Dave and Jennifer Sutherland

Family Photo Gallery
2008, back at the Darwin Station after 14 years. The same tortoises were still there. 2004, in Otavalo, Ana's home town on the Ecuadorian mainland. When we went to a store to buy her a traditional blouse, the lady got so excited to dress up an adopted Otavaleña that she called in her aunt from another store, and they pulled pieces off the racks until Ana was dressed in the complete outfit. She looked like she could have been from their family!

2004, Diana was a young Ecuadorian woman who had a stall at the Otavalo market. Dave started talking to her, and when she heard the Ana adoption story, she wanted a picture with us, which we emailed down to her later.

 2004, Ana (Age 11) gets acquainted with Tommy the llama on an Andean farm. Tommy's sister was named Dalai.

 
Ana on the summer swim team a few years ago. 2002 (Age 9) Ana camping at Canyonlands in Utah, OHHHHHHHHHHM!

Jen in May, 2008, at Ana's Quinceañera party.

Right: 2004, Ana holds a baby sea turtle in Oaxaca, Mexico. Love those corn rows!

Every Halloween, the Open Space department hosts an event called "DeHaunting Wild Things." Basically, it's like an un-spook house where kids (and hopefully their parents!) learn not to be afraid of animals that give most people the creeps: spiders, snakes, mountain lions, bats, etc. Dave does the station about bones. How do you teach comparative skull anatomy in a way that's memorable? Dave becomes "Mr. Bones." OK, maybe it is a little spooky. But he always hands out chocolate eyeballs at the end, to chase away the jitters.

As part of his mid-life crisis, Dave is worried that he is becoming too conventional.

Right: Dave leading a nature hike about prairie dogs.

 

In summer 2008, Dave climbed the Third Flatiron, a tall rock cliff that is the signature of Boulder. OK, it's the easiest multi-pitch climb in the solar system. But hey.

2008: Backpacking in the Maroon Bells Wilderness in central Colorado.

 October 1994: Dave and Jen return to the USA with Ana, who was 17 months old. No, we won't add a cliche here about how they grow up so fast.
Orion helps decorate the Christmas tree. Orion and Cacique raised a clutch of chicks in a nest box, so we got to watch the baby parakeets grow up. Cacique died suddenly as the chicks fledged, so we decided we just had to keep all the chicks. There's also a parrot, guinea pigs, a snail, a salamander and hermit crabs. Perhaps we are a bit pet-crazy Summer 2008: A relaxing moment with Luna, Penny and Calypso.
Ana in Costa Rica in 1999 (age 6) Ana and Jennifer in the Indian Peaks Wilderness, 1997.

 

So the last time we were in Ecuador, we stayed in a rainforest town called Mindo. Our "hotel" was on the wrong side of the river from the road, so we had to ride a "tarabita," a little rope cable car, back and forth over the river.

There is nothing like the tropical rainforest.

Dave in the Peace Corps (1985) with a group of fish farmers in rural Honduras. Dave had ridden 2 hours on a little red motorcycle through the rain, and was soaked to the skin. Ana and her friend Ani sniff a cattail.