Ecuador Rain Forest

Jan has told the story of our trip through the Pastaza gorge, and I have been handed off the baton for the next leg of the relay.
The city of Shell marks the end of the gorge and the beginning of the rain forest floor. Shell is also the location of the HCJB jungle hospital and airstrip where Nate Saint operated the mission plane in the 1950s. You may remember that he and Jim Elliot and three others were killed by the Auca Indians, now called the Wowari. The river they were killed on runs parallel (15 miles south) with the river we traveled alongside of as we left the main road after Puyo to visit a remote village. We traveled with Rosa, one of the national community and church leaders. The native Quichua name of the village is pretty much unpronounceable for us, but most people simply refer to it as Milepost 28, designating its distance from the start of the road. They wanted to talk with us about their church structure, but also show us their project of cocoa plant production (picture below with cocoa plants and Rosa).
When we arrived at the village we were met by many, many people--the majority of them being children. We discovered that the church has 72 adult members, but over 140 children. They sang for us and fed us fresh oranges and pineapple, and then wanted to talk about their church. It was, to say the least, too grand of a design for their numbers and their location (see picture below). We felt very bad telling them we could not help them finish such a building because of it's overall structural unworthiness, but that is exactly what we had to finally say. They have been working on it for 8 years, but will now be considering a different plan that we'll help them with, hopefully incorporating some of the present structure.
After leaving them we journeyed on to the Orchids Paradise lodge, where we spent the night. It was good for Barb and I to once again be sleeping with jungle sounds and smells, and the rest of the party seemed to sleep very well also. We started today with a great breakfast at the lodge, during which a monkey snuck up to our table and snatched Ray Van Drie's bun off his plate. Then we enjoyed sharing a surprise birthday cake (pineapple upside-down variety) with Jan Van Drie before we got back into the bus for our four hour ride back Quito.
On the way to Quito we took a couple of hours and enjoyed the thermal pools at Papallacta, arriving in the Capitol again around 6pm. Our wonderful bus driver then offered to take us on a bus tour of Quito Old Town, and Rob and Betty Wood shared much of the history and stories about it.
We are now almost ready for bed once again, but did want to get you caught up on the past few days when we did not have Internet connections. Tomorrow, our last day, we are hoping to visit two more churches/projects, and actually go to the gps equator to visit the museum there and have our lunch at he center of the earth. That, by the way, is what "Quito" means in the Cechua language--"the center of the earth". More later... Thanks again for all your prayers.