Day 63: Busing to Banos

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We got up and thankfully it was the last time I had to hear “I'm in love with this beautiful shower”...Rach's new shower singing tune in tribute to the epic pressure and hot water that our hotel bathroom generates.. Well, that's what I thought however she's still blasting it out right now at the top of her lovely singing voice as I'm sitting here writing this blog in our Banos hostel (now, where is my iPod).

We organised a cab to take us to the South Terminal bus station. As with anything in Quito, it wasn't as close as we had expected and about an hour later we arrived. It seems that whenever they decide to build a new piece of infrastructure, be it an airport or bus station, they must build it in the most inaccessible of areas. Anyway, we arrived at wondered around, looking at the many booths looking for one that looked like it would sell us tickets to Banos. One girl behind the counter waved her arms frantically at us, holding a little Banos sign and we thought, why not. It was leaving in 15mins so we bought our tickets ($3.50ea) and headed off in search for bus number 20; pulling into parking bay number 26. Well, we found where the bus was supposed to be pulling in however there was another one already there in its place, going to a different location and not even the same bus company. An Amazonian Bus eventually pulled into bay number 27 (although it wasn't the right number); we showed our tickets to someone who seemed to be in-charge and nodded and let us on. We had no idea whether we were on the right bus but hoped that eventually it would take us to Banos.

We spent the trip catching up on TV shows as our free travel days had been relatively limited of late. We caught up on Game of Thrones (Red Wedding episode, and I hate George R.R Martin all over again!) and Rach needed some emotional space as she watched the final episode of Vampire Diaries, constantly using my sleeve as a tissue.

We arrived into Banos at about 2.30pm (3.5 hours after leaving Quito). So what is this place? It is a small town that sits down in a valley, surrounding all around by the Andean mountains. It sits underneath a giant active volcano, Tungurahua, that last blew its top in 2011 (however it was too cloudy to see today). But really its famous for its baths, Banos in Spanish means Baths of Sacred Water and it has heaps of hydrothermal pools that we'll hopefully checkout in the next couple of days.

We jumped in a cab and told them “to La Casa Verde”; having been assured through emails from our hostel that any cabby would know where to take us. Sure enough, we headed a short way out of town, turned off the main road down a dusty little goat track and eventually pulled up out the front of the hostel. And it only cost us $1.50!

We checked in and headed back into town just as it started to rain. We flagged down a cab who dropped us off back in the centre of town. We wandered the streets, looking for a place for lunch and settled once again on a pizza joint, Pappardelle. It filled the spot as we were really hungry after our long commute and can recommend either the calzone or hawaiian.

We wandered around the streets for a bit, looking in souvenir shops and artisan markets for little knick knacks and a “jumping out” postcard. It really started to bucket down so we headed for the nearest cafe, Cafe Lounge that advertised “the best coffee in town”. Well, it was our first coffee so who were we to judge however hears hoping there's a better cafe. It wasn't that bad, my latte was a little weak but they had free wifi and Rach had the largest chai tea I've ever seen which meant that we'd be needing numeral bathroom breaks for the rest of the day. The funniest thing though was the owner, this Austrian lady who had clearly gotten out of the wrong side of the bed. She sat us down and raced through the menu (when we said that we'd only wanted coffees), not taking a breath and telling us the entire range of food and drink available. After ordering and waiting about 20mins for our coffee, she came out with a grunt and handed us our drinks. Clearly working in hospitality was not a good choice for her.

It was almost 6 o'clock by the time we left the cafe, hailed a cab and drove out to El Salado natural springs. We were told the other day by Hamir (our Amazon guide) that these were the best ones in town; non-touristy ones unlike the ones in the centre of town. It took us 5mins to drive out of town and we got to the baths seeing people lined up out the front. We checked the notice board which said that they opened late on Saturday nights, however nobody could understand why the whole place was locked up and deserted. We could peer through the fence and see all the hot pools steaming away however noone was their to let us in!! We gave up after waiting for 30mins for them to open. We taxied back into town and resorted to going to the touristy baths; Las Piscinas de la Virgen. We paid our $3 entrance fee, and also had to pay 30c to buy these ridiculous shower caps as to not contaminate the water. We got changed into our togs and looked around for the nearest hot pool. There was about a thousand white shower caps bobbing up and down in this one tiny little hot spring. Rach and I looked at each other in angst, but given it was bucketing down with rain, freezing cold and the prospect of 'the sooner we get in, the sooner we get out and go for dinner', we negotiated our way into the first pool. It was kind of icky, the water was a really nice temperate and the view was lovely of a waterfall cascading down from the mountain. However, being squished in a pool with heaps of locals (especially kids), I didn't know if it was the volcanic hydrothermal spring making the water warm or locals releaving themselves. We spent a few minutes in the pool before remembering we saw another one as we walked into the baths. So we got out, and quickly scurried down the stairs to the other pool. There was certainly not as many people here, and it was steaming way more than the one we'd just come from. We dipped our toes in and holy crap it was hot, 50 degrees apparently! We sat on the edge of the pool, barely dipping our feet and legs in, trying not to move as each wriggle brought on another scorching hot sensation. There was a group of poms fully submerged in the pool infront of us, trying to convince us that its not that bad once you jump in and your body gets used to it. We ended up bowing to peer pressure and jumped in. After the initial shock, it was actually a really pleasant temperature (given it was about 3 degrees outside too!). We stayed in for a couple of minutes before jumping out and getting our Ecuadorian bathing experience on. There was a freezing cold pool right next to the steaming one, so I jumped in, my body reacting straight away giving me a strange sensation from boiling hot to freezing cold instantly. Rach sort of stood knee deep in the cold pool trying to build up the courage to submerge herself. Given her utter hatred of cold showers, I was giggling to myself that this was going to be entertaining. To her credit, she finally got in, made some funny noises and soon bounced back out again. We swapped pools again and funnily enough, the hot pool was a lot easier to get in this time. My skin was tingling from this 'thermal experience' that is apparently good for you! We started to develop wrinkles on our hands and our stomachs were grumbling so we got out, dried off and changed for dinner.



It continued to bucket down and as their were no taxis at the thermal pools, we had to make a mad dash back into town. 10 mins later, we walked into La Tasca, a Spanish tapas restaurant, absolutely drenched again head-to-toe. As I was looking at the menu, big drops of water kept splashing down on the pages! We ordered 5 plates of tapas which were amazing and the really nice owner talked to us for a bit, telling us his life story on how a Spanish hotel manager ended up here in Banos. Overall, a really nice day however hopefully the heavens close up tomorrow as we'd like to see Banos in dry clothes too.

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Comments

[Al]

50 deg!!!! Our guests here complain if our spa temp is 40 deg! Hey Rach your mum paid us a suprise visit yesterday!!! We were SOOOOO THRILLED TO SEE HER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You guys have \"been everywhere man\" - it\'s amazing the places you have been & things you have done!! When we get a break from the motel we will sit down & read all the detail - meantime we are thrilled to follow you by reading the \"headlines\" & imagining what on earth you will get uo to next!!!!!!!!!! Love - Al & Dawnie xxx.