Interesting day to say the least...

---

Wow what a day. So this morning we were deciding what to do...because in baños here there is so many options, and we opted for an uphill hike because with the idea of walking the inca trail it would probably be a good idea to prepare for it. so we talked to this really cool little restaurant owner hermano and he pointed us in the direction of a map and a trail. it was a pretty steep incline and we had a few cuba libres (rum - coke - lime) last night plus a cuban cigar so we were fatigued. On top of one of the smaller hills there was a lookout point and a big crucifix so we got to the top of that, and it was going to be the extent of our hike, but then we started talking to a swiss couple and they mentioned this "casa del arbol" which means tree house. now we were nowhere near the top of the mountains...these things keep going up and up and up into the clouds you can´t even see the peaks. so we got motivated and continued up some vertical jungle like looking trails. taylor was a champ. along the way we went past a bunch of green houses growing all kinds of stuff like mangos and tomatoes...pretty cool actually, a little school up in the mountain lots of farm animals in the grass slopes like horses cows chickens etc...anyways...a couple times we thought maybe we took a wrong a turn but asked a farmer, or a kid which way was the casa del arbol and they kept saying straight ahead. you have no idea how far up the mountain we had climbed...think of being on a stairmaster for 3 hours at this point. the cool thing was the higher we got...the mountain air got fresher and crisper and we were trucking. so eventually we took a wrong trail and got lost. and we were high up in the andes in the middle of a farm field when we decided lets turn around. all the while we felt super safe and everyone we saw was very friendly including a farmer who waved a machete at me and said "hola"....i said taylor "why is that dude waving his machete at me" lol....anyways we got back to a road and eventually saw a sign for the casa del arbol 3km uphill....taylor was persistent we go since we made it this far so we kept going. finally we got there and it was sooooooo sweet. the treehouse wasn´t like swiss family robinson or anything but it was an amazing lookout point that i can´t even put into words.....actually all along the way it was like that. as far as you can see it´s lush green mountains, very steep, and the big snow capped volcano was behind the clouds until we got to the treehouse and it cleared up and we got some really nice pictures. the tree house had a sweet swing too. there was two ecuadorian kids who actually live with their dad in illinois up there, along with there nanny. they gave us a mango, and told us their dad was bringing them pizza...they were cool and talked smack about the packers - bears. so we started down and this was going to be a ridiculously far descent, but luck had it the boys came down with their dad and piled us in. it was so nice driving back to baños, and we saw a huge waterfall on the way, and it was really nice windy and scenic road.

so it was an interesting day, and we´ll be sore tomorrow but so far the most fun thing we´ve done here to me.

---