Montecarlo Riobamba

... like there is a face and the peak of the mountain is a nose... weird way to come about a name I thought but there ya go, still interesting!<br><br>45 minutes later we were back up the mountain and off on a bus back to Riobamba to have a snack lunch, collect our bags and head off to Banos. Fortunately, Riobamba to Banos is only a 2 hour journey, so we made it there by about 7pm... exhausted after a day of travelling backwards and forwards!

... up in the Mountains. After a lovely evening we headed backdown to the real world of packing before our 0730 bus to Cuenca tomorrow morning. It is suppose to be Ecuador s nicest city and as we have been quite shielded so far, it should be quite interesting. Overall it has been a lovely stay in Banos and I would definately recommend it, including the Santa Cruz hostel, the Baths, the walks and the rafting. Canyoning I think I may enjoy more somewhere else. <br><br>

... which proved to be quite scary as our bikes and the tunnel had a distinct lack of lighting, combined with the ominous sound of approaching buses. We survive that hurdle and are thankful for the subsequent tracks which bypassed further tunnels, only for us to avoid a number of very recent looking landfalls. The quality health and safety continues as we descend to a spectacular waterfall, and observe it from a bridge (warning sign reassuringly ...

... br>And so the popular thing to do in Baños is to rent a bike and cycle part of the way to Puyo past an avenue of splendid waterfalls - so this is what we did. The bikes are everywhere and it cost $5 to rent one - bargain! Mind you I could get a better mountain bike at KMart and the gears didn´t really work all that well. They also gave us a puncture kit that I´m ashamed to say I have no idea how to use... but all in all I was psyched to go.<br><br ...

... worth all the hassle!<br><br>The train is the last remaining running section of the Trans-Andean railway that ran from Quito to Guayaquil (major port city). The section from Riobamba runs down through the mountains, culminating in the Nariz Del Diablo which drops a few hundred metres on the side of the mountain thanks to a series of switchbacks. This was a major engineering feat in 1902 when it was first built and many people died ...

... des Gewichtes ein Kentern verhindern. An manchen Stellen sitzt man in der ersten Reihe und sieht eine Wasserwand von ein bis zwei Metern vor sich und fährt direkt hinein. An einer Stelle mit einer gemeinen Querströmung hat es uns dann doch noch einmal umgehauen, alle zu einer Seite weswegen es etwas Stau beim Auftauen gab, also ich Stand auf den Schultern von irgendjemandem aber alles ist gut gegangen. Dann waren wir am eigentlichen Ende der ...

... So we managed to hitch a lift in the back of a big truck that could take all our bikes as well as us and we enjoyed a warmer, drier and much more comfortable ride back to town.<br><br>In all seriousness, that was the most uncomfortable seat I've ever had the misfortune to sit on and the next day was pretty painful. All the same, I decided to leave and go to nearby Riobamba to ride Ecuador's most famous (and possibly only) train, which apparently has some hair-raising switch ...

... view, took some pix. it was 657 steps up to the top. not as bad as the grind but i was still tired. and there was no gondola to take back down, boo.<br><br>today we´re going to visit the hot springs and just look around the town (its not very big). tomorrow we´re going to do the 18km bike ride (not the 85km one) to some crazy waterfall and then we´ll head back into town and go back to quito for the evening.<br><br>

Heute morgen ging dann alles zuruck, jetzt bin ich auf Zwischenstation<br>in Riobamba (nicht schoen hier), morgen frueh geht es weiter nach<br>Guayaquil und von dort geht dann uebermorgen mein Flieger zu den<br>Galapagos...also ueber eine Woche Funkstille von mir.

... immer spektakulärer. In einem kleinen Tal wurden wir zwar kurzfristig von einem kleinen Erdrutsch gestoppt. Da das in der ecuadorianischen Gebirgslandschaft jedoch keine Seltenheit ist, konnte das Problem mit mitgeführter Schaufel und Pickel schnell beseitigt werden. Besonders spektakulär ist der Abschnitt um Alausi von wo die Bahnstrecke entlang des Hangs eines sehr tiefen und steilen Tals führt. Schliesslich werden in sehr ...