Today is Ash Wednesday, so the town is about half back to life.  Many people are still taking today off, but tomorrow should return to normal around here.

Efrain, from MIO Tours, picked us up again today at 9:00 sharp, and drove us to El Cajon National Park.  The trip was a little disappointing, through no fault of Efrain’s.  The weather was heavily overcast, cold, with frequent showers throughout the day.  Also, we haven’t totally acclimated to the 8,500 Cuenca yet, and were today trying to cope with a shack at 13,670 ft.  We couldn’t really move very fast, and certainly not do any hiking at that elevation.

As we got back into town, Efrain agreed to help us shop for a satellite internet dongle at Claro.  I was sure that would take more Spanish than I could muster.  At the store, we found that the price was prohibitive, so we passed. ($99 without a plan, plus $5 per 500MB data, or $30/month for 4GB data/month, but with an 18 month commitment.)

Efrain then drove us around some more possible rental areas, including one he referred to as “the 50-50 area,” because about half the occupants are gringos and half locals.  Looked like a very nice place to live, and he said a 2 bedroom apt there would run about $200-$300/month unfurnished.

We have seen several ‘Costto’ stores around, but have not ventured in.  Efrain commented that they are the same as ‘Costco’ in the states, with the only difference being one letter in the name. Perhaps we will check them out on our next trip.

Efrain next drove us to Paute, because we had heard so much about it and wanted to see it a bit more.  He stated that potato soup was invented in Paute (Wikipedia says it dates to 6000BC though, so we take that with a grain of salt), and that we should try it.  We stopped at Corvel Eventos for lunch, and their version of the potato soup was worth coming back for — delicious!

Paute is about 5 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than Cuenca, and is a bit lower, so there are birds (and bugs).  We have heard of several expats deciding to move there, but the town seems too small and isolated for our tastes. Move that 5 degrees to Cuenca though, and we would be in heaven! 🙂

We have heard various things about an international airport being approved for Cuenca, but never anything definite.  Efrain says that the issue was put to a vote and was resoundly defeated.  I can find Google references to it being approved in 2009 if new radar was put in, but can’t find any references more current nor to any vote, so am not really sure of the details — other than it is clear we cannot use Cuenca airport as a port-of-entry at this time.

We told Efrain that we were thinking of returning Nov 1 to study Spanish for a month.  He warned us that Nov 1, 2, and 3 are big holidays (Dia de Muerta and Cuenca Independence Day) and that we should arrive a few days earlier to get settled before the big celebrations.  Sounds like a good plan to us.

Dinner was at Guajibamba, where the house specialty is cuy.  We had the cuy, but I think I prefer the preparation of the roadside vendor on Monday.  The rest of the meal’s side dishes were good though.

Another birthday survived… 🙂