Luna Runtun Banos

We took a 3hr bus ride with a bunch of wacked out american kids and one who refused to get her passport out when the police stopped us for a routine check. Their guide took the flack for her and didn´t look happy when he got back on the bus. I jumped off the bus, happy to be on the move again and was confronted by stalls and stalls of sugar cane ladies trying to sell me sweets and sticks of rock. For a minute I thought we´d arrived in Brighton, but no, this was Ba ...

... over and said she knew us from the machu piccu trek as she had been doing it at the same time as us in the other Peru Treks group and knew Amy from our group… she did look familiar but I would never have placed her from there… that seemed so long ago! She was called Becky and her partner, Kevin… they were really nice… and ended up being in our raft with us and a dutch couple, Eric and Maria. Our guide was called William and we definitely got lucky with the guide ...

... bright. There was very little traffic to worry about but on one occasion the experience was a little more than tranquil as I emerged from the tunnel with a large bus honking on my tail. I was just glad he saw me.

For two of the tunnels however, there was relief via an alternative tourist route around the outside of the tunnel overlooking the river in the gorge below. We stopped at a couple of sites along the route, there was a place where we crossed ...

... up as the judge explained the rules (very quickly). He counted down, ¨tres, dos, uno¨ and we took off, down the road, down a steep muddy hill to the rocky bank where the boats were stationed. We found the boat that was marked with our color, jumped in and started paddling our hearts out, rain and river water pounding at our face. We got fourth place, but were certainly the crowd favorite. The little boys on the shore were cheering ¨Ągringo sucio ...

... were also going to Banos. By now a cold front had moved in to hide Cotopaxi and bring down the rain. The plastic sheets were enough to protect us. We arrived at the pan American highway at Muchachi to catch our bus to Banos but there was no shelter from the rain so our taxi driver was kind enough to allow us to stay in the taxi until he flagged down our bus.

There was a problem on the highway and our bus ...

... of the waterfalls, which is a 60km ride through the valley until you hit the amazon). Anyway, a rafting trip was leaving and they needed an extra person so I signed up, and also signed up to abseil down some waterfalls in the afternoon!
We drove abit out of town, got the typical ********** latin america safety briefing and were in the water within about 10 minutes.
The water was bloody freezing, even with a wetsuit, and our guide deliberately flipped the raft at ...

... of the small settlement of Runtin with the Volcano lurking above us. Runtin, like everywhere we have seen in South America that has any signs of civilization, had it s mandatory Catholic Church and Football court. Our descent was easier with just the occasional slide and hold up with cute kids posing for photos with dogs= slightly surreal. After this we thoroughly deserved our visit to the thermal baths= Roman baths essential, which were jam packed with ...

... the sunset from the volcanic springs, we were sitting out in the open air up to our chins in really hot water, watching the sun disapper between the mountains... fantastic!!! Although the ice cold plunge pool afterwards was a bit a of a shock!!!

Got another bus journey tomorrow, heading of a couple of days in Cuenca... so we`ll let you know more later...

Blog you later

Mark and Kate x

... were in laos. The first 20 kms was
lovely, the jungle was lively and full of noise, the trouble with the
jungle being so dense is that animals and birds disappear into it
very easily. We saw a flock of Hornbills flying around, and there
were plenty of smaller birds, many we have seen before but can't
identify.


Having tried the first hostal in the lp
book (full) we tried the one next door (not so nice), then we
realised that we were right opposite ...

A slightly misleading title, perhaps, as the last week or so has not been a total waste. After visiting the "Middle of the World" on my last day in Quito, I decided to head off to a town called Banos (pronounced "ban-yos" - I don't have to n with a squiggle on my keyboard) in the central highlands. The town is famous for being a gringo hotspot where you cannot move for tour operators and artesania shops.

After a small mix-up on the way, where I accidentally got off the bus ...