If there’s one thing you all know about me, it’s that I like making friends. I’m intentional about this and as I move through the world, I work at building connections with others, especially women. From these relationships, I learn about myself, my constructs, their culture, and different perspectives, which helps me to integrate, grow as a person and experience the world more fully. These friends are really important to me and that’s why I return to some countries again and again.

Over the years, in this blog, I’ve featured many of these women friends, telling their stories or sharing an experience we had together. Leticia, or Leti as I call her, is one of these women. I hired her to be my Spanish Teacher when I first arrived in Ibarra, Ecuador, and we’re still very good friends today. I really value our conversations and our time together, always laughing!

This year on my visit to Ecuador, I was thinking a lot about revisiting one of my favorite places, El Rosal, in the Intag Valley. El Rosal is a community-based farm stay that promotes ecological tourism and the empowerment of their citizens through collective economic enterprises. Many women of the community work together to cultivate aloe vera and develop natural aloe-based cosmetics, while the men of the community cultivate coffee to sell to Café Intag. I’ve been to El Rosal a couple of times on my own and with my family visiting from the States, and written about those experiences here:

El Rosal and the Heart of Intag Valley

Visiting El Rosal – a Community Cooperative in the Intag Valley

This year, when I heard that Leti had never been to El Rosal before, I invited her to share a weekend adventure with me.

She loved the experience! So, I asked her to use her voice and write this blog post for me. Below is her description of our weekend together, in Spanish. If you don’t read Spanish, lucky for you, there’s a semblance of what she says below. Some words just don’t translate, but you’ll get the idea.

Enjoy!

Mi Fin de Semana en “El Rosal”

Siempre es un gusto compartir tiempo con mi buena amiga Becky, esta vez fuimos a la finca Agroecológica el Rosal que está en Intag.

Yo vivo en Ibarra, primero tuvimos que viajar a Otavalo para comprar nuestros boletos a García Moreno. Viajamos más o menos tres horas y media y llegamos a García Moreno, luego contratamos una camioneta para que nos lleve a la finca. Desde el camino ya se puede observar la diversidad de flora del lugar, al llegar es impresionante ver la cantidad de plantas con flores de muchas formas y colores.

Nos recibió con una hermosa sonrisa Germania, la propietaria de ese precioso lugar, descansamos un poco y luego Ramiro nos llevó a recorrer la finca donde vimos la plantación de café, de yuca, de maíz, los árboles de arazá, borojó, naranjas, guabas, aguacates y muchos más, y por primera vez conocí el árbol de sangre de drago, la sangre de drago en Ecuador se usa como medicina. 

Fue fascinante aprender sobre todo el proceso del café…

 

…y hacer pan de yuca sin horno y más.

No pudimos ver cómo se hace el jabón de sábila, pero pudimos comprar.

Agradezco a todas las personas que nos recibieron con calidad y calidez e hicieron que esta visita sea una experiencia maravillosa.

Es un lugar hermoso, lejos del ruido y cerca de la tranquilidad.

Siempre pienso que cuando la naturaleza se viste de verde es hermosa.

My Weekend in “El Rosal”

It is always a pleasure to share time with my good friend Becky, this time we went to the Agroecológica el Rosal farm that is in Intag Valley.

I live in Ibarra, so first we had to travel to Otavalo to buy our tickets onward to García Moreno. We traveled about three and a half hours and arrived at García Moreno, then we hired a truck to take us to the farm. From the road I could see the diversity of flora in this place and upon arrival it was impressive to see the amount of plants with flowers of many shapes and colors.

Germania, the owner of that beautiful place, welcomed us with a beautiful smile. We rested a little and then Ramiro, her husband, took us on a tour of the farm where we saw the plantation of coffee, cassava (yuca), corn, arazá trees, borojó, oranges, guabas, avocados and so much more. For the first time, I saw the tree called “Blood of Drago”! The Blood of Drago in Ecuador is used as medicine.

It was fascinating to learn about the whole coffee process, making yuca bread over a fire without an oven, and more. We didn’t get to see how aloe soap is made, but we were able to buy it.

I thank all the people who welcomed us with quality and warmth and made this visit a wonderful experience.

It is a beautiful place, away from the noise and close to the tranquility.

I always think that when nature dresses in green, it is beautiful.

Thank you my friend Leti, for expressing it all so beautifully.