Waterfall happy

Due to a tiny technical hitch I haven´t been able to post in a while, but thanks to Emily´s brilliance, I´m sure you´ll all be happy to see that I´m back online again. =)


So two weekends ago, I headed off on Saturday to Mindo with a group organised by my teacher´s spanish school. Here´s a pic of Sarah (the other volunteer from my clinic) and me on the bus. It´s so crazy that those people standing are doing so for more than 2hrs and sometimes more. Thank goodnesss we had reserved seats. Standing up for ages in a crowded hot bus, winding around these mountainous roads, is not that fun. But we were lucky to catch this bus at all ie the one and only bus to Mindo each day since we had been running late and thanks to my frantic sprinting, I managed to flag down the bus and we successfully got to Mindo.


Actually the road to Mindo is quite amazing, because we are pretty much just descending from Quito into these foresty jungly areas and I didn´t even feel like I was Ecuador anymore. There were tropical type huts, palm trees and it was getting really humid. Ecuador is such an amazing country in that it has every single type of geographical region, but all compacted into such a tiny area. So we were only 2hrs from Quito, but it was like a tropical rainforest - although just for accuracy, Mindo is technically a cloud forest.


So the first thing we did in Mindo was go tubing. You can see below the construction process and then the transportation. We packed into the back of the ute with these huge voluminous tubes sticking way above the truck, but it was effective and we arrived at the river.


It wasn´t exactly that hot, so we entered the water a little hesitantly, but it was all very refreshing. Obviously I couldn´t bring my camera with me, but here´s a pic of another group doing it that I took later - just imagine that´s me in the tube instead.

Tubing is amazing! There are massive rocks everywhere and the river actually wasn´t that deep, but the tubes just bump and bounce off everything and we´re spinning crazily down the river and was a really nice way to see the forest for the first time. Our guide was this little boy who would just hop on and off the tubes to push us past fallen trees and maneouvre us through the rapids - he seemed like he was having heaps of fun. It was only $3, but we were actually tubing for like 40min or something, so so totally worth it. After we got to the end, since I was already half wet, I decided to immerse myself completely in the river, but as soon as I stepped out into the middle of the river, I was almost completely swept away and if it wasn´t for the guy guide rushing in to get me, I just might have been. It was a surprisingly really strong current, although maybe if I had thought about it more, the fact that we were racing down it in tubes, should have tipped me off about the strength of the river. But ah well..it´s all good now.


We then headed off to have lunch and I tried churrasco:



It kind of reminded me of a vietnamese pork chop because of the rice and eggs and meat chop thing. It was really nice especially with the avocado. yum.


Here are the pics of the whole group:

Yes I realise I have a maniacal smile in that pic, but that was the best of the three that oliver attempted to take, in which one I was blinking and the other I was looking away. Anyway, I´m with Nancy and Jim from Colorado and they were seriously a really beautiful couple - I love them! Nancy had just retired, so could finally join Jim on his trips to Ecuador and they are going to be here for an entire year, as freelance suppliers of school supplies out in the extreme remote areas. For instance, they will buy school supplies and catch the bus out to the jungle, and then have to trek for 5 hrs to get to that particular school. So cool that they´re doing that. They say that those schools are just so poor - no paper, pens, chalk for the black board, no desks or floor and even though there might be a footbal pitch (as there is everywhere) the kids are too poor to own a football, so they actually play with a grapefruit instead. Anyway, in the next pic from the front left is Oliver (Switzerland), Sofy (my spanish teacher), Zeno (Holland), Alfonsina (local - also a spanish teacher), and Sarah (US).


I love talking to Alfonsina because she learnt her English in Australia (she actually lived in Circular Quay for crying out loud!) and so she has an australian accent when she talks and she´s always saying "no worries" and other aussie stuff, that´s so cool coming from an ecuadorian. Anyway, she told me this crazy story about how her house is always robbed and one time even their toilet was stolen!!! I can´t even imagine the logistics of stealing a toilet. So insane.


Anyway, after lunch, we went for a bike ride. These bikes were something else - most of them were barely passable as a means of transport and I´m surprised none actually fell apart after we used them on the road we had to use. But despite the ricketyness and the extreme rockiness and dust of the "road", I still had to go for the long-arm shot while riding.



Our final destination after this bike ride was the butterfly house, which was pretty nice. Not that big, but still nice. Here are some pics:



Anyone for pink bananas?


Sofy and me outside the butterfly house and before making our way back into town and then back to Quito. And that´s that for Mindo.


Bright and early Sunday morning, I met up with Stefany and Alex - daughters of a lady who works at the clinic who I met in my first week at the clinic, but this is the first time we´ve had a chance to do anything. Alex is studying tourism and english and so was a total pro about the whole thing, and would know all the meanings of each monument and history of each town etc - really interesting. We were heading to Baños, which was about 3.5hrs away. It was a nice trip and the first time I didn´t get slightly nauseous on a trip - not sure why, maybe because better air conditioning and less diesel fumes. But it was cool - we passed through Salcedo, which has a monument to ice cream because that´s what it´s famous for, and then another town that just sells jeans so the streets are just lined with jean-clad mannequins. The only bad thing about the bus trip, which we only found out later, was that the bus driver gave us our change in counterfeit notes and so when I went to use that $5 later, I couldn´t and it was so strange to me that there are actually fake bills around.


Baños is a really nice town and surrounded by such beautiful scenery. There is just an overload of waterfalls everywhere, but before we got to the waterfalls, we visited the main church that faces out on the town square, Iglesia de . I was a bit skeptical at first, because I´m not the biggest fan of exploring cathedral after cathedral, but it turned out to be really interesting. First, we visited the accompanying museum which was filled with all things that people dedicate and give back to the Virgin Mary. So like for instance, below there were all these cabinets filled with sports trophies that people give back to the church because they view their victory as being because of the Virgin. Then there were all these really ornate dresses that is a requirements for wannabe nuns to make. Apparently if you want to be a nun, you have three months in which to make these ceremonial dresses and if you don´t finish it in time, then that´s it - you can´t be a nun. Sheesh...pressure. And then they don´t even get to wear the dresses because they are just given straight back to the church.

Because it was Sunday, there was an actual Mass going on, and I know it´s bad to say, but I was surprised that it was packed. I´m so used to going to empty cathedrals and they just seem to be used for tourist purposes, that it was actually really good to see that they really are fully functional and operational and obviously popular.

The reason this church is special is because of the nearby waterfall and the water that comes from there is pumped into the church and it is believed to be holy. So as you can see, there were people packed into that area dipping their hands into the water, filling up massive jugs of it and the custom is to get candles, dip it into the water, rub the candle on your head because it´s believed that the holy water will bless you and heal your sicknesses, and then you light the candle and place it in this large trough, see on the left.

There was a statue of Santo Domingo outside, and I thought it was cute how his dog was immortalised along with him because he was Domingo´s best friend and I thought it was totally cute until you find out that the candle he´s holding in his mouth is the purgatory fire that´s going to cleanse and purge the earth of all evil and i guess that´s a good thing, depending on your perspective. Just thought it was strange how his dog had the task of doing such a thing.


The specialty product of Baños is sugar cane and all sugar cane related products and the streets are just lined with sugar cane stalls. Stefany and Alex ordered a drink called a "sandwich" - literally that´s how it´s called and just handed it to me and try - and holy frickin moly that is THE strongest drink I have ever ever tried! It´s made with puntas, a sugar cane liquor and later on I found out that puntas is 90% alcohol!!!!!! I only managed two tiny sips, but Stefany and Alex went to town and took huge gulps at a time. Apparently if you drink just a few of those sandwiches, you start to hallucinate, and I don´t doubt that.




So the first waterfall is the one right above the town - the agua de santa maria and that water is channelled into a pool next to it and it is packed out, again because people believe the water is holy and will heal their ailments etc. There was no way I was getting in that pool though, no matter how special the water. It was just way too packed - and cold. Really nice waterfall though.


Here are some food pics from Baños:


I was totally trying to psych myself up to try cuy (guinea pig) once and for all in order to complete my ecuadorian experience and i had heard that there was good cuy in baños, so we went in search of it, but when we found it and this is what it looked like, there was no way i could psych myself up that much to eat that. just zoom in on the pic on the left to the guts spilling out - *shudder* sooo gross.





Bananas and queso are two of the most popular foods here, I guess I shouldn´t have been surprised when they were actually put together as one snack. Who would´ve thunk it? platanas con queso - actually quite tasty.

The guy in the pic on the right is making melcocha, which is a taffy found everywhere all around baños. They just stretch and bang it on this hook on the wall and that´s how it´s done. simple as that. Not quite my thing, but still good stuff.


After lunch, we had some time to fill, so I suggested we try the cuadrenos (quad bikes) that were everywhere around the town. The girls were a bit hesitant as neither can drive, but I just told them to hop on the back and off we went. It was really really fun and totally easy. Stefany (seen in pic) had a quick go, and we almost crashed ;) but it was all good - those things are so sturdy, there´s no way we can really crash or tip over.

We then went on a Chiva bus tour of the cascades. Unfortunately I forgot to take a photo of the actual chiva, but it´s just basically a open, no-doors, wooden bus. Here´s a pic of me hanging off the back of it - soo fun and you get such a good view of the whole area.

Anyway so we stopped off at heaps of waterfalls and I won´t bore you with all the pics of them, but one thing that was of unique difference was that we stopped by these two bridges and we were told there was bridge jumping available if we wanted to. Everyone was totally chicken and I finally decided to give it a go - why not? This is my one and only time in baños, so I gave it a go.

Here´s a link to the video of me doing it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JEKWz4AEBfc

It was sooo cool - as you can see it was hard jumping off after the first countdown, but the guy gave me a bit of a push on the second time and I just fell off that bridge and hoped the rope wouldn´t break, but once it tightened, and I started swinging, it was sooo cool.

Anyway, we continued on our way and kept on seeing heaps more waterfalls. We also went on a cable car - the first one in Ecuador that crosses the river and valley and of course it´s near another waterfall. Here are some pics from the rest of the tour:

The last waterfall was Machaye and we totally trekked down into the valley to get to it and it was amazing! The spray was everywhere and surprisingly when we finally left, I found that I was completely saturated, just from the spray of the cascade. Really really beautiful.

And that´s it for that weekend. We headed back up to the bus terminal and headed on back to Quito. A very productive weekend if I do say so myself.