North of Cuenca

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Well, we've headed north, and have arrived in Banos, Ecuador, where we've been staying for the last three nights. I will be able to write more later. Take care, everyone. Love, all.

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Photos

The Cajas
Here is the view of a small lake, near the bunkhouse that we stayed in while hiking through the Cajas National Park.

The Cajas
Un otro foto de las cajas.

The Cajas
Un otro foto de las cajas tambien.

The Cajas
On one of our hikes, we had to climb through a forest. The trees, called 'paper trees', have peeling, paper-like bark, some of which are a thousand years old. They are beautiful.

The Cajas
One of the numerous scratchy prickly plants (cacti?) found all over the grassy ground at the Cajas. This one is a particularly big buggar.

The Cajas
Close-up of one of the paper trees, or Quinuas.

Riobamba
We went on a train ride (well, you sit on the top of the train, with hundreds of other gringos, and get to peacefully watch the Ecuadorian countryside roll by)in Riobamba. I met this woman at one of the stops we made to take on more passengers a few hours into the ride.

Riobamba
A truck filled with kids racing with the train as we passed through a small, country town. Across the street, school children come racing out of their classrooms and scream, hoping that the train passengers will throw candy to them.

Riobamba
Ecuador's rolling countryside.

Banos
Whilst in Banos, we took a bike ride north through the Andes on a road that passes a number of Ecuador's most popular waterfalls. Here we are on a rickety bridge (that is only supposed to have 5 people on it at a time because it's wicked old) next to the biggest waterfall in Ecuador.

Banos
The waterfall.

Banos
One of the views from our bike ride.

Banos
We took a walk above Banos, through the Cloud Forest, an entrance to Ecuador's jungle. Here are some pictures of the critters and wildlife we saw. This is a frighteningly big spider we found, just chilling in his web. And, yes, I did in fact have to get my camera pretty dang close to get this picture. He was not a little guy.

Banos
Fuzzy, lemon-yellow catepillar guy just crawling along the road. He had an orange belly. And little black feet.

Banos
Pretty orange and red flowers.

Banos
Funky tree with little clusters of spikes sticking out all over it.

Banos
Here is a bee sucking the pollen off of a hallucinogenic (for humans; maybe not for bees...) flower.

Banos
Striped red and yellow flower.

Banos
Mas.

Banos
Mas.

Banos
Mas.

Banos
Mas.

Banos
And, here is Josh's sunburn, which he received during our hike.