Nach meinen 4 Wochen Freiwilligendienst im Amazonas, bin ich zurück nach Quito gefahren und, natürlich, ging ich wieder ins Casa Urbana Hostel, das mehr wie ein zu Hause für mich war als ein Hostel. Ich habe mich sehr gefreut, die super nette Besitzerin, Carolina, und Jamshid, den Freiwilligen aus Usbekistan, wiederzusehen! :-) Zum Glück war meine Freundin Elena aus der Schweiz (die ich in Minca in Kolumbien kennengelernt hatte) auch in Quito und so schafften wir es am nächsten Tag endlich uns wiederzusehen. Wir haben uns erst im Juan Valdez Café getroffen (mein Lieblingscafé, eine Art südamerikanischer Starbucks – gleiche Preise...), wo ich den Morgen damit verbracht hatte an meinem Blog zu arbeiten. Dann sind wir zusammen Mittagessen gegangen ; wir sind zu einem Platz in der Nähe vom Plaza Foch gegangen (Café Galeria oder sowas) ... read more

Have you ever lived in a place with candles, gas and headlights instead of electricity? Did you ever have to shake out your clothes before putting them on to make sure there is no scorpion sleeping inside? Did you ever have to wash dishes and clothes by hand in the river next door, brush your teeth, take a bath and drink this water there as well? Well, that’s basically the description of the living conditions in the Selva Vida project in Ecuador where I worked for 4 weeks as a volunteer. Living in the tropical rainforest - called Amazonas - in Ecuador was quite different from what I had imagined. What would you have imagined ? Little villages with people still dressed in traditional clothes, shamans, lots of exotic, wild and dangerous animals, dirty and dangerous ... read more

César, the leader of Selva Vida, the project where I volunteered in in Ecuador, had been telling us a lot about the different national parks in the Amazonas of Ecuador. Having been a bit disappointed about not seeing many animals where we lived, I was very eager to go there. Fortunately I wasn’t the only one feeling this way ; when I told Maja that it would be nice to go to Yasuní together with César as a guide, maybe at the end of their stay in Selva Vida, she was very excited about it and talked to Jacob and César about it. César had been a tour guide in Baños and in the national parks before starting his project and he was excited about doing this tour with us, especially with Maja and Jacob, and ... read more

After our train ride, Sanne, Soya and I left Alausi at 11:30AM and we arrived to Cuenca around 4PM. There we said goodbye to Soya and we were not very keen on seeing her again. She had been pretty annoying that night and morning in the dorm, making a lot of noise and waking up everybody and, honestly, she was a bit weird. Our hostel, the Bauhouse hostel, was ok but not the best. Doors, beds and floors made a lot of noise, breakfast wasn’t good and way too expensive, there were no power plugs for the upper beds on the bunkbeds and the hostel was very cold (not just the temperature, also the atmosphere). The staff was super friendly, but not very knowledgeable about the different activities or the area. Our first evening in Cuenca ... read more

After finishing the Quilotoa loop, I went from Quilotoa to Latacunga and from there to Baños. The bus ride from Quilotoa to Latacunga is about 2 hours (2$) and it’s 3 hours (4$) from Latacunga to Baños (you have to change buses in Ambato). In the first bus, I met Shane from Australia. I had seen him earlier in my hostel in Isinlivi and a few times during the hike, but we had never really talked before. He’s a very nice guy (around his 40s or 50s I guess) and he has been to almost every country in the world, except for South America. He was also going to Baños, even to the same hostel as me, so we decided to travel together. In Latacunga we went to pick up our luggage and on the way ... read more