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Consuela - my new best friend
The coolest and most useful thing I have bought in Ecuador...for $1.90!! Wohoo! Thursday marked yet another journey up to Quito on the delight that is the Cuenca night bus! Lots of sleeping was done by myself and sooner than I realised we were rolling into Quito´s bus terminal. After a refuel at Coffee Tree we wandered off to find a hostal to stay in for the 2 nights we were spending there. Managed to get one in the centre of the mariscal called Centro del Mundo, which has a bit of a party rep and general feel of traveller, but was actually very quiet, cheap and clean, which is pretty much all you need - right?! Not sure you´d agree mum..!
Anyways after getting settled here we split off into 3 teams on a Galapagos mission, which needed to be completed before the end of the weekend! Myself and Kat got a little distracted by phone calls and inhalers, but managed to find an excellent deal in the disconcerting lugar of Happy Gringo..however, team Spongebob beat us and managed to find a small Catamaran for 16 people, that´s a tourist-superior boat, only 3 years old, all food, water, tea, coffee, snorkelling and flights included for a mere $1180 - trust
A trip to Coffee Tree
Matt has been practising his "Ladylike" pose.. me, thats amazing! And its an 8 day cruise with 2 days after on the biggest island, Isabela - perfect! Anyway after all this brainsearching, sorting of money and general combined lack of sleep, we headed off back to the hostal where I found Joe! Bizarre seeing a Sheffield peep here! So we went from some tasty coffee and cake at cafecito, which was delicious...and then after a bit of chilling in the hostal, went to an English Pub! Bizarre! After a happy happy hour spent there, the others joined us, and me and bel went on a mission to find Sam! Once again, bizarre finding someone from Sheffield here. although makes it all feel very real now as someone else can verify that I´ve actually been here and that I´ve not just made the whole thing up! One of the most bizarre things was that Joe and Sam knew each other from basketball - crazy!
So of we went on a search for food, as usual - rumbling teenage boys tummies! And weirdly enough ended up at an Indian restaurant, which was actually amazing! Went back to hostal to sleep after that as some of us (although thankfully
not me as I have developed an amazing capability for sleeping on buses!) still hadn´t really slept in 24 hours..
Were woken up to the sound of Bob Marley streaming through our open window at 9am..and eventually got up at 10:30! Today was Sophies birthday however, so we had a big hug session and the boys came up and said hello and then we got dressed and went for the traditional birthday breakfast! Soph managed to collect loads of pressies and her mum even managed to send some out to her! So after our fantastic brekkie, we went off on the days mission, which was to find t-shirts to get printed with some kind of Cuenca related design. Took an hour and lots of shop assistants, but we now all have matching "Cuenca All Stars" t-shirts - your jealous and we are cool and you know it!! Met the Quito girls at Starnet for a bit of surfing and general internet fun. Then as per usual, we went for some coffee and cake fun at Coffee Tree with the rest of teh Quito girls who were present and not laid up in bed... 😞 get better soon Sar. Split
Imo, Jack and Mat
Jack seemed to think he needs to practise his man pose.. up again and meandered off to the bank to finish off our Galaps malarky and then to the hostal to get ready to p-a-r-t-y!! Wohoo! We were quickly introduced to the delights of Puro..a "typical" Ecuadorian drink made from Sugar Cane. I quote Jack "It´s ok when you´ve had a few, you can´t really taste it" I think that pretty much speaks for itself!
Went and had a very very jolly mexican meal..and took lots and lots of photo´s...and then drank some daquiri´s and went dancing at Zocalo (yep, the traslation is skirting board) for hours and hours! And when the live band packed up for the night we went on to Mayo, a typically Ecuadorian Salsateca! Awesome times!
My personal highlight of the evening was "Well, its half three...and my coach is going to be mad at me tommorow, so I´m going to bed" Quality Jack. I don´t think he even realised we were in Quito and not Cuenca and that he wasn´t going to get to his football match wether he went to bed or not!!
And so ended another fun filled weekend...followed by another Coffee Tree brekkie and a 9 hour bus ride! Wohoo!
Me and Joe!
I was simply very excited that I managed to teach Joe some Salsa..! And next weekend is Vilcabamba - the valley of longlivity, so stay tuned for that exciting enstallment!
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MUM
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New Top?
New top looks v pretty - or did you borrow someone else's? Either that or Kat has managed to give you her shopping bug! Glad to see the general 'looking absolutely bonkers on all the evening photos' is continuing. Spelling ( yours) continues to be v bad.