Written by Tim Park

We started our adventure before the sun was even up, gathering at O’Hare with sleep still in our eyes and excitement already kicking in. Our long travel day to Quito had officially begun. By noon we touched down in warm, sunny Miami after a brief and surprisingly restful first flight. While we waited for our connection, a running theme quickly emerged: a collective craving for Chili’s.

Before long, we were boarding our second and final flight of the day, bound for Quito. The flight turned out to be shorter than expected, and we were greeted by an incredible sunset as we descended into the Ecuadorian capital. After nearly 12 hours of travel, exhaustion definitely set in, but so did the realization that we had finally arrived.

We met Franz, made our way to the hostel, and crashed almost immediately. With a good night’s sleep ahead of us, all of us are excited for what Day 2 will bring.

Photo: at the Quito airport from (Franz Reinoso)

Photo: plane's view of the Ecuador sunset (Tim Park)

Written by Amelia Grisius and Greyson Marincic

We started the day at Hosteria Colibri with a breakfast of fruits, juice, eggs, and bread. This included the yucca bread we also had the night before. Then we drove to Urkuwayku farm where we discussed the evolution of bacteria, regenerative agriculture, and tested aggregate samples. We took a tour of the farm and ate lunch featuring dishes such as potato avocado soup and a star fruit dessert.

Photos: wildlife at Hosteria Colibri (Amelia Grisius) and soil aggregate experiment

From the farm, we took the bus into Quito’s historical district. We first went to La Compañía church founded by the Jesuits in the 1500s. It was really interesting to learn about the cultural changes with Christianity arriving in Ecuador. Also, we walked to the different city squares and learned the history of Ecuadorian independence.

Photo: La Compañía church

After, we went to Yumbos chocolate company to learn the process of making chocolate and of course to try it. From there, we looked at another church on our way to dinner. We had dinner at the Chimbo Cafe and the food was great. I (Greyson) got the shrimp ceviche, goat stew, and plantain cheesecake; my favorite was the ceviche. Then we went to Hotel Ibis where we wrapped up our night by going over our day with the class.

Photos: Yumbos chocolate tasting and Basílica del Voto Nacional

Written by Violet Spychalski

We started today with a tour at Casa Agave. We learned about how each part of the agave plant is used to produce food, clothing, musical instruments, and more rooted in indigenous Kichwa practices. We planted our own agave plants and made dye using only products from the agave plant. At the end of our tour we had a tasting of many different agave products.

Photos: making dye, tying wishes to an agave plant at Casa Agave, participating in the distilling process (Violet Spychalski)

Next, we visited the Inti Ñan museum. We learned about ancient Ecuadorean culture and geographical diversity. We saw exhibits that demonstrated indigenous homes including bedrooms and kitchens. We also had the opportunity to learn why being located on the equator is so special. We participated in activities such as walking in a straight line over the equator and balancing an egg on a nail.

Photos: scenes from the Inti Ñan museum (Violet Spychalski)

Afterwards, we went to lunch at El Patio from Chef Alfredo.  We enjoyed an organically sourced meal and learned about Chef Alfredo’s projects. After attending culinary school, he intentionally chose his home community in the Chocó Andino region for El Patio to pursue his mission that extends much further than it just being a restaurant. One of Chef Alfredo’s projects is teaching children about sustainable farming and eating, so they apply it in their own lives. Another one of his projects includes learning agricultural techniques and methods from local abuelos so their traditional practices don’t get lost through generations.

Photo: Chef Alredo discussing questions at El Patio

Finally we ended our day by taking a scenic drive to Yunguilla Community, a community with a shared culture of sustainability. Every pair of students moved into Yunguilla family homes. We ate home cooked Ecuadorean meals and conversed with our home-stay families in Spanish about their culture and traditions.

Photo: entrance to the Yunguilla community

Written by Miranda Parikh and Maeve O'Connor

Today we spent the day in Yunguilla, a rural community in the cloud forest outside Quito. Almost everything here is built around working with the land and finding ways to support the community through local production. We started at the milk processing factory, where I learned that making cheese is a longer process than I expected. Milk moves through three different rooms for processing, receiving, and preservation, and it takes a full day to prepare the cheese. Nothing goes to waste. Anything that is not used becomes feed for animals, and the final products are sold in the community or sent to Quito.

After that, we visited the marmalade workshop. Women in Yunguilla started making marmalade at home in the 1990s and later organized to open a proper factory in 2003. They grow fruit on the farm and make marmalades that last up to eight months without preservatives. Chigualcán is the most popular flavor. Learning how this small industry grew out of women’s work at home was one of my favorite parts of the day.

Photo: assorted marmalades made by the Yunguilla community

We also toured a recycled paper workshop that turns scrap paper and plastic into hand-crafted paper. Drying the paper can take five days on sunny days or fifteen days when it is cloudy and humid. The finished paper is given to schools, and the women in the workshop paint animals from the community onto it. They also run environmental activities with kids, such as making bracelets with seeds, which teach them about biodiversity and sustainability.

Photo: Yunguilla community recycled paper and painting

In the afternoon we visited the house of the grandparents, a preserved home that showed how people lived decades ago. The walls were built from a mix of feces, sugar cane skins, and whey from milk, which was surprisingly sturdy. Our next stop was the forest with plants. Yunguilla works with scientists to collect seeds from native species, grow them into seedlings, and reintroduce them into the forest. It is slow work, but it keeps biodiversity alive and treats the forest as something to care for, not just something to use.

Photo: Yunguilla nursery plant

Lunch was at the community restaurant, which is a major gathering point. It was built by local carpenters, and about 25 percent of the food comes directly from the surrounding territory. It was cool to see how the restaurant sends money back into the community instead of out of it.

Photo: lunch of beef, tortillas, carrots and beets, and salad

After lunch, we headed to the Culuncos for a beautiful (and wet) hike. To get there, we were transported by utility truck. All packed in, we had some interesting experiences — Tim, in particular, bore the brunt of the intrigue. The Culuncos are trails paved by the Yumbos people (pre-Incan) over thousands of years. We learned that these roads were once used to transport alcohol and other contraband. Our driver, Rolando, even transported alcohol by horse through the trails when he was a child.

Photos: scenes from the Culuncos trek

Written by Ian Chung

Our day started at 6 AM, where we woke up early to milk cows in the community. We trekked down a hill to the cow pasture. Two cows were brought out, and each of us took turns manually milking the cows. We were also able to use the milk to feed baby calves on the farm. We were also shown the milking machine that they normally use.

Photos: young small cows and scene from milking cows (Ian Chung)

Afterwards, we had a grueling hike back to the car and we drove back to our homestay families, where we had breakfast.

Photo: my homestay family's breakfast today (Ian Chung)

After the meal, students did different tasks with each of their families. In my family, we did our laundry. Then, we helped our house dad rake grass clippings off of the road. We also raked around the hill and stairs up towards the house. Our family also took us to harvest bamboo leaves for guinea pigs to eat. Their dog Scott came with us.

Photos: raking grass clippings, collected bamboo leaves, and Scott (Ian Chung)

Then, we ate lunch at the community restaurant. Afterwards, we learned how to cook quimbolito, a dessert, from Juana at her home. All of us volunteered to help make it.

Photos: making quimbolitos (Ian Chung)

After making the quimbolitos, we discussed food sustainability practices we've learned about in Quito and Yunguilla and compared them with practices in our communities in the United States and their challenges. We ended the day spending time playing games with the local community children.

Written by Varsha Parthasarathy

We started the day at 8am with our families for breakfast. At our house, we ate eggs, yucca bread, and bread with marmalade. We then headed to the factories to assist the community. We were split into three groups and rotated between each factory. My group started at the tree nursery, where we helped pull weeds and discarded dead plants, along with filling bags with dirt for new saplings. It was fun to get our hands in the dirt, and see how the community works to fight deforestation.

Photo: preparing soil for new saplings (Varsha Parthasarathy)

Next, we headed to the cheese factory to help with assembling yogurts with fruit jam, and clean the floors and doors. I especially enjoyed cleaning the floors, as it was satisfying to get rid of all of the mud our boots tracked inside.

Photo: packaging yogurt parfaits in the dairy factory using Yunguilla homemade yogurt and mulberry marmalade (Varsha Parthasarathy)

 Last, we headed to the marmalade factory to learn from Juana to make and assemble bags of plantain chips. This involved peeling the plantains, slicing them, frying them, and putting them in bags to sell. I really liked this factory, as it was fun to see how one of my favorite Ecuadorian snacks are made.

Photo: preparing plantains (Varsha Parthasarathy)

We then had a break for lunch at the community restaurant. After lunch, we assisted Patricio with removing invasive plants from nearby hillside. There were many invasive plants in this area, so we used shovels, pickaxes, and our hands to pull out the plants along with their many weeds. It was hard work, but I enjoyed having the opportunity to help the community and reduce invasive species. 

Photo: weeding a local path from invasive plants (Varsha Parthasarathy)

We then returned to our homes for dinner and prepared for a surprise! At around 7:00pm, we all headed to the nearby gathering place for a farewell party. We danced, sang, and had lots of fun with our families. I’m sad to leave the Yunguilla community, but I’m happy with all that we learned from the people here.

Photo: farewell celebration with our homestay families

Written by Emory Naylor

We started the day by having our final breakfast with our families in Yunguilla. Our family had a form of tortilla and fruit, which was a standard in our house for breakfast.

Photo: my last breakfast with our homestay family (Emoy Naylor)

After saying our final goodbyes to our families, we headed to the Mindo region. We first stopped to go on a waterfall hike. We went to 4 waterfalls during the hike and a few of the students even fought the currents to swim. As we trekked back in wet clothes, we got to take in the scenic views of Mindo. 

Photo: scenes from waterfall hike in the Mindo cloudforest (Emory Naylor)

For lunch, we went to the butterfly sanctuary in Mindo. We then learned about a butterfly’s lifespan and how the sanctuary aims to breed butterflies and release them to the wild to help biodiversity. Many students were able to get butterflies to sit on their hand.

Photo: caligo bellerophon species of butterfly (Emory Naylor)

Following the afternoon at the butterfly sanctuary, we headed to the Mashpi valley and got settled into the farm we will be working at for the next 3 days. The owner of the farm, Oliver, explained to us the mission of sustainability for the community and how we will be helping around the farm.

Written by Megan Johnson and Annabel Li

This morning, we started the day with breakfast at Chontaloma. After our meal of eggs, fried plantains, and yogurt, the group set off for a hike to the farms in the area. On the farm tour, students had the opportunity to talk with some of the farmers about soil health and try some new fruit, such as cacao and bubblegum fruit! Some of us were feeling under the weather, so we took the chance to rest and play some cards during this time. After the farm tour was done, we had lunch— salad, chicken, potatoes, and rice, followed by pineapple cake for dessert. In the downtime between lunch and our next activity, many of us relaxed in the hammocks at Pambiliño!

Photo: taking a break in the hammocks before the next activity (Megan Johnson)

Next, we visited a farm run by a man named Jim. Here, we learned more about sustainable agriculture practices first hand. From smelling leaves of star anise and allspice to tasting local cinnamon plant, jackfruit, and salak, we experienced the flourishing biodiversity of this farm using multiple senses. Along with a few more exotic plants, one of the plants we explored was achote. The seeds inside this fruit create a vibrant red-orange paste when crushed, which can be used to dye hair or used as a cosmetic product.

Photo: achote paste demonstration (Megan Johnson)

After this tour, we drove to Magdalena’s farm. This farm was smaller but had a very large tree nursery, and our guide noted that many seeds from the first farm were grown here. We finished off this visit with delicious sour guava and Cupuaçu ice cream! To end the day, we returned to Chontaloma for dinner. The main course was pasta with a pesto sauce made from native stinging nettle plants, which we encountered several times throughout the day. After having jelly fruit cake for dessert, we returned to our cabins to shower and enjoy each other’s company.

Today, we engaged with several farmers in the Mashpi area and were able to learn how they incorporate sustainability into their lives and work. One major difference between farms in the US and the farms we visited today is the diversity of crops. Most US farms are monocultures, meaning they only grow one or two types of crops at a time. In contrast, the farms we toured today grow hundreds of species of plants at once, with the rainforest supporting species from all around the world like Asia and Africa. Another difference is in how they handle weeds - while most farmers completely cut away or destroy weeds, the Mashpi farmers girdle them, which let the plants slowly die out and prevents nearby plants from harm.

Written by Taran Balakrishnan

The day started early, with the boys staying at Chontaloma farm walking over to Pambiliño farm at 7:15 am for a hearty breakfast of eggs, mangos, papaya and yogurt. After breakfast, we gathered around the firepit in the morning drone of insects and had a long discussion with Oliver, the steward of Pambiliño Farm, about various aspects of food sustainability and ecological welfare. We debated about the importance and applications of agricultural techniques we learned about over our time in Mashpi, including permafarming and agro-forestry. We discussed the implications of these methods towards a sustainable future for the United States and other countries, and the detrimental aspects of currently implemented techniques like monocrop cultures.

Today was a day of work and service, and Oliver quickly divided our group into 2 sections: group 1 would work with moving and applying a nutrient-rich fertilizer made of organic compost and manures; they transported this precious fertilizer from Oliver’s plant nursery to various locations around Pambiliño Farm. Group 2, which I was a part of, had the exciting job of planting new baby palm trees. We first gathered around 35 saplings of palm from Oliver’s nursery, then the group (around 7 of us) walked over to the edge of Pambiliño Farm where there was a dense forest with suitable terrain for palms to grow. We were working with saplings that were around a year old, and they were truly tiny. It’s astounding that each of the trees we planted, though barely the width of a pencil now, will become a 50-meter-tall palm in its zenith of life.

We macheted the vegetation, paved the holes and dug pits for the plants, planting over 30 plants over the course of 2 hours. It was gruelling, yet incredibly rewarding labor. The thought that we were now responsible for 30 new trees that would break through the forest canopy in a decade from now is an amazing thought that connected us to the work we were doing and imprinted our souls onto the forests of the Chocó Andino.

Photo: Group 2 after planting over 30 baby palms

Lunch was a delectable feast of turmeric rice, pork chops and salad. We visited a restaurant down the road from the Farms, which was dedicated to sustainable food sourcing and ethical produce.

After lunch, we visited a farm down the road, called Mashpi Shungo. “Shungo” in the Kichwa language means “heart”. Mashpi Shungo is a small agro-forestry farm that specializes in one thing - chocolate and cacao cultivation. The warden of Mashpi Shungo, Alejo, showed us around the farm, taking us to different parts of the cultivated land, and demonstrating various steps in the chocolate-making process. We had a good time examining his fermentation fertilizer mixes, and he explained how he produces it, and how it nourishes the cacao crops as an organic substitute for harmful artificial products. He spoke at great length about the importance of sustainability, and Mashpi Shungo’s growth as an international distributor of authentic chocolate. We also discussed several ethical issues that currently afflict the global cacao supply, including child labor, exploitation and inferior produce. He explained his role as an ethical producer and chocolatier, and how he caters to particular markets in countries all around the world.

Then was the most exciting part - tasting the Chocolate! Alejo guided us through 3 distinct chocolates, each symbolic of a part of the Andean Choco that Mashpi embodied. We tried chocolate infused with calamondin (a miniature lemon-like citrus.), chocolate mixed with sea-salt and endemic cardamom and lastly a chocolate ganache made with a puree of Cacao fruit pulp, which was quickly the class’s favorite.

Certainly, we couldn’t leave without snagging a few bars for ourselves from Alejo’s wide variety of options and inventions. After that, we walked back towards the restaurant down the road to get dinner, and we turned into our cabins early. Today was our last full day at the Mashpi Farms, and our time here was enlightening and educational.

Photo: end of the Mashpi Shungo tour

Written by Vicky Liu

Today is our last day in Ecuador before going back home. This morning, we work up at the early time of 6:30 in order to get breakfast. The worst part was that the girls had to wake up earlier since the restaurant is closer to the boy's place. For breakfast included a bowl of fruit, eggs, and tortilla made of yucca and filled of cheese. After breakfast, we headed back to Pambiliño to learn about non-conventional food plants with Nina. In class the semester before, my group was assigned to the topic of non-conventional food plants, so the class was somewhat familiar to the topic. Within the presentation, we learn a lot more about non-conventional food plants including: what plants are non-conventional, use of the plants, benefits of the plants, and example of plants.

Photo: set of non-conventional food plants (Vicky Liu)

After the non-conventional food plants presentations, we started help cook the plants that we just learn about. We split up into different sections to prepare the meal. I was assigned to the help with the tempera/frying station. I first started with cleaning the lambskin leaf which is a common weed that is found within the US. Afterwards, I prepared the buds from the flower of a native banana plant in Ecuador. Following that, I was able to help tempera the lambskin leaf which is a common weed that is found within the US. Afterwards, I prepared the buds from the flower of a native banana plant in Ecuador. Following that, I was able to help tempera the lambskin leaf and fry the buds of the flower. When everything is finishing cooking, we gather around shared what we made and the process. After that we got our plate, keeping in mind not to waste food.

Photo: lunch prepared by students and the Pambiliño team

Written by Ricky Kim

Coming soon!