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Published: February 21st 2011
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Hello again!
My first week in Quito is over and I'm off to the Galapagos tomorrow 😊
This weekend Danielle, Jorrik and I went to Mindo which is a small city about 2 hours away from Quito, but so totally different it's amazing! While Quito was cold and miserable and rainy when we left Mindo is slightly tropical (it's cloud forest there) humid and warm 😊
On the bus to Mindo we met a guy called Eric and has already spent 4 months travelling around South America and 1.5 of that in Galapagos! So he told me all about it and now I'm actually ueber excited to go there 😊 Apparently there is loads and loads to do so 6 weeks there doesn't seem so dauntingly long anymore. When we arrived at Mindo it was actually pissing it down (excuse my french). It was almost India Monsoon rain. So we went to have a drink before looking for our Hostel. We ended up staying in a Hostel called "La Casa de Cecilia" which was really nice for a Hostel and the people there were really lovely and helped us to book all our activities for the day after. So we
went out to dinner to have Pizza which was amazing!!
The next guy we got up, had breakfast surrounded by hummingbirds and next to a river (all very beautiful😊 ) and then Jorrik, Danielle and I went off to see the cascadas (waterfalls). You get there using a thing called the tarabita which is basically like a tiny lift powered by an ancient motor and it takes you across like 500m of valley and it did't strike me as particularily safe to be honest. but very fun anyway 😊 once you arrive at the other side you have to hike to the different waterfalls who are all fairly far apart. The first one wasn't particularily nice, but the second one was amazing! We went to swim in there as well which was cold, but really fun! In total there were about 7 or 8 waterfalls we visited and all of them absolutely beautiful. We swam in 2 more, the most amazing one being the last one actually. Because in the last one there was a tree trunk stood against the waterfall so you could go underneath the trunk and you had the waterfall to either side of you. An
incredible feeling! 😊 After hiking all the way back up (which was so tiring! and made me slightly worried about doing the Inca Trail...) we went back across the valley, had some lunch there and then went off to do canoping.
The canoping was hilarious. You could do the lines in like the normal position or you could do it with you head facing downwards (el mariposa) or in like a plane like position (el superman or like the guide liked to call it with me "Super Sabrina"). With a guide of course. Who then immediately started hitting on me which wasn't too pleasant really. So I got invited to go dancing with the guides that night in a bar called el diabolo tum tum (which we later saw and it looked fully scary!). Surprisingly I didn't end up taking them up on that offer. We had great fun at the canoping anyway.
When we came back to Mindo itself we went to a juice bar with swings which was owned by a portugues. he was really lovely and actually spoke dutch (which wasn't too helpful for me, but for Danielle who is from Holland and for Jorrik
as well (Belgium)). We tried loads of different fresh juices while just chilling and chatting on the swings.
After that we met up with Eric again and went out for dinner. We ended up having soup and chicken with rice (which were both really nice) for 2,75 which is just ridiculously cheap 😊 Then we went to bed early because needed to get up very early the next morning.
So at 5am on Sunday we all rolled out of bed to go and see the "Cock of the Rock" which is a bird which is fairly rare and special. Our guide arrived at 5.15 and we took the jeep to the forest where we were going to observe it. In that forest there's a place where the male bird practise their mating dance. The females don't arrive until June but they're practising already. Bless them 😊 We met up with another ecuatorian group and all hiked up to the spot in the dark. Which was fairly exciting especially since I was wearing wellies which were like 3 sizes to big for me. Once we arrived we started hearing the calls of the "Cock of the Rock" very soon. It
basically sounds a bit like someone is vomiting very loudly (bless them) and the we started to see flashes of red which is the colour of their feathers. It was all very exciting really and thanks to the help of a very lovely ecuatorian called Felix I saw quite a few of them dancing. At about 7am us and our guide (who was actually a german lady) went to a place called "Lindo Mindo". It's basically a nature reservat where they do tours and you can see humming birds up close. The tour around the forest was really interesting with loads of very cleverly adapted plants (one for example grows so that it looks like an animal has already eaten all it's edible parts and another tree has like an army of ants which protects it, so when you cut down the tree the ants jump on you and start biting). After the tour we to the house of the german lady and saw loads of hummingbirds really up close! It was amazing! They are so quick!! And weren't shy at all. We then had homemade tea and went back to the hostel.
We checked out at about 10
and then went to the butterly farm which was meant to be like a half hour walk away. So we walked and walked and walked and then finally we saw a butterfly farm. But it didn't have the same name as the one on our ticket from the hostel so we were like. Maybe we just have to keep walking... which we did. So another long walk in the burning sun later we arrived at a place which had the exact same name as on our ticket, but turns out it's only the restaurant and we passed the butterfly farm ages earlier!! So we had to walk aaaaaall the way back and once we actually arrived there again we were absolutely knackered. The butterfly farm was really beautiful though. Very many different species and you could actually hold them on your hand which was nice. Mine liked me so much he didn't want to leave and I just carried him around with me the entire duration of our stay 😊
After that we only returned to our juice place, chilled some more and then took the bus back to Quito at 3pm. In the row in front of Danielle and me there was this woman with the cutest baby ever who kept grabbing our hands from in between the seats 😊 very lovely.
So now after an amazing weekend I'm back in Quito for the night and shall fly to Galapagos tomorrow morning! I'm very excited 😊😊
Hasta luego
xxx
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Mojojojo
non-member comment
WOW
hello!!!! Wow, you've done so much!! I didn't realize you were doing a travel blog, great idea! Though how do you get to previous entries?? I'm glad you having an awesome time and I'll come and hit that guide for hitting on you with George cause I'm sure he'll be coming :) yey! Water falls :) geography is cool :) Look after yourself and have an awesome time darling :) looking forward to your next installment :D xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx