Just a quick one this time. Currently in Pisco - it´s a bit of a strange town. They had an earthquake last August and the town is in a pretty bad state of repair. There are so many buildings still not rebuilt and so many poor people around. Quite an eye opener. After studying so many earthquakes at uni to actually see the impacts of one is pretty interesting. The town looks very dusty and brown and there´s hardly any colour to it anywhere. Lots of buildings with the sides missing and some repairs going on. It must be hard living [View Full Entry]

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Sun 4th May We´re in Peru, but we´re not really officially here. We haven´t had our passports stamped. We left Ecuador and have now disappeared. We met our new guide who hadn´t realised we hadn´t had our passports stamped and it was only about 40 minutes into the bus journey to Mancora that he noticed. Hopefully we´ll go back in a day or two or we´ll have trouble trying to get in to Bolivia!! Our first experience of Peru was heat, dust and brown earth. So different here to the lush greens of Ecuador. We´re in a coastal town called Mancora [View Full Entry]

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We seem to spend alot of time on buses. We had a 7 hour journey to get to Cuenca and headed back up to 2,800m so almost the same as Quito. The coach journey was an experience to say the least. These were the worst roads yet. Sorry to go on about the roads but they have to be seen to be believed. And the drivers too! Ecuadorian roads = potholes, mudslides, collapsing roads, rocks on the roads, no visibility due to cloud cover, overtaking on bends and at the middle of a hill so not seeing what´s coming, overtaking in [View Full Entry]

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We arrived in Banos after another 5 hour bus journey. This time in a private bus. Our guide decided that it was easier with 16 people to go privately rather than losing some of us on the way. More incredible scenery - very difficult to do it justice. More horrendous roads too. Rocks from landslides on the roads, overtaking with little or no visibility due to the cloud cover but exciting nonetheless! Banos is a lovely little town. Great friendly feel to it. Overlooked by the Tungarahua volcano that was bellowing out smoke. Currently the town is on yellow alert - [View Full Entry]

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First of all - apologies for not writing sooner - first time I´ve had for ages to get to a computer. Will try to get up to date. Spent a lovely couple of days in Cotacocha Lodge and the Ecuadorian jungle. It wasn't exactly what I expected as the jungle wasn't quite as wild as I would have hoped. It was still pretty humid and the temperature made a change from Quito - it was actually warm! The sun shone for most of the time we were there too which was great. We had a 5.5 hour bus journey to get [View Full Entry]

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Hola Amigos! I arrived in Quito (after about 15 hours of travel) to a grey but warm day so a bit like the UK. Found my hotel ok and met up with the group. I'm the only English girl. Everyone else is either australian, kiwi or from Hong Kong. We had a group meeting pretty much as soon as I arrived and then headed off for some food - to an indian restaurant of all places! I think I was up for at least 24 hours so was intending on having a good sleep that night, but we got up at [View Full Entry]

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