Field Trip Day 2--Friday

I awoke at 6 a.m. to hike to the telephone signal with two of the girls, and we were blown away by the view! The sunrise wasn’t the most impressive, due to the colors fading by the time the sun rose above the mountains, but the view of Cotopaxi was increíble and there was virtually no wind. We climbed the first cerro, then walked and walked along the top of the ridge until we finally reached the post! By this point we had lost one of the girls, but she happily went back to the lodge to get showered (building on right, on slope of mountain). Now’s a good time to joyously proclaim that the lodge had hot water! The first day mine was rather lukewarm due to being last in line, but the second day I actually had to add cold water to not burn myself! My first hot shower in over a month!

Breakfast was fantastic, lots of fruits and granola and café, and then we set off to enjoy a day of perfect weather. If we thought we were lucky the day before, we were mightily blessed this day and could see Cotopaxi almost all day! I didn’t need my coat after about 11 a.m. and I amazingly didn’t get sunburned either (though many did) In the morning we did the first two steps in the Capture-Mark-Release-Recapture technique for estimating population sizes. We used these wingless beetles that huddle under rocks, most of the time found in pairs, copulating, thus bearing the name culiaringo. Impressively, only a few students were afraid to touch them (lucky for me I could just direct and delegate) and they got to paint them rather than hold them. We then went to the laguna where I got to join a group due to uneven numbers and perform transects and data collections along the footpath to evaluate the erosion due to tourists. I had never done that before (never had geography), and I really enjoyed it! We did two before lunch, two after, and then the students collected soil samples from 4 different vegetation zones to be tested later for pH and nitrogen content. After a long, physically draining day, we returned for dinner and report write-ups. And, thankfully, a long night of deep sleep! We had lights at about 9, and the first thing I heard was my alarm that went off at 6 a.m.