Ecuadorian Equinox

It was another morning cappuccino at the Foundation for Understanding Nature in Bethseda, Maryland. I, Sue Fairview, looked down at the swirl of foam on my double and went off to look for Mr. Butterfly. I found him at his desk in his cubicle; we all have cubicles even though we have PhD’s. What ever happened to doors? I gave a gentle knock on his off white fuzzy fake wall. He was so engrossed at looking at the Lepidoptera on his desk; he didn’t even give me notice. I cleared my throat. Finally I had his attention.

“You want to grab a latte and go to the café?”

“Sure Sue!”

With that he stood and off we went towards the node, where the small coffee stand was. He bought his from the attendant, who had substituted a photo of Greta Garbo for her own on her photo ID without security noticing, and we found some seats in the airy atrium space.

“Gosh it has been so long since our trip to the Nile, what has it been, three months?”

He said “I think so. My luggage is feeling ignored. It has never been this long since between trips before.”

“What do you think is going on?”

“I don’t know. We keep running into trouble when they send us out. That could be it.”

“Yeah, I guess. In the Amazon, we both had a spot of trouble, in Iceland we ran into that nutcase who took me hostage, and then in Egypt, you know the harem thing.”

“I remember. But each time they send us out, we still come home with results. I mean in the Amazon, we came home with a possible cure for HIV, we did a great job in Iceland, and in Egypt, we verified the finding of a new water strider species. I’d say that is success. Wouldn’t you?”

“Yup! I don’t know what they are thinking. But, I think it has been long enough, and we should ask.”

“I agree!”

Just then, Dr. Gutekunde strode up and joined them. “Hey, how are my two favorite field scientists?”, he said, giving Mr. Butterfly a hard slap on the back.

“We were just wondering when we were going to see the field again.”, said Mr. Butterfly as he recovered from the slap. “And how are you Dr. Gutekunde? And how is our pet compound?”

“Ah, I am well thank you! Not to worry, you two will be back in the field before you know it! We have a special trip planned for both of you. But first and update on our compound. The scale up is going well and I don’t think the difficult synthesis step will be a problem. The safety studies were begun on time and should be completed in three months. No significant safety issues have been noted so far. Human protocols are written and we should be first in man by then. Try to think of name for it. So it is all good news for the compound.”

“That’s great Doc!”, I said.

Mr. Butterfly smiled and nodded. “Hmm. A name, I’ll have to think about that. ‘Mr. Butterfly’s HIV cure-all and lube’ How does that sound?”, he said jokingly.

“Very funny.” And I gave him a finger poke in the ribs.

“Ow!”, he said comically.

Dr. Gutekunde just smiled at our antics.

“Now,” he said, “for your next assignment. So, have you been studying up on new orchid species Dr. Fairview?”

“Why yes. Do you mean the ones in Papua New Guinea or the ones in Ecuador or the stinky feet ones in Yosemite?”

“Hmm. Actually I was referring to the ones in Ecuador. If I sent you to Papua New Guinea, you would never come back. They have 300 or so plants to go through over there. No, no, you guys are going to Ecuador!”

“Oh boy! I’m going to get to see Teagueia in their native habitat!”

“Yes, that’s true.”

“And me?”, said Mr. Butterfly.

“You my boy are going to get a look at the rare butterflies and moths of the cloud forests of the Andes. So pack your photographic equipment because you are going there too!”

“Oh boy!”, we said in unison.

* * *

Several days later, the trip was shaping up. Our flights were set with American Airlines from Baltimore to Atlanta to Quito and we would arrive in Quito in the morning the day after we left. Our team of nine in all would be assembled and ready to meet us at a small town near our base camp. Our native guide, Jose, would meet us at the airport.

So it was, that we would be in Quito, Ecuador on the Autumnal Equinox.

Ecuadorian Equinox, part 2

Our flight from Baltimore to Atlanta took off on time, but due to thunderstorms, we circled the airport endlessly and landed late. Mr. Butterfly and I had to run up our concourse to the moving walkway and then run on the moving walkway to our next concourse to make our flight to Quito, Ecuador. We arrived out of breath, but glad to make our flight. Finally seated, we looked at each other in triumph. The rest of the flight went without incident.

When we got close to Quito we began to look out the windows for the airport. Where was it?

Finally we saw it right before we landed on it.

Mr. Butterfly and I grabbed our carryon bags and waited for what seemed like forever to get off the huge plane and made our way through the airport to baggage claim. We waited for our bags and snagged them off the carousel and made our way to customs and immigration. Once clearing that, we made our way to ground transportation to meet José.

José

Fortunately, he was holding a sign with our names on it, so we located him easily. He was young, cute and cheerful. José was going to be our translator, guide, technician, mountain climber, security guard and porter on this trip. We had to assemble a team of people who could assume multiple responsibilities to cover our needs. José could speak the language and knew his way around the country, so we sent him for training in mountain climbing and the technical aspects of botanical collection to fully utilize him on our team. We did the same with other members as well. Mr. Butterfly and I had also gone for some training in mountain climbing at certain points in our field experiences.

“Buenos días Señor y la Señora! I am José. I am pleased to meet you.”

“It is so nice to meet you José! You can call me Sue and this is Mr. Butterfly.” We all shook hands.

“My truck is just outside. Let me grab your bags and take you for a quick tour of Quito. Then we will head for the base camp and try to make it there before nightfall.”

We followed him outside and there was an off-white Toyota Land Cruiser. We stowed our gear in the back, and we all sat up front on the bench seat. Off we went for our tour of Quito.

We saw the Plaza Grande,

The San Francisco Plaza and Church,

The Presidential Palace,

La Compania de Jesus which has more than 1 ton of gold in leaf and other decoration used in the interior,

And a typical street scene.

Then we began to drive northeast towards Baeza and our base camp in the Mindo cloud forest. Some of the roads through the Andes were quite narrow. I felt quite tired and asked if I could go lie down in the back seat. Of course the guys agreed, so we pulled off the road and I got in the back and curled up across the seats. Mr. Butterfly reclined in the front seat to try to catch a nap also. We trusted José to drive us there.

Now that there was no conversation, José began to think of his teenage love, Trella. Her skin was as soft as cream, not like the Señora, the medico Fairview. That was not to say that the Señora’s skin was not nice, it was just not as soft as cream, it was that of an adult. His Trella had a beautiful young, lithe body with small perky breasts capped by brown nipples, a small waist, and soft little buttocks. The Señora had a similar body, actually she was probably in better physical shape than Trella, but he was in love with Trella’s youth, soft skin, tenderness, and untouched nature and virginity. He was the only man that would ever have her. Could he say the same of the Señora? So, he could not think of the Señora in a sexual way. He was too busy thinking of Trella. Her long black tresses, her black eyes, her soft loving form; these are what made his little mushroom headed cock stand to attention in the middle of the night. He just couldn’t wait to finish this job and rush home to marry her and finally make love to her. He inhaled deeply. They had gotten pretty close already and she was enjoying their encounters. This job would earn him the money to make his dream come true. Now that he had the training that this job provided, he could earn a living as a travel guide in his country in either the city or the jungle. He was pretty much set for life. José was a happy young man; he had everything he required for his universe, even his star.

José photo credit: Brawny Stud

Ecuadorian Equinox, part 3

José

After many twists and turns on the Andean highway, José made a turn off onto a smaller road into the jungle. About 30 miles later, there was a post with a reflector shoved into the ground for the base camp dirt road and José followed it. Not far from there he parked at the large tent of base camp. The stopping of our Land Cruiser woke me up and Mr. Butterfly was also stirring.

“Are we there yet?”, jokingly asked the young explorer.

“Si Señor, we are there!”

I stretched my legs, which were a bit cramped from sleeping curled up in the back seat, and got out of the vehicle. Everyone got out. We headed for the tent and were greeted by a large soft spoken man. When we got close enough, he put his index finger across his lips to signal for quiet, and whispered to us, so as not to wake up those who were sleeping in the tent.

“Hi. My name is Peter Beck, but you can call me Pete. You must be Dr. Sue Fairview and…”

“Yes, let’s not stand on formalities Pete. You can call me Mr. Butterfly and call Dr. Fairview, Sue.”, whispered Mr. Butterfly cutting him off.

“Thanks. I’ve met José. We all shook hands. I don’t want to wake the others. Welcome to our little expedition. I am head of security and the boss of the men who will be your guides. If you have any questions, I’d be the guy you want to ask. Let me just review some basic stuff. Water, we have iodizing pills available in case you didn’t bring any. Food, we supply rice, the jungle supplies fruit and any meat or fish you can catch. Toilet, just make sure you pick a spot away from others. Bathing, there is a river not far from here that we all use.”

“I have a question.”

“Yes, Sue, go ahead.”

“I am ready to bathe naked if that is what everyone else is doing.”

“That’s great Sue. But, there are a few of the guys that might get the wrong idea from that. As it is, we are not all bathing naked now even though we are all men. So I suggest wearing a swim suit for now, at least with the big group. Okay? Sleeping, everyone uses sleeping bags. Look out for snakes, scorpions and bees. So, for tonight, just pick a spot on the floor of the tent and get some rest. You’ll meet everybody else in the morning. Can I help anybody with their stuff? No? Good night then.”

Then he turned around and walked back to where he was sitting guard. We went back to the truck and got our sleeping bags and brought them into the tent. The tent was big enough to walk into upright and it was filled with sleeping men. We picked out spots at the back that were empty and unrolled our bags. We stretched out on them and were asleep in no time lulled by the sounds of the jungle.

* * *

I awoke and the sun was already up. I sat up slowly, and looked around. All of the sleeping bags were empty except Mr. Butterfly’s. He was snoozing away.

“Wake up sleeping beauty.”, I said as I nudged him. He woke up and opened his big eyes to look at me.

“Where’s the fire?”

“Ha ha! Get up lazy bones! It’s time to make scientific history or meet your mystery date. I can’t remember which.” Then I smiled.

He had the grace to laugh.

“Christ, where the hell are we?”

“Some god forsaken jungle in some god forsaken country, that’s where.”

“Why ever did we come here?”

“For science.”

“Oh yeah, that.”

Then he slowly got up. We got into our swim suits; mine was a brand new Speedo Endurance Camouflage one piece.

Speedo Endurance Camouflage Swim Suit

We wandered out of the tent and made our morning ablutions in what we hoped was a remote enough spot. Then we headed back to base camp and met up with José, who was there to lead us to the river. The air was already warm like summer.

The river was not far and it was an easy hike. It seemed as if our site had been used before for a camp and the path to the river was worn in. We could even have gone bare foot, but we had our hiking boots on. The river was moving along pretty swiftly, it would have been great for tubing, and had a stony bottom. It was maybe three feet deep in the middle and all of the men were in it bathing. We took off our boots and joined them immediately.

Introductions ensued.

We met Chuck, who was bathing naked. He was slender and muscled with brown hair and hazel eyes. His dick was average and cut. He was a bit too friendly with me. He might have been one of the men that Pete was warning me about.

Chuck

Austin was next. He was bathing in Marine Corps issue nylon shorts. He was muscular and business like and still wearing his dog tags.

Austin

Marine Corps issue nylon shorts

Dr. William Brandtley III bathed in top of the line racing Speedos made with Aquablade fabric (guaranteed to slice through the water). He was the orchid specialist heading the expedition and would brief me later. Blond with blue eyes, he was also muscular. He seemed a bit uptight. Maybe it was because he was nearly naked.

Dr. William Brandtley III

Pricey Speedos

Also bathing in the nude was Oscar. Oscar was hung and uncut. He wasn’t as well endowed as Volchuk though, but still I thought Mr. Butterfly’s eyes would fall out of his head. He also had brown curly hair and brown eyes and was really cute. Oscar was the other native guide, but had lived in California for a while. So he spoke both English and Spanish easily.

Oscar

The other lepidopterist was Dr. Allen Wise. He was wearing an Aussiebum Wonderjock in ice blue and was just really open and friendly. He had light brown hair and eyes and was really magnetic. What a casual ease he had about him. I got the feeling that Mr. Butterfly was going to have a good time on this trip.

Dr. Allen Wise

Aussiebum Wonderjock in Iceblue

Pete was also there. In daylight I could see that he was older, hugely muscular and had buzzed brown hair with steely blue eyes and a salt and pepper beard. He was also wearing Marine issue shorts, just like Austin’s.

Pete

He came over to check with us and see how we were doing. We said we were fine and thanked him for asking. We then continued our chat with Allen and William.

After our swim and bath, everyone gathered water from the river to iodize for drinking and cooking and headed back to the tent. Apparently, Oscar had caught some fish earlier and grabbed those for our breakfast. There were passion fruit back at the tent. The only thing missing was coffee. Coffee made with iodized water. I wonder how that would taste?

Photo credits: José, Chuck, Austin, Pete, William from Brawny Stud Allen & Oscar from So Slowly

Ecuadorian Equinox, part 4

During the walk back to the tent, everybody had their own thoughts.

Dr. William Brandtley the third was consumed by the thought the Dr. Sue Fairview was certainly his type. Petite, cute and dirty blonde, it only remained to be seen if she was smart and could be presentable in company. Perhaps she would even be pretty if she was dressed up and wore make up. He would seduce her on this trip and then bring her home to see if she could make it in his world. His world was one of money; that meant big money. He had been searching for a mate for some time. This expedition was going to be the one where he could find his perfect match. That meant not only a female, but one who specialized in orchids, just as he did. He didn’t care if she had some mileage on her. Well, that wasn’t really true. He cared, but that had to be put up with in these modern times. Times when one could count on getting a virgin who would be all that one wanted in a mate were sadly over. Dr. Fairview was the one. She was his perfect match. He had to have her. He just had to make her see things his way. He would start his plan during the briefing on orchids.

Dr. Allen Wise thought Mr. Butterfly was very attractive. What a hottie! But unfortunately, his former lover had committed suicide and he was not over it yet. Even though it had been well over a year ago and his therapist told him it was time for him to have a fling or even a romance. But he was hesitant. He couldn’t help feeling that he was the cause of his lover’s death, even though drugs had been involved. If he allowed himself to love again, would that person kill himself too? He knew that it was irrational to think that way and took the time to know it and hear himself think it. Instead, he focused on how alluring Mr. Butterfly was. They were going to be in the field together for some time. Who knew what could happen. They were both lepidopterists too! How exciting that was! He actually felt his groin give a little stirring and he smiled. Yup, there was life there still.

Chuck lusted for Sue. He knew he had to hit that piece of ass. She was his only chance to get laid here since Pete said that the local ass was off limits. Native girls could cry rape and make life difficult for an American. He didn’t need that shit. And what an ass Sue had! Man, spectacular was an understatement! He was lucky he didn’t get aroused back in the river. Fuck! What he wouldn’t do to get close to her. Phew! He hoped he would get assigned to her group to go out and look for whatever damn flowers they were there to find. Then there would be only one other guy. So she was a bit older. That sure didn’t matter. Fuck. He had seen her in her Speedo. Ugh, for crying out loud, she was so fucking hot. Her body was hotter than many twenty somethings he had seen. God he just wanted to boff her until she screamed for mercy. So her tits weren’t that big. He wanted to impale her on his dick from behind and pump her until she couldn’t walk right. Think of what her ass would look like then. But then his penis began to get aroused for real and he had to control his thoughts. He thought about how he wasn’t allowed to smoke cigs or drink beer on this trip and how that really sucked to get control of his meat.

Austin was frustrated. This trip took him away from his fiancée. He was doing it as a favor to his old buddy Pete before he got married to make money to afford the honeymoon trip to Barbados. His thoughts were with Diane. His beautiful Diane. She had red hair, green eyes and a bountiful body and was prom queen in their senior year. They were childhood sweethearts and true to each other since forever. This was going to be his last mission period. End of story. This was the last of his being a mercenary with Pete. Complete this mission. Go home to Diane. Get hitched. Go on his honeymoon. His job running a local security firm was waiting for him at home in Texas. That was his agenda. He thought wistfully of his Diane bouncing up and down on his cock while they made love; her huge soft tits swaying this way and that. She would throw her head back in ecstasy. But he had to keep his mind on this fucking job in this jungle hell hole. At least people weren’t shooting at them.

Oscar thought that Mr. Butterfly was adorable and so was Dr. Wise. He thought a threesome would be fabulous. But he was game for anything. All of the male members of the expedition we certainly doable and that fed his fantasy of doing a straight man. That was what really gave him a chub. He enjoyed seeing Chuck in his altogether; his butt looked good enough to eat that was for sure! He certainly had nothing to hide and had demonstrated that during the river bath. He was just happy to be here on the expedition to make some money, help out, whatever. These were nice well meaning people, here to study the environment, not hurt it. He was all for that. So, whatever happened was okay with Oscar.

Pete was hoping that the expedition met with no trouble. Ecuador was basically a safe place; the safest he had been to in a while. There were bandits, but attacks were rare, and this is why they had security. There were poisonous snakes, scorpions and such, but these were also rare and they were prepared for them. He had certainly taken all precautions for the expedition team. He was trying very hard not to have distracting thoughts, like about how cute that Dr. Fairview looked in her camo Speedo. Mmm. What he could do to her. FOCUS! He tried very hard to get his mind back on the mission. In true Marine fashion, he succeeded.

Photo credits: Chuck, Austin, Pete, William from Brawny Stud Allen & Oscar from So Slowly

Ecuadorian Equinox, part 5

I thought to myself that all these guys were pretty hot, but too young for me, except for Pete. But he was so brusque and business like, there was no way he was interested in me. Bill, excuse me, William, as he had told me he preferred to be called, struck me as kind of stuffy, but closer to me in age. So I would wait and see how that turned out. Mr. Butterfly kept his thoughts to himself as we walked back to base camp.

When we got there, breakfast was about ready as José had gone ahead and cooked everything. There was rice, as promised, the fish that Oscar had caught, and some fresh passion fruit that the rain forest had provided and the men had gathered.

There was also coffee. I was hungry. The fresh fruit was amazing and the fish was great. Rice at breakfast was going to take some getting used to, as was coffee made with iodized water. Ugh. We all cleared our own dishes, which were part of our own camp sets. Then, Pete began to draw our attention for our first briefing.

“Let me explain the setup of our organization to you.” said Pete. “We have four PhD.’s with us. They are Dr. Allen Wise and Mr. Butterfly who are Lepidopterists, and Dr. William Brandtley III and Dr. Sue Fairview who are Orchid specialists. We have two local guides. They are José and Oscar. They both speak English and Spanish and are trained in city touring, rainforest camping, cloud forest camping, mountaineering, rock climbing, gun handling, first aid, and they know their way around this area. We have three security specialists. They are all ex-Marines. They are Austin, Chuck and me. We will provide security for your trip. Ecuador is a pretty safe place, but there can be bandits and we will be carrying machine guns since this is what we would expect that they will have. Everyone is trained to help you with technical aspects of collection.

“We are going to break into three groups. The first group will contain Allen and Mr. Butterfly and me. We will remain in this rainforest looking for rare or new species of butterflies and moths. I will provide security. No guide will be needed since Allen was also here last year and speaks fluent Spanish. The second group will contain William, Austin and José and the third group will contain Sue, Chuck and Oscar. The two latter groups will climb to the cloud forests to collect orchid species and William and Sue will give you your briefings on that. We will now split into butterfly and orchid groups for those briefings. Thank you!”

Then Pete stepped aside and we broke into two groups. The butterfly group of three went outside and the orchid group stayed inside the tent.

William began our briefing to Oscar, Chuck, José and Austin.

“Our goal is to find out if any orchids of the genus Teaguiea exist on the mountains 3000 m above us and more importantly to find new species, and collect them to bring back to our greenhouses. I know that all you are already briefed on climbing in cloud forests at these altitudes and our guides actually have experience at this. I am here to tell you about these orchids so that you may help Sue and I collect them. We will be splitting up to maximize our coverage of the mountains above us. Much of this work has been done by Lou Jost. He first discovered the genus Teagueia in 1990 at 3400 m growing in some moss on a mountain called Mayordomo. Here is a slide showing that mountain.

“Teagueia have also been found on Cerro Negro, a nearby mountain. The next slide here shows a space shuttle image of the area that Lou Jost studied and the following slide is a blow up that includes the area that we are now in.

“You can see that we have areas of the Andes Mountains with cloud forests that are the same altitudes that he is at. Thus we hope that we may find the same orchids here.

“Teagueia are smallish creeping orchids and have broad sepals without tails that grow above the tree line. We have slides, since you may not be familiar with the terminology. This next slide shows what a Teagueia plant looks like when it is fully teased out of the moss it grows in. Please note that the ruler next to it is in centimetres, not inches, so they are pretty small.

“The next two slides show what Teagueia looks like growing in moss both in flower and not in flower. This is what you will be looking for.

“This slide shows thirteen of the newer Teagueia species in flower to scale.

“Sue will have a copy of this slide with her and so will I. But basically we will recognize a new one. There are currently a total of 32 known Teagueia species.

“However, if you see any orchids in bloom, please point them out to either Sue or myself. We will tell you what they are and if they are of interest to us. Over time you will learn what interests us or not. Are there any questions?

“Okay then. Let’s get ready to go.”

William then walked over to me and put his hand on my shoulder and said “Gee, Sue, I’m sorry; I forgot to ask you if you had anything to say.”

“That’s okay William, you covered everything just fine.” I replied feeling that I didn’t really like his hand on my shoulder. So, I said “Excuse me but I really must pack for the journey now.”, and then began to move away to begin to roll up my sleeping bag. He reluctantly dropped his hand off my shoulder. Thank god! I had said it with a big smile to make him feel a bit better about the whole thing. He looked a bit crestfallen though as if I had spoiled some master plan or something.

Soon enough, Mr. Butterfly came in to grab his camera, butterfly net, and some water. He was all excited because he and Allen were going out on their first butterfly hunt together.

About a fifteen minutes later the two orchid groups were assembled outside and ready for departure, and it was only 9:00 a.m.. José led William and Austin south to the mountains. I said my farewells to Mr. Butterfly, and then Oscar led Chuck and me north up into the mountains and the cloud forest beyond.

Ecuadorian Equinox, part 6

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