St John

We visited St. John, USVI in November, 2010.  We stayed in an eco-friendly resort in Maho Bay.  The photo below has no particular story, it’s just a sunset as seen from the porch of our little cabin.

Scotland

We visited Scotland in July, 2011.  The biggest single reason was to visit Marguerite’s nephew Oliver, who was then a doctoral candidate specializing in mycology.  On the first day of our time with him, he took us on the most challenging and demanding hike we have ever taken together.  On the second day, the hike was one of our most memorable.

Oli lived on the essentially unoccupied side of Loch Maree, the fourth largest in Scotland.  On a perfect day for hiking, he took us straight up the mountain behind the estate where he was living.  One of many memorable views is shown below.  In addition to the majesty and bleakness of the image, I was struck by the fact that in the entire photo, I can find nothing that shows the hand of man.  From this distance, it appears to be untouched.

Costa Rica

Our second visit to Costa Rica was in October, 2012.  The first time we visited Volcan Arenal, it was very active, with some sort of visible activity every five or ten minutes.  On our most recent visit, it was utterly silent, with only a little steam and its iconic shape to announce that it is a volcano.  This photo was taken shortly after dawn.  It is the only time of the day that it is not at least partially blocked by clouds and mist.

Introduction

Welcome to Jeff and Marguerite Wilson In Ecuador.

This a blog by Jeff and Marguerite Wilson to record our experiences serving in the Peace Corps in Ecuador.  Since we have not been sent there yet, we will be using some postings from other places we have visited as examples of what we anticipate they will be like.  The first three sample postings all happen to be landscapes.  When get to the community we will be serving, we expect to publish posts about the people, wild animals, and the countryside.  We will also be commenting on our experiences, and all of the things we are learning.  We welcome your comments and questions.

At this point, we don't know what our internet access will be like.  If we don't have it where we are working, we have been told that every town of any size in Ecuador has an internet cafe.  So, we don't know how frequent or regular our postings will be.