More of everything!

Hello! I feel like I've lived a few lives since the last update on here. We are currently in Banos, Ecuador. It means baths, as in thermal hot springs, from the Tungurahua “Throat of Fire” volcano. We have loved going to the thermal baths in town. They are at the foot of the volcano and at the bottom of a huge waterfall. You have your choice of pool temperature from cold plunge to scalding hot tub. We've gone three times since we've been here! It's a social scene with 90's music blasting, good vibes, and 99% local people. We've also rented bikes, hiked around a bit, went rock climbing, and tomorrow we are going canyoning (repelling down/around waterfalls). We also ziplined across a 1km valley over a waterfall.

I'll go back a little bit… the night of my last post Sam woke up around 3am with some pretty violent food poisoning. He was sick for around 48 hours and we ended up having to cancel our trek. It was a bummer. Luckily one of my best friend's is a doctor and she calmy guided me through it. Zofran is over the counter here and that brought him back to being human pretty quickly. It was a definite low for both of us. Sam was more bummed about canceling the trek, I was more deep breathing in the corner of our bright orange room with white noise at maximum volume in my ears (I'm terrified of vomit). We are both SO happy that's over. There's a rupi kaur poem that says in part, “..learning mint chocolate chip ice cream will fix about everything. and for the pains it can't there will always be my mother's arms”. Or frantic facetime calls. I think she said that too.

We did salvage a part of our trek by going to Quilotoa for the day and hiking the rim of the crater leftover from a volcano that erupted an estimated 800 years ago. The trail was pretty challenging especially after we were both horizontal for the 2-3 days prior. We called it “couch to Quilotoa”. I feel as though that is a very ‘Sam and Bridget’ way to get back into shape fast... a six mile hike at 12,000 feet. Speaking of trek, my jacket and shoes did in fact find their way to me. I will not question the miracles.

Honestly, when Sam was sick and I felt like I was being hunted for sport (so dramatic), I wanted to be done. Call it quits, come home, finish early, etc. But after getting through to the other side it's almost like staying the course was the way through. It feels a bit like a bigger theme or lesson, of not throwing in the towel the second something is hard or uncomfortable. Of actually staying and looking for the good despite the bad thing. It was asking the cleaning lady for new sheets and her coming to our room (with heavy duty gloves and cleaning supplies) but also chamomile tea and a smile. It's asking, “What would we have done if it was both of us?” and a kind Canadian woman replied, “I would have taken care of you”. It's telling the pharmacy what was happening in Spanish but also acting it out to make sure my message came across early and reflecting now about how that must have looked. It's slowly trusting the food again and still being uncomfortable but walking towards that feeling anyway instead of fleeing the country.

In a few days we head to Cuenca for a week and a half. We are taking Spanish classes for a week while we are there for four hours each day. We already say how much easier this trip feels compared to Peru based on how much more Spanish we have this time. We're excited to take the class to increase our skills even more. How lucky am I to have a fiancé that has an appetite for learning and so desparetly wants to do and be better at something? The glimmers of this trip are not lost on me.

Thanks for following along.