pictures from el viaje de mi familia...

here are some pics from my parents and ginger's trip here abut a month or so ago.. sorry it's taken me so long for me to upload! lo siento..yo trato de hacer mucho mejor en el futuro!


my dad lead a study at a ch called el amor construye (the love he is building) and my mom translated. they both did an amazing job... i was real proud of my mama for stepping out of her comfort zone..


me gustaria casarme esta chica... : )


this was on monday night at english class.. we broke up into 5 groups and just spoke basic english with the youth. my dad and ginger did great! I'm pretty sure one guy gave ginger his number...hah!


this is at the entrance of my school where i studied spanish. this was the first day of my study at my school..


mi amigovia.. as they would call it here.. if you don't know what that means...sorry!


at the study.. we had 13 people show up! we had pizza at the end...


after the study we stopped by this little tienda and got some chocolate..nice break from the rain..


after the chocolate break we went to this indigenous market. en esta lugar es posible para regatear, pero con frecuencia yo no tenia exito!


on our way to quicentro mall to eat..


but first i had to get a haricut! for those that don't know, i made a "deal" with my little brother that i wouldn't cut my hair until i was conversational in spanish. i went almost 6 months without getting it cut!


all cleaned up.. i promise i really don't wear ARIZONA stuff often! i try to fit in as much as possible..

the best picture ever!

this is my little cousin robert.. aka bobby.. showing a little love to his older cousin while my fam was in disneyland during thanksgiving. i know i have a lot of pics to upload, but i had to put this one up first. Go Cats! (sorry, mom, mark, shelley, and ginger) i truly am a proud cousin... hah! (not really sure who that little kid beside him is..maybe some random kid who just wanted a hug or something..)

geocaching...

hey everyone! yeah i know, it's been awhile since i've posted. but i promise i will make up for the long absence. i have a lot of pictures to post (mainly from when my family was here about a month ago). before i start to post those, i wanted to post some pictures from when i went geocaching last friday. i've never been geocaching prior to last friday, so i was kinda skeptical about it. for those who don't know what it is, basically its a new "sport" in which you have a gps and you have coordinates of a hidden treasure (cache) and you punch in the coordinates and it leads you to the general area where the cache is...


our geocaching group..just about to head out..


on our way to our first cache...


still on our way. this was my partner, bob..a fellow m..


this is where our gps led us to the first cache.. needless to say we were unable to find it. i was a little bummed that we couldn't find it. call it pride, but i just wanted to say i found the first cache i tried to find!


on our way to the second cache...


we found it!


this is what the cahce looks like. inside there is a notebook to record your name, instructions on what to do once you find it, and usually some "swag" items (random things you can take, but your supposed to leave something if you take something).


another trail...


me!


group shot...

feliz cumpleanos!

i know its a little late... i love you guys! i wish i could have been there with you all this weekend to celebrate... miss you both..

Puerto Quito...

This is at puerto quito on our way back to quito... just thought i'd take a litle video and show you all a little more..

more pics from guayaquil...

these are from sunday again.. on our way home. last set of pics. I promise!


on our way home we stopped at this little watermelon tienda.. it was very good! muy jugoso!


this place really made me think of my mom and little brother luke because they both love watermelon..


this place also had lots of bananas as well.. this is Patricio, Ricardo, and our bus driver. (don't know his name)


dentro del bus!


this one is mainly for my boys overseas.. brought back a lot of memories! "that water is as cold as san franciso water!" this is at a place called Puerto Quito.. about 3 hours outside of Quito..


this is jose.. he is a really nice guy.. he's actually one of the few youth who went that I could always understand! he doesn't talk that fast..


another of me..i didn't realize those two guys were in the background!



some of the guys.. notice the guy in the red shorts giving the thumbs up.. everyone here does that! its really weird bc nobody really still does that back home.. unless your name is peyton..

guayaquil once more...

some more pictures! these are all from sunday, the day we left. we went to this area near the malecon to sightsee.. it was pretty cool. enjoy!


I'm really not sure what the name of this area is. but we had to walk up i think 530 stairs! and this was first thing in the morning, like around 7:00ish!


everyone walking up the stairs... this is right at the beginning, but im pretty sure everyone was already tired!


a view of guayaquil while ascending up the stairs...


another view...


this is for all my family..i had to take a picture with this cannon.. it reminded me being on mainstreet u.s.a. in disneyland! (this was on top of the place where we were climbing to)


also on top, there was this nice, but small catholic church..


inside the church...


we had a brief impromptu time of worship/devotional here.. it was amazing. Pastor Patricio read some scripture and we all sang "How Great Thou Art" and ""Because He Lives." it was in spanish, but i just sang along in english...but it was a powerful time of worship.


after singing we met these two jewish type ppl.. i say that bc they weren't exactly fully jewish. it was a weird encounter.. i couldn't really understand everything they were saying..


one more for mommy! (ginger, don't you love my hair?!)

more guayaquil...

i just felt compelled to take this random picture of this street.. this is near the malecon..


on saturday afternoon i went with patricio to this market place. there were so many things it was so crazy! he was looking for a gift for his kids.. it was fun watching him barter with ppl..


this is right outside where the conference was. this man made keychains with inscriptions on them.. here he is making me one for someone special..


there was a cultural night on saturday where every group was supposed to do something to represent their country.. our group decided to do a little drama. this is them practicing on the malecon.. they didn't get to finish because a police officer wasn't to happy we were there..


a parade honoring the fire department...(me and patricio)


at the conference.. an altar call..


this was during the cultural night.. not sure what group this was or where they were from, but they did this loooooooooong skit/play and apparently there was a witch in it. i couldn't really understand what they were saying, so i took a little snooze!


this picture is a little unclear, sorry. this is our group doing their drama thingy..


our group that came from the surrounding quito area..