Banos

Banos (pronounced Ban-yos) is a popular small tourist town surrounded by green mountains and a beautiful waterfall.  Both Ecuadorians and foreigners come here.  People come here not so much for the town itself (which is very colourful and pretty), but for the outdoor activities based here that it offers.  Every other shop offers tours - hiking, biking, water-rafting.

  It was about a four hour bus journey here from Quito.  The bus was so much nicer than we expected!  Smelt a bit like old ladies, like any bad smells had been masked with copious amounts of talc.  The reclining seats were really comfy with loads of space, a bit too much actually - I had to slouch in the seat for my feet to reach the foot rest at the back of the seat in front!  There´s even a toilet on board for women only which was spotlessly clean (because women are nice and clean).  At various points along the way, locals get on and try to sell food, calling out what they have - and leave wafts of hot cheese-filled empanadas (pastries) as they run to get off before the bus moves on.

  Our hostel here is really nice.  We ´splashed out´ and got our own room and en-suite - only $7.50 each a night (got to stop telling you how cheap stuff is, I´m sure the novelty will wear off soon!).  We´ve got a ring of ivy circling the bed on the ceiling which is quite homely, but looks like it might strangle us in the middle of the night.  The hostel has got a open-air roof terrace for breakfast with nice views of the waterfall, plus a steam room.  We handed over our washing which is priced on dry weight.  It was returned to us at the hostel the next day.  Lovely!

  Banos literally sits at the foot of the active Volcan Tungarahua (volcano).  The town has been evacuated twice, in 1999 and 2006 due to eruptions.  There´s no hint of any action up there at the moment, and you´re not allowed to climb it for obvious reasons.  The town seems very proud of it´s resident volcano - in the local church there are bizarre paintings of people being saved from natural disasters amongst other things by the Virgin of the Holy Water (Banos´ patron saint).

  We went on a night tour to a neighbouring mountain to get a bit closer to the volcano (not that you can see anything except the grid of street lights of Banos from above).  We went on this kind of minibus with open sides and seats on the roof - bloody freezing!  They played thumping Latin American music, which all sounded like that ´Gasolina´ song.  I quite like it!  At the viewpoint we were treated to some local firewater - Canelazo, which was welcome because it´s served hot.  There was food (for purchase of course) and we all kind of stood around waiting for them to take us back again.  Later they made a bonfire and put on a fire-throwing and juggling performance.  The highlight was feeling an earthquake!  We were chatting to a couple from Ireland when it happened.  Initially it was strong enough to make the bonfire wobble but there were discernible earth movements for about 20 seconds.  The locals looked completely unfazed apart from an older woman who clutched at her chest.  Apparently, it was quite a strong one, but they occur roughly every month.  We checked on the internet the next day - the epicentre was quite far away, at the border of Ecuador and Peru, and measured 6.7 on the Richter scale!

  I´ve tried another Ecuadorian dish, called churrasco.  There´s nothing not to like about it really - steak, the (ubiquitous) rice, chips, a couple of fried eggs, avocado and salad.  Banos in particular is famous for it´s melcocha (taffy) - makers pull it from wooden pegs in doorways around town.  It´s nice when it´s just been made and still warm.  

East of Banos, the road drops toward the upper Amazon basin.  We hired mountain bikes and although we didn´t go the 60km to the Amazon, we cycled 20km along the road.  The views are spectactular.  Being mostly downhill, it was quite an easy and exhilarating ride, past many waterfalls (even through a few road-side ones!) and stunning scenary.

  We took a short ride in a surprisingly safe-feeling open-topped cable car across the river and some waterfalls, Indiana Jones-style.

  There was a tunnel along the route we took on bikes which had no lights.  I was following Brad and dropped off a bit because I was scared of potholes - I was just concentrating on the light at the end of the tunnel, which was all I could see.  I bumped into the side of the tunnel like an idiot!  We´re talking about a tunnel that´s big enough for a car!  I didn´t really hurt anything other than my pride - haven´t had scraped knees since school!  I was just happy I didn´t rip my combats!  We carried on riding until the rain got a bit too much and then got a lift in the back of a truck with our bikes back to town. 

Leaving for Riobamba in the morning for the weekly Saturday market...