Yesterday we went to a pistol firing range for the first time. Today we upped the ante, and went to a machine gun firing range called Lock and Load! We started out with nearly an hour of explanation of what the various gun choices were, and then training on how to stand and fire. These […]
Bulls Eye
We went this morning to the Stone Hart shooting range in Miami, and each fired 25 rounds of a Glock 9mm pistol for the first time in our lives. We have watched cop shows and action movies for years, and wondered “is it really that hard to hit something?” We decided to go try it […]
Tornado!
We flew from Cuenca to Quito, then on to Miami today. We are here to handle some legal issues that required being in the States (more details on that next week). When arriving, our first stop was a local Citibank branch, to handle closing out an obsolete account. While there, the wind whipped into […]
I Could Feel The Soap Melting…
I could feel the soap melting in my ears, after the vicious attack of el diablillos (aka “the little devils”) as we wandered into an unexpected battle zone. Carnaval had begun! ☺ Evelyn had seen some barricades going up earlier today on Parque Calderon. After dinner at Cesar’s (a friend’s restaurant around the corner that […]
30 Days of Madness
The last night of election campaigning included several fireworks displays, including this one shot from our living room window. Ecuador has an interesting election cycle — I think the USA could learn something from their process. Nobody is allowed to campaign until 30 days before the election. All campaigning must stop 48 hours before the […]
FotoClub Cuena Night Photo Walk
FotoClub Cuenca members (plus random birthday group that walked through, sitting down front). I’m in the blue jacket just below standing group on the (photo) right. I showed up at the FotoClub Cuenca meeting tonight, expecting to try out a couple of my photographs on the group, only to find most people standing around […]
Love and Passion
Dinner at “That’s Amore” had only two choices tonight — “menu of love” or “menu of passion.” We had both! Valentine’s Day seems a bigger deal here in Cuenca than back in Berkeley. All day long, we saw women walking with single roses, and couples arm-in-arm. Though young couples dominated, there was plenty of […]
Free Music Everywhere
Free jazz concert in the plaza behind Iglesia Todos Santos We continue to be amazed by the amount of free music around Cuenca. A couple nights ago we were walking towards a restaurant and heard a band tuning up. We wandered over a block and found a hard rock band playing on a temporary stage […]
Volcano Erupts
Volcano erupts (image courtesy El Mercurio newsaper) Truck in our parking lot with fine layer of volcanic ash We lived in Beaverton, Oregon in 1980 when Mt St. Helens erupted. We could see the eruption from our house, and ash covered the town several times over the following weeks. Today we had a small […]
Earthquake!
I have lived in earthquake zones in California for most of my life. I have felt many quakes in that time, including the Loma Prieta quake of 1989 that did major damage in the San Francisco Bay Area. Tonight, sitting in my office in Cuenca, Ecuador, I felt the chair start to rock. I paused […]