The High Life

Quito, 2850 metres above sea level and boy don't I know it. After our first happy evening at the Secret Garden drinking and eating on the roof top, surrounded by an astonishing view of snow capped mountains, thousands of little colonial buildings clinging to steep hills all watched over by the benevolent gaze of the virgin of quito who sits on a narrow but steep mountain in the city wearing a crown of stars, eagles wings and holding a dragon on a chain. The city sits in a bowl created by the surrounding peaks.

After dinner we race off to bed keen to sleep off the last three days travelling. Within two hours we wake up, I feel like I have been run over by a truck which has then backed over me a couple times more for good measure. My hands are numb and it feels like someone has stabbed me in the head with a knitting needle. Ed isn't fairing much better, he's waxy and pale holding his head before disapearing to the toilet for a vomit session. I lie in bed shivering then sweating then shivering again. We are a tragic pair and the dance between the bathroom, the bed and some pitiful whimpering (on my part anyway) continues through the long dark night and into the majority of the day.

Today things are better, though I still feel like an 80 year old woman with asthama when walk too quickly up a hill. People tell me things will improve after a couple of days. God knows what it must be like at 4000 or even 5000 metres. Personally, I think I was designed for a life at sea level.