RoscoRoundtheworld

I eventually left Quito and got myself on a bus to Banos. It is situated 3 and a half hours south of Quito and is one of the most popular tourist destinations in Ecuador. One of the interesting facts about Banos is that is has an active volcano right on its door step called ‘Tungurahua’ which means ‘Throat of fire’, the last major eruption was in October 1999 but has had activity ever since so makes it a pretty interesting place to be. Seeing as Banos is a popular tourist place as you would expect there are a lot of tour agencies around as well as numerous souvenir shops but there are still a lot of locals around too! There are also tons of hotel’s and hostel’s so was tough to know where to go, in ... read more

It’s now Monday and my first day at Spanish School. I signed up to a School called ‘Galapagos Spanish School’ it’s a well organised and friendly place with a little adorable dog called Bobby...who is now my best mate! I moved hostel the previous day to a place called Casa Bamu which has great views of the city from the terrace and also has nice comfy beds...but the walk up the hill to get to the place is a bit of a struggle ha. I met my teacher Rosita who is a very nice local lady and we got started on the classes, they are 4hrs a day and the majority of that is talking which is good as that is the hardest part for me when it comes to Spanish. My classes seemed to time ... read more

I had a nice surprise on my bus to Cali as the company I went with had wifi on the bus and also a TV at the back of each seat, there were a lot of movies to choose from as well as music....the only problem was that everything was in Spanish and with no subtitles so was a bit of a struggle to watch a film. I made it to Cali around 8am and got a taxi to my hostel. I thought this would be straight forward but it definitely wasn’t, I gave the driver a copy of the address and he seemed to know where it was. After around 20mins driving we were in a really dodgy looking area and I started wondering what type of place I would be staying in. He couldn’t ... read more

Salento was next up after Medellin and with it being Easter a lot of Colombians were making their way to the same place as us which made for some traffic troubles. The weather had also took a turn for the worse and there was a massive storm going on with torrential rain, we arrived in Salento 9hrs after leaving Medellin due to a change in Armenia and also the traffic coming into Salento. After grabbing our bags myself and Jack asked the driver where the taxis are and his response was there are none and laughed so we had to navigate ourselves around although it’s not a big town. We did find the hostel but the owner said they were full and they had moved us to another called Plantation House so we made our way ... read more

After returning from the impressive Tayrona National Park we checked back into the hostel we were previously at in Taganga. Since the previous visit to Taganga I had been considering doing my PADI Open Water diving course, I knew that it would be my last opportunity for a while to be able to do it and especially at a low price so I decided to go for it. I did a bit of research and asked around a bit and found out that Aquantis Dive Centre seemed to be the best bet. I went in and booked for the next day...the course takes 3 days to complete and that varies from place to place as I know some people who have done it over more days. I had to watch a 3hr to video to begin ... read more