December 30

Day 1 (traveling to Ecuador) was rather uneventful. I was dropped off at the Baton Rouge airport at around 11:30am. My suitcase was half a pound under the weight limit. Remind me on the way back to put my jeans in my carry-on.

Sat around as people slowly showed up. Met a resident of the airport.



Flew about an hour to Houston. Called my mother to let her know I was in town and if she drove by I’d wave out the window. Grabbed a quick bite at the Panda Express, and then hopped on the plane bound for Ecuador. Only about a 5 hour flight (much better than that 13 hours to China). Watched Hairspray for the first hour or so, and then read a book in the last hour or so (Simply Divine by Wendy Holden).

Grabbed all our bags, met our tour guides, and loaded up our bus for the 15 minute ride to the hotel.




Had some late night pizza, and then crashed around 1:30am. The hotel(s) have no heating or air conditioning. But it’s no matter, because the weather is the same all year. From 50 to 72 during the day…and dropping to 40 or 45 at night. Who wants to move? *raises hand*

We just cracked the window open for some airflow. Then of course we had to listen to the noise on the street, but we obviously fell asleep at some point. And of course they have 12 hours each of day and night, so at 6:30 am it was full on brightness through the unsubstantial curtains, which had me awake and thinking I had 15 minutes to be ready. Really I had 3 hours.

Tidbit: The reason we go to Ecuador in the first place is that the MBA program has a former student (from the executive program) that lives in Ecuador. So he and his wife have been around a bit, not as guides, but just to join us for the fun. His wife’s name is Margarita (probably not spelled like that though) and she’s super fun. She also owns a spa so we’re probably going to check that out later in the trip. Our actual guide/translator is named Miguel (LSU always gets the same one) and I think a guy named Sebastian is showing up on Wednesday.