Another wild bird. How can they fly with such a big beak-all the weight being upfront? I never did see one in flight, just crawling from limb to limb.

The most amazing thing is the man in the background!

Along the headwaters of the Amazon, the jungle in thick right up to the river. There is no place to land without chopping the flora away.

We are having a great time!

La loca vida (via canoe).

Along the way there are public beaches. No one worries about the croc's and the pirahnnas are far away. Even so, I stayed out of the water!

A tour boat for $3 per person.

Masons at dinner in Quito, Ecuador.

There are three Masonic Centers in Quito. Five lodges meet here.

This symbol is on the wall in the reception area.

The West.

The East. All furniture was in perfect condition.

Free masonry is alive and well in Ecuador!

This trout cost me $1.35 to catch at a trout-fish farm. Another fifty cents to be cleaned. We cooked and ate same for dinner that night.

A recruiting poster on the church tower:"Jesus wants you."

The top of the beak and the skull are one piece. the beak´s jaw is cerrated to hold the fruit or nuts they eat. (The bird tastes like chicken.)

This paw print on our trail meaures four inches across.

The indiginous locals, claim that twenty minutes of huging will share the tree's spirit-power. Because they never had watches, I am skeptical.

Growing in the wild is one of those flowers which catch insects for food. The bugs are the tiny ones the size of fruit flies and sand fleas.

This is Quito, the Ecuadorian capital.

The monument which marks the equadortial line which runs through Ecuador.
This is the "Center of the World" monument.
Some folks confuse the Equador with the south pole! Here we are only sidewise, not up-side-down.

Here I did my toilet bowl experiment. The water does spin clockwise when south of the equador! Three meters north of the equador it spins the opposite direction! Imagen, only six feet of difference makes the difference of the rotation! When the bowl is exactly over the equador, the water does not spin- only moves directly toward the drain hole.

This is Cumanda, who is making the trip to Equador worthwilde!

Los HELADOS de la MITAD del MUNDO reads "The ice cream shop of the middle of the world."

Once at the summit, all the energy returns.

This is a tour group of 16 and 17 year olds from Wales.

Note the rim trail on the left side of the photo. We traversed for two hours before getting to the mountain's base.

The "countryside" between peaks.

Center peak is Ruminahi at 4500 meters, one of our destinations.

The photo´s subject is not the interesting thing. It is where I had to get to photograph the tops of the clouds.

Another summit!! Mt Corazon.

My climbing buddy, making the last sign of victory. Only the two of us and the guide made it.

Cotopaxi. I got to 17,500 feet and had to give up the attempt due to personal exhaustion. Actually, I did not "give up." My guide thought I looked so pathetic (he was right), that he told me to return to the base camp. I was glad he did. The return was worse than the ascent. I fell and put my glasses into my eye socket and was blinded on that side (OK now). The other eye got full of sand and my head latern failed! Did I mention that it was 3:30 am and still totally dark? Of the nine who started out, only two made it to the top.

Ilinizac. A five hour climb.

A jungle river, crossed on a small wooden bridge.

Many farms have a plot of sugar cane and a mill to make cane syrup for friends and the family. Here is my visit to friends of Cumanda. Step One: Feeding the sugar cane into the mill.

A water flush cleans the mechanism from time to time.



The mill is not self feeding. It takes a real man to

The productive flow of the cane syrup, which falls into a bucket, not shown.

Some lemon juice is added and it is all delicious! Even tho it has the look of pond scum.

Meet Cumanda!