Bienvenido Quito!

We travelled through Ecuador in roughly three weeks but we could have spent longer there. The long scenic route from Colombia over the border to Tumbes then to Quito was hassle free but we arrived there late and very tired after the 4am start, try and get up as early as that as little as possible! We stayed at a really lovely hostel, the Secret Garden that had the most amazing views over Quito especcially at night so was worth the long breathless climb up to the terrace on the roof! It wasn´t really a secret though because you had to book in advance as it was always full!

Claire and I thought we would spend about a week in Quito to improve our spanish a little more. During our time in Quito we did a few excursions such as the famous Otovalo market, we missed the best part though which is in the morning on the Saturday because we were partying the night before at Bungalow 69! We met some Otavaeleños in beautiful traditional dress at the market, and I bought a wooly hat and Claire bought two because she couldn´t decide, I was soo tempted to buy many more souvenirs! Unfortunately I had my camera stolen on the bus to Otavalo but will try and put that to the back of my mind, Im soo unlucky!! We had a busy few days in Quito we visited lots of churches and museums and also took a ride up the teleferico cable car to have an amazing view over the city. I also tried my first Guinea Pig here in a traditional eatery, and it tasted like chicken, oh the poor thing came out on a plate fried to a crisp with his little head looking at me I nearly didnt eat it!

We also visited the Cotopaxi volcano in the Andean mountains which is reputed to be the highest active volcano in the world at 5,897m and can be seen 75km from Quito, we climbed to the refuge, the climb felt like two steps forward and three steps back but there was a nice hot chocolate waiting for us at the refuge! We then mountain biked downhill from there which was fun but a bit scary too! We couldn´t visit Ecuador and not go to the Ecuatorial line so we went on our last day in Quito and I learnt that it´s not a myth that water drains clockwise in the northern hemisphere and anti-clockwise in the south and weirdly straight down in the centre of the line! The little kid in me couldn´t resist doing a little cartwheel on the line! We moved on to Baños from Quito on July the 3rd...