Blogs from Centre, Ecuador, South America - page 7

Baños - Known for being the place people go for activities in Ecuador. Nearly most travellers we had met had mentioned this place so there was no doubt that it was going to be touristy. To get here from Latacunga we hopped on a 2 hour bus to Ambato then another bus to Baños. Arriving in Baños we guessed it right, this place was all about tourism. It was so strange seeing so many westerners in the same place at once compared to last few places we had visited. There were tour shops with bikes and buggies vying for people's attention, women trying to draw you in with massages and enough eateries & tourist trinket shops to reflect the numbers of tourists here and then some. It always gives you a good feeling when you arrive ... read more

The Month of May started off well -- my skin "oogies" healed nicely and I continued to enjoy my work in fundraising for the Volunteer Children's Library; the BIB Bazar Charity Shoppe continues to have brisk sales every weekend, and the preparation for the semi-annual Garage Sale was relatively painless this time...since Jody & I have been doing the triage of donations bit by bit to separate out the quality goods for the Bazaar (aka bizarre!), everything was pretty well pre-sorted and there were only a few boxes of "stuff" to price. The day of the big Garage Sale, as usual there were dozens of people waiting outside the gate for the opening rush. We had a good group of volunteers to help with crowd control and refolding, reorganizing as shoppers threw things around...it gets pretty ... read more

After nearly 3 months on the road in Peru, we were both looking forward to crossing the border into Ecuador. We played the 1997 iconic tune 'Ecuador' by Sash on You Tube and immediately felt euphoric about what lay ahead! Ironically, having researched a little bit more into where the video for 'Ecuador' was filmed it turns out it was produced in Lanzarote and Tenerife. What a let down! Our time in Ecuador was limited by the fact that it took so long to obtain a Columbian and UK visa for my Iranian partner in Peru and so our cycle journey throughout this country was massively curtailed. We only managed a total of 289 KM, but I don't have any regrets whatsoever. At this stage of my journey, I've achieved what I set out to do ... read more

Before getting to Ecuador we had a few things to see in the south of Colombia and celebrate Alice´s 30th birthday! Alice´s big day saw spent in the small town of Popayan which was a slight anti-climax after all the cool places we´ve been; but she got to have a good chat with her family - it was also a positive to have something of an enforced rest day which is something we´re not very good at giving ourselves. The reason for being there is we were on route to the even smaller town of San Agustin way off in the hills and pretty far off the main tourist trail. SA was home to a per-Colombian civilization who built hundreds of statues of men, women, animals and animal-human hybrids deep in the Colombian cloud forest. A ... read more

After another long bus ride (this time comfortable thanks to a recommendation made by Walter our Cuybeno guide) and a fairly unpleasant encounter with a taxi driver who charged us a taxi fare and dropped us nowhere near our hotel we felt that Banos may not be the best place to be. How wrong we were!! Our hotel room at Backpacker Balcones was fantastic and beautifully situated within earshot of the river which soothed us to sleep each night of our stay. After we cleared our minds we bounced into Banos centre to see what activities were on offer. The short answer being if you love adventure sports then Banos is the place to be. Bungy jumping (called puenting here) tick! White water rafter double tick! If you can imagine it then in all likelihood there ... read more