Working my way into Autumn...well not so much on the Equator.

Good Afternoon!

I hope your summer went well and that you found much relaxation! As we move into our wet season here (one of two seasons in Ecuador, the other being dry) things are also slowing down around the office. All of our teams and interns have left for the summer to resume life in the States. I am still working at the office Tuesdays and Thursdays and out of my home Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

Speaking of home, I moved into a new house and now am living with my friend Christy. It has been great getting to know her more too. My previous roommate Ashley who I have spoke of in the past is now in CA raising money to return to Quito for two more years.

Part of living in Christy's place is taking care of a yellow lab named "Cooper" for the next 4 months. His brother "Dakota" is with us for a little while too which makes for fun times (Their picture is to the right).

Some other great things happened in August...my parents came to visit in mid-August and Justin arrived just before they went home. All four of us spent a weekend (just happened to be the weekend of my birthday ;) in a small town called, "Banos." It has the reputation of being an adventure town which we took full advantage of. Saturday the 23rd was my birthday and we started the day with a horseback riding trip up to a beautiful waterfall near Tungurahua, an active volcano that just blew this past February - making international news. At the end we were all racing our horses at full speed down the city streets. It was quite the family adventure!

In the afternoon we went "canyoning," an adventure that involves repelling down large scale waterfalls on the side of a mountain. With all our gear in place, and pure exhaustion from hiking up the mountain first we began the decent down 5 waterfalls. I was the first to start and I made it to the bottom of the first fall with no big issues, until I dropped the metal thing that held our ropes in place into a pool of water at the base of the waterfall. So feeling like a failure already I motioned to the guide who found it underwater right away...which I was really thankful for...not being sure how I was going to get down the rest of the waterfalls without it.

We made it to the last waterfall and found out it was over 150ft high! For you experienced climbers and repelers that probably sounds like nothing, but we were scared! Turned out we were all naturals and loved every minute of it, even my mom! When we got to the bottom we were all ready to go again, especially mom! Little did we know that 3.5 hours of repelling would kill our bodies later that day after the adrenaline wore off!

We celebrated my birthday at a Brazilian-style steak house that night. It was a great way to refuel after a long adventurous day.

In September I was able to partake in a recruiting trip in Chicago, IL with my roommate Christy. Christy is the Dean of Students for Youth World's semester abroad program and we recruited students and schools to join our program. An amazing trip with interest from mulitple colleges and universities.

I also was able to return to Grand Rapids for the weekend to see some friends and family which was truly a blessing. Jeff was a huge help in driving me back and forth to Chicago and hosting a party! It was also really great to see him for almost a whole week.

I returned to Ecuador on a Wednesday and that Friday morning I hopped on a bus to the jungle. I visited 6 jungle towns from Friday - Tuesday with my co-worker Dario. We were reconnecting with our jungle partnerships, people that we send short term mission groups to in the summer. I was in charge of capturing stories and taking lots of pictures. What an adventure - at one point we hitch-hiked from just south of Tena to Puyo (it is about an hour and a half drive straight through). It is very common to jump in the back of people's pick-ups and hitch a ride. There are only a few buses that pass through in the day and all of them were full. Hithing rides was our only option...besides walking...which was not an option for me. :) That would have been almost 5 hours of walking with all our heavy gear in crazy heat! We made it to Puyo safely and continued our trip.

I made it back to Quito last Tuesday and have been playing catch-up with my life since I left for the states two weeks prior.

I am back into work and normal life, working on the next Youth World newsletter. I hope you received that newsletter I wrote in September. If you didn't receive it and would like a copy sent to you, let me know! My email is jenny.luth@gmail.com.

Miss you all!
Jenny Luth