Well that was cool! We´ve just left the lush paradise of Mindo, on the other side of the mountain from the not-so-lush, not so paradisical Quito. We stumbled across a flyer in Otavalo for some environmental volunteer work there, and signed up for two weeks of we weren´t quite sure what.

What we did get was two weeks in a beautiful bamboo cabin, two storeys with trees growing right through the middle of the kitchen. Mindo is ridiculously pretty - it feels like you can´t walk down the street without swatting aside clouds of hummingbirds and butterflies, or at night, fireflies (fireflies are still such a stupid novelty for me - I spent far too long trying to communicate with them by flashing my headlamp on and off...). The day we arrived we learned about the Christmas bird count, an annual bird watching census, of which Mindo is the current world champion. It seemed like a good excuse for the resident bird watchers to have a party in any case. We walked past their meeting several times during the day - hearing things like "Who´s spotted red-throated bog-croucher?", and the answering cries of "I do! I do!". This went on for something like fourteen hours.

Anyway, Barbara and Milton run BioMindo, an environmental project with the formidable aim of producing an inventory of every species in the Mindo area. Just to be clear, we´re talking something like ten to twenty thousand species! First things first though, we were building a giant bamboo roundhouse, to function as an environmental interpretive centre. Finally, finally my years of experience dragging bundles of bamboo home to mum´s house to turn into tree houses has come in handy. I knew it was just a matter of time...

Big inside the tube

Mindo had plenty of other offerings - we hiked up to a set of waterfalls, spotting our first armadillo on the way, and I jumped 12 metres from a rock into the spray at the bottom of the falls. It took a lot of psyching up, but it was a great rush. We also tried tubing - a brilliant low budget combination of white water rafting and bumper cars, performed in a roped together collection of truck inner tubes. The best part was that, while we all had life jackets and helmets, our 10 year old assistant guide had but a pair of shorts!

The insectoid menace

The one downside I can think of is the fact that Mindo is so absolutely overflowing with life, and that includes the tiny, flying, carnivorous variety. We were woefully under prepared for the continuous attack from these tiny biting flies - they put Aussie mozzies to shame in terms of tenacity, numbers and the terrible, unrelenting itchiness of the resultant bite... We spent hours evey night, scratching the skin off our ankles. We tried every type of repellent and lotion, creams for the itch, fresh lemon juice applied before bed - this worked better than anything else - but still we went mental. Amy is sitting beside me now, still trying to scratch without everyone in the room noticing.

There is plenty more to say about Mindo - I could go on all day. Actually, considering the internet café is then only airconditioned room in town, I probably should. Nevertheless, there's a hammock on the beach front calling me, so the rest will have to wait. Adiosª