwww.! But! There were tons of dogs outside and one slept inside the house. So, my lips never left my inhailer. Over the years, I have gotten really allergic to animals. My lungs feel as though they are closing in on me. But, thanks to modern medicine, I was able to breathe. We stayed in Quito overnight also and went on a quick tour of town. The next day we headded back for Riobama but stopped in Ambato, which has a beautiful park. We had a picnic there and after walking around the park, we headed back to Riobama and Sunday morning we left for home. We missed the first bus because there was a parade in the street and was blocking traffic. We were able to catch the next bus that left at 1pm. It was nice to be back in Cuenca and to be introduced to hot water again. I had no hot showers during my short vacation but beside the inconvenience of the cold water, my cold feet our last night in Riobama and no sleep, I had really a wonderful time. Although no one is a baptized witness in the families that I meet, several of them are studying and are progressing spiritually towards baptisma. I have pictures of the part and will put them on my blog page later.