Una costa sin sol y mi salida de Ecuador

Beunos días novia, familia y amigos mios,

This message feels as though it's cheating somewhat as I'm already back in the UK. But for all those who hadn't been keeping up with affairs on the other side of the world (the vast majority of you), one of the best parts of the tale is in my semi-epic exit of Ecuador.

From Bahía de Caráquez I caught a series of buses from the slender peninsula down the coast of Ecuador. I had to go from Bahía to Portoviejo, from Portoviejo to Manta and from Manta to the delightfully named Jipijapa. I don't fully recall all that much of the journey but Portoviejo, Manta and Jipijapa are places I had no real desire to stay, and I managed to get a bus from the latter to Puerto López quite soon.

That evening in Puerto López was one of the tiredest I'd been all trip, but I somehow managed to book into a hostel where they put me in a tiny room with the entire roof terrace as a balcony, and booked a trip to the famous Isla de la Plata for the next day. I took a little food in a nearby restaurant, watched the hordes of gringos walk the streets and went to bed, exhausted.

My next day began very early with an impromptu walk and customary singing session along the beach an hour or so after dawn. Joggers stared. Fisherfolk stared too. The other oddballs out at that time of day stared less, since they were pretty odd. But there weren't any foreigners out at that time of day. I think that's why I liked it.

At around 9:30am I was waiting for our boat to arrive on the beach. The Isla de la Plata is 22 nautical miles northwest from Puerto López, and the boat takes quite a while, but seeing as it was comfortable and I was in the company of two other Brits (whose names, I'm afraid, I forget) the journey was relatively decent. We didn't succeed in spotting whales on the way in, though.

Despite that it had been hazy and heavily overcast at the beachhead, once we reached the island after a fairly rough crossing the sun was out and it was set to be a fine day. We changed back into our shoes, were shown the two routes available to us and set off up the steep steps to the trailhead. Most of us selected the right-hand path, the Sendero Punta Machete for those in the know, which was a slightly longer and apparently more arduous circular walk around the east side of the island.

You'll have to check out the photos when I can work out some way of that happening, but basically it's one of the most beautiful little islands I've ever been to. In many ways it reminded me of Orkney, islands like Hoy and stuff, but with a bit more of a tropical flavour. And with more sun. The really impressive part, though, was all the remarkably tame wildlife we passed on the way. I have a host of photos of hundreds of boobies - blue-footed boobies and Nazca boobies and possibly another species that I know not the name for. There was one extremely rare waved albatross, and I saw one frigate bird in the sky. At one rest point we saw a humped back arching out of the Pacific which I was assured was a whale, and we were privy to a basking sea lion, slowly colonising the Isla's luxurious sun-bleached rocks.

Sadly this little jaunt had to come to an all-to-swift end and we were taken back to the boat for a spot of lunch and then a brief snorkelling trip over the coral reef to the immediate south of the island. Being a naturally inquisitive person I had to give this a shot, so I donned my mask and snorkel and did just that. Indeed, the coral reef looked thoroughly interesting, and the colourful, darting fish within it were rather pretty, but seeing as I'd never been snorkelling before and the idea of breathing underwater, aided mechanically or not, freaked me out, and I swallowed a fair old amount of seawater in the process. I found the whole thing rather terrifying, although obviously it was a grand thing to have done.

Dried out on the boat, we headed back to shore, but on the way we caught up with a few whales who come into the Puerto López area at that time of year to breed. From the boat we all took hundreds of photos and videos, which consist mostly of oodles of sea and the occasional spout, back or tail. But I did get one particularly good video - I'll put it somewhere you can see it as soon as I can. The day drew all too swiftly to a close and it would have been nice to be able to check out the other path too, with its resident frigate bird colony, but that wasn't possible. I'll just have to go back with a real birdwatcher next time.

In the evening I sat on my "balcony" and watched an evangelical preacher man from Guayaquil do his religious thing. Don't get me wrong - I've not been converted - but it was interesting to watch Ecuadorian evangelism in action. Very striking speeches, from what I could make out - the acento guayaquileño was particularly thick at times, and naturally it's hard to make out what preachers like that are saying sometimes.

The next day I caught a bus down the coast to a little fishing town called Olón, where there isn't much to do to be honest, but it's only 3km from the mad little town of Montañita, where I knew I didn't want to stay overnight since it'd be really raucous and I'd never be able to sleep. Once I'd check into a hostel, though, I walked over to the surfing hangout/gringolandia to check out the town, which was full of gringos, naturally, with surfboards, dreads, beads, bangles and bongos. Slightly insane.

Most of that day I spent walking up and down the long beaches in the overcast heat, dipping my toes occasionally into the Pacific and watching the occasional off-season surfer. In the evening I walked back entirely along the beach and around the headland to Olón, ate an excelent meal of bolones de queso, rice and salad for a dollar in an Israeli hostel where vegetarianism was accepted, and went to bed exceptionally early.

I walked back into Montañita at some ridiculously early hour of the following morning, from where I rented a bicycle for $6 and took a long, winding trip down the coast from Montañita to Monte Verde in the south - a round trip of about 64km, more or less. On this trip I learnt several important biking facts of life - one should never cycle on soft sand or in soft, silty mud on soft tyres. It's just a bad plan.

The route was lovely with great views over the Pacific and with headlands surrounding secluded little coves, little fishing villages and craft villages and the massive Monte Verde tuna factory - very famous tuna brand in Ecuador, that. There were also hills which seemed vertical, but there always are. On the way back I visited an archaeological museum in Valdivia, but it was unremarkable and in pretty poor nick. Needs monetary donations to protect its cultural ones, but most museums in Ecuador are like that, really.

Obviously I was very sore after this long trip and so I went home and chilled out, taking another early night before my final day in Ecuador. This was another day spent largely chilling out once I'd walked my belongings from Olón to Montañita along the road, checked into a hostel costing $9 but with free breakfast and a free cocktail, and sat in a hammock reading about all the neat stuff in Ecuador I hadn't the time left to do. The rest of the day I spent sipping cocktails and beers on the beach, and visiting the headland of La Punta again to walk big crabs for a few hours. Oh, and paddled in the Pacific for the last time. I shall miss her, the fine ocean she is.

That night, as predicted earlier when I decided to stay in Olón, very little sleep was had for all of the bongo music going on outside. This was on a Monday night, just to give you some kind of impression of what a crazy gringo-oriented place Montañita is. There were probably next to no Ecuadorians in the whole town apart from those providing the services. Damned strange.

The next day I packed up and waited around for my bus which, arriving and leaving at 1pm precisely, was more or less the only reliable article of public transport which I caught for the next 58 hours. Yes folks, the getting home to the United Kingdom Oddysey had begun.

The bus to Guayaquil from Montañita took a little over three hours, enough time for me to converse brightly with the peruana next to me and to watch Rush Hour 3 in its entirety. We arrived pretty much when we were told we would be, which filled my heart with confidence. I headed straight for the airport, where I waited patiently to board for some three and a half hours - easy. But then the troubles began.

To cut a long story short, I waited on the plane for an hour and forty minutes, panicking all the while that I'd be missing my connection in Madrid, before I realised that that didn't matter at all - we all had to disembark and wait 24 hours. I learnt later that one of the motors was broken, so at least it was something serious, but that fact didn't help me to feel less annoyed.

Neither did staying in Guayaquil's famous Oro Verde Hotel, which was all expenses paid - and five star. Free meals, a free room (which I shared out of convenience and a desire not to be so alone with a fantastic Ecuadorian guy called Jessie) and just generally great stuff. Of course, it was far too luxurious for me, and what I really wanted was to be home with my own bed, but spending a day in bed watching TV and eating fantastic food really wasn't incredibly tough on me.

At 5pm the next day they whisked us back to the airport for another stab at getting to Madrid. This flight was successful and even left on time, but in the 11 hours flight time I got very bored and barely slept a wink. I'd also forgotten to pre-book vegetarian food and so had to kind of eat around the meat and proffer it to the Ecuadorian sitting next to me. Such is life.

In Madrid there was a mad dash from our flight to the customer service desk, for which through some lacking in my Spanish I had to queue twice in order to get my missed connections to Heathrow changed. Eventually, and rather painlessly compared to the hordes of Germans in similar positions, this came to pass, but the flight was at 19:55 - some four hours in the future. Basically, after weeping slightly at the ludicrosity of the situation, I lay down on the floor and went to sleep.

Feeling refreshed, I began waiting at the departure gate as soon as I'd found out which one it was, information in the gargantuan terminal complex which was not immediately forthcoming. And waited. The incoming flight, the plane from which we would be catching, had arrived late, and by the time it did arrive and we'd boarded we were already running 30 minutes late, although since I had no idea when I'd be catching a bus from Heathrow to Nottingham this wasn't a problem.

Apart from not sleeping, the rest of the journey to and through Heathrow passed without event, but once I'd called home my heart dropped again on learning that in fact I'd have to wait two hours before I'd be able to get a bus back to Nottingham. It fell again when the bus arrived 15 minutes late, and yet again when just before Leicester the driver pulled into services and took a 45 minute break. By the time we pulled into Nottingham it was nearly 5am and my Dad, who'd said he'd pick me up at 3:45am, was nowhere to be seen.

After walking around for a while I caught an exceedinly expensive taxi back home, where I was greeted with great elation, a warm and wholesome meal, caring parents and, finally, the most comfortable bed I'd slept in in nearly 7 weeks - my own. It'd had been one hell of a 58 hour trip.

In fact, it's been one hell of a trip altogether, and now it's over I'm a little saddened. But yeah. It's great to be home, too. That, my friends, is the truth.

Un viajote por el hemisferio del norte

Buenos días novia, familia y amigos míos ...

Today I'm in Bahía de Caráquez, on the northern coast of Ecuador. It's a lovely, upmarket place which is, for the most part, remarkably clean. It reminds me, quite inexplicably so, of Geneva. I think it's the seafront. Not that Geneva has one, but you know what I mean.

Last Tuesday afternoon, Wednesday and Thursday I basically just cruised around the museums of Cuenca, which is certainly the city in which to do it if you like that kind of thing. Which, I suppose, I do. It's always something that is far more fun to do by yourself, which is useful since I am, for the most part, by myself. I also spent a lot of time catching up with a few old friends.

But after a while, being somewhere I'd spent so long in before started to wear on me and I had to leave. Sad to say goodbye again, but Cuenca had both changed a lot and not at all, if you can believe that paradox. If indeed a paradox it is. So, I caught the night bus to Quito, some 9 or 10 hours, and slept quite well for the entire trip.

This time in Quito I was actually privy to the terrifying spectacle which is Quito bus terminal, which is awesomely confusing and surprising untidy for such a touristic city. Fortunately I quickly located a bus to Otavalo, even at 6 in the morning or whatever time it was, and made our slow journey through beautiful sierran landscape to the small town beyond the lakes.

Otavalo is a town very famous for it's large, proud indigenous population and for it's artesenía markets on a Saturday. Since I'd arrived on a Friday morning, I had to find something to do for most of that day, so after locating a ludicrously expensive hotel ($10 a night ... funny how standards change so quickly) I set off in search of a museum. Or anything, really, that might occupy my time that day.

Eventually I chanced upon a free museum that was part of Otavalo's university, for which I had to wait half an hour to open. This wasn't overly much of a problem except that I was bored, but when it did open it was quite interesting - an archaeological and anthropological history of the town and region, including a rather tantalising collection of musical instruments from all over Ecuador.

Unfortunately the small museum didn't keep me entertained for very long, and I wandered back into town, largely defeated. I don't really remember what I did for the rest of the day, but it wasn't anything particularly exciting. Sigh.

The next day there was a power cut in the morning, and the entire town was, for once in Ecuador, a very quiet place without the usual high-volume blasts of reggatón, folklórica and salsa from all the stores I passed. This made a lovely change and my exploration of the market all the more exciting.

Otavalo's market is huge. I mean, absolutely massive. At it's maximum, around 9am when the Quito tourists arrive, it must have spread over two or three dozen streets, all centered around the manic sales banter in the Plaza de Ponchos. You could buy anything in this market, and I did buy rather a lot of stuff. It was really rather impressive. I even bartered. Nothing Monty Python-esque, I'm afraid to say, but I got my money's worth. And I did spend quite a lot, by Ecuadorian standards.

Lunchtime came and went and I decided to hop it, having wandered penniless around Otavalo's market for hours. I caught the first bus possible to the nearby city of Ibarra, where I spent much of the afternoon wandering around the terribly confusing streets taking photos of pretty buildings, churches and parks. It's a nice place - they call it the ciudad blanca, which I suppose it is - but on a Saturday afternoon, maybe because most of its residents are in Otavalo or something, it's totally deserted, with barely a cheap eatery in which to recharge my depleted batteries.

That night I chanced upon a dance recital by a well-known Ecuadorian dance outfit, which was free and really awesome. They're so well-known that I've forgotten their name, but it was Andean dance from various indigenous cultures which was jolly impressive. There was even a little live folklórica music, which after almost a whole day of being starved of music, was remarkably refreshing.

The next morning there was yet another power cut, so I gave up the ghost of staying another night in Ibarra and headed to the train station - yes, a train station in Ecuador! They do exist. From Ibarra I caught the very full tourist train, sitting on the roof, legs dangling through the railings as there were no seats for those without reservations, with a whole host of other people, some gringos and some Ecuadorians.

The train passed through the city and the countryside at a slow enough speed to take photos every now and again, riding bridges over deep, deep gorges and a through tunnels where those on the roof had to duck and tuck in mighty quickly. Naturally the service wasn't without it's problems - half the fun is in the journey, after all - and we broke down once due to an overheated engine, stopped for ages in a dusty little town called Salinas whilst the Ecuadorians piled off the train to book lunch, and were forced to stop once more in the middle of nowhere whilst the train staff grabbed pickaxes and shovels to clear a landslide that had covered the lines.

Eventually we pulled into Primer Paso, where the Rough Guide, sadly 5 years out of date, had promised a hostería with food and maybe even beds. Not so, as it's all now in ruins ... still, we had to descend from the train at a turntable, with the real menfolk (not me) pushed the train by hand through 180 degrees for it's return journey to Ibarra. We stopped at Primer Paso for a little while to check out the river, before the train returned a little way to the highway to drop off those with a single ticket (me) for the onwards bus to San Lorenzo on the northern coast (basically on the border with Columbia), to where the railway used to extend only 10 years ago.

The highway was just that - a highway, in the middle of nowhere, without a bus stop or a timetable or anything. Fortunately a bus to San Lorenzo was forthcoming, and albeit slow, it did eventually bring me to the dusty little port town.

From here I'd hoped to see the ocean, but San Lorenzo is surrounded by mangroves and is actually on a river mouth and not the ocean, so this dream wasn't realised just yet. I stayed just one night in the very isolated town before catching two boats through the mangroves the next morning to Limones and La Tola to the west. These were beautiful boat rides and more than made up for the terribly scrubby nature of all the towns and villages involved. Mangroves are really pretty and more should be done to protect them! I saw lots of cool birds, not that I know any of their names, as well as more types of trees and plants than I could name. It was a passenger boat, not a tourist boat, so explanations weren't forthcoming or extant at all, but it was still an exhilirating ride.

From La Tola it was just about feasible to catch a bus further down the coast to Esmereldas, possibly the worst place in which I've had the misfortune to spend 2 hours. It's dirty, smelly and quite scary - the police themselves warned me not to walk down one street in particular - and I was glad to get onto another bus which took me to the tiny town of El Relleno to the south.

From El Relleno I caught a boat across the river to the island of Muisne, which may once have been quite popular with local and foreign tourists. It is quite an idyllic place, if you ignore that there was basically nobody there for the entire two nights I spent there. I saw maybe five or six foreign tourists, including one Swede who was as desperate to talk to me as I was to him. Fortunately during the day the beach was full of Ecuadorian tourists, but still. Weird.

A handful of local Muisneños were also very glad to talk to me, introducing me to the deserted houses on the seafront where I was assured a Finn, an American, a Colombian, a Venezuelan, a German, a Swiss and even a Brit lived - for some of the year. Rather saddening, but the story seems to be the same in seaside towns the world over.

It would have been Tuesday when I lathered myself in suncream and headed out to the beach, where the day before I'd seen the beautiful, terrifying, edge-of-the-world expanse of water known as the Pacific Ocean. Having barely seen the Atlantic Ocean in the last few years I was pretty excited by this, and after a few hours frolic in the neck-high oceanic waves I knew why - the Pacific was in fact my new favourite ocean. I think I'm in love with it. It's beautiful, and quite amazing. I'm certainly going to try and get in again before I come home. And then, before the year's up, perhaps I'll swim in the Atlantic, make the double. Sweet.

Wednesday morning saw me set out from Muisne at about 9am. I expected to arrive in Bahía de Caráquez at around 3 or 4 that afternoon, maybe 5 if bus connections turned out to be a problem. The problem, it seemed, was less in the connections, and more in the roads themselves.

First I had to catch a bus which I expected to take 10 minutes, which took 20. Then another bus wasn't forthcoming at El Salto, and when it did arrive it didn't leave for another 30 minutes. Fortunately on the road we saw a bus heading to a town I needed to change in, so I hopped off and caught the other bus to Pedernales. Big mistake.

This bus was slow, but not quite slow enough. After about 20 minutes, the driver hit a pothole at just the wrong angle and there was an almighty crack, the bus slowing to a dead halt at an angle across the road. The passengers looked at one another. I looked out of the window to see a pair of the bus crew fish a broken pipe about 6cm in diameter from the underside of the bus.

Not good, they told us, and sure enough, the bus wasn't going anywhere. As usual we were in the middle of nowhere, and there was little to do but wait for passing camionetas, buses, and chivas, the little open-sided wooden buses that I'd caught in Baños to the Mirador and that are common in Ecuador's rural areas.

One of these chivas turned up pretty soon and 20 or 30 of us piled onto it, me on the roof as there was nowhere else to sit. It was pretty uncomfortable, what with having to sit on a bus roof and lean against a metal railing, but remarkably refreshing. Apart from the terribly slow speed, the propensity to stop 3 or 4 times in every tiny settlement, and having to slow down even more for the multidinious potholes in the road surface.

After an age we arrived in Pedernales where I succeeded in catching a bus almost immediately to San Vincente, the town across the river from the resort town of Bahía de Caráquez. This bus travelled at what I considered a reasonable speed, and eventually we arrived at San Vincente, which seemed like quite a paradise after most of the grimy towns we'd passed through on the way. I caught a car ferry for free across the water and after locating a hostel for the night just before 5:30pm - $5 including breakfast! - I went on an impromptu walk around the little peninsula before tea and settling down for the night.

And so we come to today, when I'm either leaving for Puerto López further to the south or staying one night more in Bahía so I can see more of the sights. Not that there are many. It's just quite a novelty being here. But more journeying? Who knows.

"The worst thing that can happen on when travelling is that everything goes to plan." Ain't that the truth. Hasta luego, amigos - I'll write once more from Guayaquil, next Tuesday.

Rafting, Baños y estar en Cuenca

Buenos días novia, familia y amigos mios ...

I'm in Cuenca at the moment, after quite a week. Actually, not really a totally insane week, but quite cool all the same.

The day that I posted last I spent quite a long time trying to work out where in Tena I might be able to change Traveller's Cheques. This has become somewhat of an ongoing saga here in Ecuador, so I'd recommend getting a travel money card to anyone who's coming to South America, since TCs seem to be massively out of fashion. Most bankers haven't even heard of them.

In the interim I visited a place my guidebook (and the place itself) assured me was an animal rescue centre, but when I was there and when I was chatting about it to some British folks later on it did strike me that none of the animals in the place, again, especially not the birds, looked particularly happy or even well-kept. Their habitats weren't of the highest quality and although they were probably well-fed, they just didn't ooze the bouncebackability (aha) of the animals at AmaZOOnico in the Selva Viva. I guess that's one of the pitfalls of visiting zoos in less developed countries. And it was a zoo, really. Not much more to it than that.

Still, I didn't let this slight hiccup ruin my experience of Tena and I spent much of the day trying to arrange a rafting trip with the British-run company River People, who were a lovely bunch of chaps, albeit bent on extracting vast quantities of money from my already stretched reserves. Finally, about 8pm that night, I decided I'd try the Class III-IV river which was leaving the next day. A full day trip for $70 seemed a little bit steep by Ecuadorian standards, but, I decided, that would be far cheaper than staying in Tena until Friday at least, which was my other option.

That night I played cards with some rafters and some of the guides who'd be taking us the next day, and ended up in a karaoke bar at some ungodly hour of the morning. Fortunately I avoided any of the crooning - if crooning you could call it - claiming a sore throat and an early start. But it was good to get to know the guides before I started.

Unfortunately - you might say - it started raining that night at about 9pm. Real, heavy jungle rain which lasted all through the night and into the next morning. When I got to the River People agency to kit up, the lady who'd sold me the trip told me, to paraphrase, that if we went out on the Class III-IV river we'd probably end up either dead or hiking out, since there was so much water in the canyon that it would be somewhat insane to attempt it. When the other raftees arrived the situation was explained, and we settled for the Class III+ river, which was a good compromise and a little bit cheaper. I was happy - with no rafting experience, any rapids sounded good to me.

When we set out from Tena there were 4 rafters - myself, an American and two Australians - as well as one of the guides from the night before and a safety kayakero. And the driver. The 4WD was quite full but the trip down to the river was pretty cool. Apart from that it was still raining, but my theory was, if you're going to get wet rafting, you might as well start wet. Anyway, we arrived, kitted up and had the good ol' fashioned safety chat in Spanglish, and then two more chaps arrived, a Swiss dude and a Portuguese lady who were on their own in a raft. Since they didn't want to flip their raft with such lightness, they joined our group, adding another safety kayakero and another guide to our raft. And more food to the lunch.

When I looked out over the river, I didn't know what to think. I'd certainly never seen water move that fast in a river that wide before. It was pretty impressive, but since I was a rafting virgin I didn't truly know what to think. Some of the others looked a bit apprehensive, especially the Portuguese girl, but to me it looked fun. And man, once we'd launched, it sure was fun.

We did two hours on that river before lunch, and it was fantastically good fun. Rapid sections where the guides would shout at us to paddle for our lives, beautiful - absolutely stunning - landscape, flat sections where the guides would walk up the boat conspiratorially before chucking us all in ... yeah. If you've done rafting before, you'll know what I mean. If not, go rafting, and find out. I'd met two British guys the day before, who were jobbing as guides for River People. I'd come to the conclusion after those first two hours that they have one of the finest jobs in the world.

Lunch was a grand buffet affair which lasted long enough for us to catch our breath and relax our strained muscles - paddling can be tough, after all. Then a bridge jump for the bold (not me, as I was convinced if I jumped off the bridge I'd be terribly sick) and back on the river for another hour or so. The river, although very high, was a little more tame after lunch, but still good fun as we larked about a little bit more, and still managed to get totally soaked on the rapid sections. Great fun.

We landed in the Puerto de Misahuallí, where in the main square a troop of various species of monkey roam free, steal cameras, fight each other and generally cause chaos. They seemed to live in an abandoned house on the square, where you could see them jumping on the sofas and swinging from the light fittings. It was certainly highly drole watching them. I apologise for not having any photos of the entire day, but I was pretty scared I'd ruin my camera if I took it.

So that was it - my first rafting adventure. Rather excellent fun, and I recommend it to all. If you're in Ecuador, and in Tena, go and see the River People (end shameless plug).

The next day I left Tena for Baños, one of the major tourist centres in Ecuador. I'd been recommended to stay in a hostel called Plantas y Blanco whilst I was there, which was interesting at best since all the signs were in English and French but the staff spoke only Spanish, and as far as I could tell most of the guests were German or Swiss-German. I made friends almost straight off with an English guy travelling the entire length of South America before heading to Australia - all in the space of about 3 months. He had a week in Ecuador and was spending most of it in Baños, which seems to be the general plan of most folks in the hostel, as far as I could tell. So yeah, Baños is pretty odd. But it is a nice place.

The first day I'd made up my mind to do nothing, so after getting over a hangover from the night before I sat in the hostel and read for hours and hours, before finally giving in and walking around the town centre for a while to locate a rafting tour for the next day. After trawling various travel agencies, all offering pretty much the same things for the same kind of money, I chanced upon a place doing Class III rivers for $25. I didn't think this was bad, so I put in a deposit for the next day, musing that it would probably be a little tame.

Unfortunately, when the next day came around I'd succeeded in making myself exceedingly ill somehow - probably something I ate - and once I'd gotten to the river I nearly fainted from the 900m descent by car, which apparently happens but that I'd never heard of. They still let me on the river once I'd recovered, but for certain I didn't enjoy it as much - although I was the only person to fall in, which was very funny. Still, the river was tamer, and if I'm brutally honest the guides weren't as good. But it was a good trip and a lot of fun - just not so much fun as in Tena.

Anyway, I went to bed as soon as I got back and slept off most of my illness, I think, so that was okay. The next day I took it easy as well, taking only a trip to the nearby hot spring-fed baths, which was somewhat of a cattle ranch of Ecuadorian families and not, by any stretch of the imagination, the cleanest swimming pool I've ever been to. Probably better to go at 4:30am, when they opened. But I needed the lie-in that day. In the evening I tried to take a wooden chiva bus to the volcano, but by some fluke I succeeded in taking one of the only few in the city going only to the Mirador over Baños, which was very nice I suppose, but having been promised some vague tectonic activity by some Brits I met at breakfast, I was rather looking forward to gazing into the centre of the world.

The next day I braved the bus ride to Cuenca, which is 6 hours from Riobamba, which is 2 hours from Baños. Fortunately I met a lovely British couple called Johnny and Hannah who made the wait in Riobamba and the hot, cramped and noisy busride to Cuenca a lot more enjoyable. Thanks, guys. The bus gradually filled up on our way through the Sierra, but I could take my mind off it by gazing idly out of the window on the absolutely stunning landscape that we were passing through. It's one of the greatest bus journeys I've been on, in that respect.

One of the more bizarre things about long-haul buses in Ecuador is their propensity to show highly unsuitable and generally violent films on the way. This is terribly distracting and should be discouraged. Or banned.

Anyway, now I'm in Cuenca. The first night I did nothing but see a couple of friends. It is really weird being here, since I know both the city and what seems like hundreds of people here. But it's very nice to be recognised in the street or in a café by people I probably had little more than a brush with last year. So, really it's very enjoyable. Just a little odd.

So yeah - now I'm staying at Esperanza and Wilson's rebranded "hostel" Tourist of the World, which wasn't a hostel last year and isn't really now, but it is an awesome place for $5 a night - far cheaper than the other good budget options in town. The first day I checked out the, erm, again rebranded Museo del Banco Central - now Museo Pumapungo - and it's attached ruins of what's left of the original Cuenca, the Incan city of Tomebamba. That was cool. Later on I checked out an art gallery at the other end of the city, sitting in a beautiful little colonial building with umpteen lovely Mediterranean courtyards and housing a fantastic collection of contemporary Ecuadorian and Latin American art, from which hopefully I'll remember some artists and be able to come by some prints.

And this morning? Another museum and attached art gallery of paintings of and inspired by Cuenca. That was a nice little place - Museo del Remigio Crespo, and certainly not bad for the grand price of zilch. There was even a free guide.

I'm going to be here another day or so, then catch the night bus up the spine of the country to Quito and then on to Otavalo for Saturday morning's awesome market. I might consider buying some presents, but then again I'm terribly lacking in space at the moment ...

Anyway, I have about two weeks left in Ecuador, which isn't really enough time to do everything I wanted to do, but there's plenty of time left to do some more great stuff. So - take care one and all, don't feel too jealous, come travel in Ecuador and I'll see you soon.

He regresado de la selva ...

Hola novia, familia y amigos varios mios ...

I'm back from the jungle. After being a little puzzled as to why it's called the "rain"forest I discovered precisely the answer to this question yesterday. Now a lot of my clothes are absolutely soaked. But it was a lot of fun.

I apologise for the long delay in writing more on my blog. I went to the jungle last Thursday when normally I would have tried to find an acceptable internet café on the Friday. As a result I missed you all. But I'm sure you don't really mind.

Anyway, since my last post nearly a week and a half ago I've done some cool stuff. I went to Vilcabamba, for a start, and met some very interesting people - Águeda y Pedro, Cristobal (apologies if I got your name wrong), Karl ... it's quite a long list and I'm sure I'd never actually succeed in getting them all on there, but needless to say it was a lot of fun spending time with them.

I met Águeda on the bus almost immediately after writing my last post. She directed me to a lovely hostel in Vilcabamba, El Valle Sagrado, which was a snip at $5 a night and an absolute dream to stay in. I spent most of the first day sitting in a hammock reading, for example, which was truly wonderful. Later on I met up with everyone sitting outside the church where we had some wine and tea, and listened to some Chilenos play some rather delightful music. I never caught those guys' names but thanks for the guitar/pipe music - really rather delightful.

The next day Águeda y Pedro had invited me up to their farm near the Cerro Mandango (a mountain formation which resembles from some angles an Inca person lying down - nice views) and for a walk down into the nearby neighbourhood. Chris is studying Vilcabamba, in the broadest possible sense, so Águeda wanted to explain to him all the problems that are being introduced into the area by people moving in to make a quick buck from the tourists, and screw over the locals and the environment at the same time.

Y'all know me - y'all know how that gets right on my nerves, how I'm liable to get on my high horse about that kind of thing - but really, Vilcabamba is probably heading for a horrific meltdown at the rate assorted gringos are moving in a ruining the feel of the place. Not entirely sure what we, as gringos, can do, but going there and spending money in a sustainable way - oh, and not buying property there - is probably a good way to begin.

On the third day in Vilcabamba I decided to take a little walk, as recommended by the German dude Karl, to a waterfall in Podocarpus National Park, which was a very nice walk except it took me forever to find the place. In the blazing sun and later, in the cloudforest, in intense heat. I never actually made it to the waterfall, as I think I was suffering the effects of a minor flu and possible some heat exhaustion or sunstroke. But I did observe that Podocarpus is lovely and definitely worth visiting. I'll just be more cautious next time. Plus I'll know the way.

The fourth day, after going to bed at 5pm the day before, Águeda and Chris met up with me and took me to Águeda's lovely little house in Vilcabamba. Yes, she has two houses, but she's turning one of them into an open guesthouse, on the proviso that anybody who goes there is not to make money. That's an excellent rule. I apologise for not being able to remember the Hebrew word for such a place, but it is a rather excellent idea that I'm all in favour of.

That day I met the famous Patterson, a fascinating man who is writing a proper history of Christianity - http://www.metalog.org/ . It's interesting stuff, from what I can tell, and it's certainly got a large group of people radiating out of Vilcabamba very excited. Some day I'll keep you all posted.

That night I decided I wouldn't try for my Oriental Oddysey as I had proposed to do, and instead stayed at Águeda's guesthouse for the night, which was wonderful. I slept under a mosquito net surrounded by the noise of the countryside. It was rather wonderful, if annoying to be woken before dawn by the eight thousand cockerels which live in Vilcabamba. It wouldn't be so bad if they didn't set the dogs off as well.

The next day I left Vilcabamba and took care of some business in Loja where things are far too hectic and expensive. I was halfway through a phonecall to my parents when I realised I still had something belonging to the guesthouse, so I had to return to Vilcabamba, take it back, and come back to Loja before 7pm. It was quite easy to manage, but terribly dull, hot and smelly. Not the most fun thing I'd done so far on my trip.

That night I spent on a bus between Loja and Riobamba, which took 10 hours and arrived a little before 5am. I hardly slept a wink, since behind me was a young child and in front of me some young ladies insistent on giggling and flashing their mobile phone lights every ten minutes. Needless to say, when I arrived in Riobamba and made an attempt at speaking Spanish, I was barely coherent, but somehow I managed to obtain a bus ticket to Tena where I was hoping I'd be able to arrange some kind of trip to the jungle.

I arrived in Tena at 11am the next morning, after some 16 hours of travelling. Tired, hot and sweaty, all I wanted to do was sleep, but I still had business to take care of. Fortunately, I found a relatively cheap internet café and found out - much to my glee - that my late application for accomodation at Liana Lodge had been accepted! Four nights at a lovely lodge about 40km away from Tena on the Rio Alajuno - bliss. The downside was that instead of starting on the Friday, as I'd expected, I was due to be picked on Thursday, the following day ...

Fortunately everything went to plan, and in fact when I arrived early at Puerto Barantilla the next day I was shocked to discover that the canoa pilot who'd come to pick me up was an hour early. Anyone who's ever been to South America will understand this shock ... normally I'd expect to have to wait at least fifteen minutes for a scheduled event to happen ...

Liana Lodge is accessible only by canoa, which makes it even more wonderful as you can't here any cars or honking horns or screeching brakes at night. It's delightful. All you can hear is the insects, birdlife and lapping river shore as you lie in bed at night. No electricity, everything lit by candles (almost) and a delightful log fire about which to sit and chat at night. The cabins themselves had paja toquilla rooves and where made of wood salvaged from the (illegal) clearance of rainforest to make way for the nearby oil pipeline and associated highway. Okay, so there were luxuries - too much for backpackers, I personally believe - like hot water and comfortable beds, but it was just the right side of rustic to be adorable. Anyway I paid for it all, so more fool me.

Or not. The first afternoon I spent lying in a hammock reading, and thinking how absolutely golden the place was. Pure, absolute gold. The Rough Guide wasn't wrong when it said that staying in a lodge was the most comfortable way to enjoy the rainforest. I just lay there and refused to do anything else for a few hours ... hammocks seem to have that effect on me.

The first day was delightful. We were taken on a (short) tour to a giant tree in the middle of a mix of primary and secondary tropical rainforest a short canoa ride away up the Rio. That was a nice introduction to the rainforest - no hard forest trekking on your first day. Afterwards we were shown around the animal rescue centre attached to Liana Lodge called AmaZOOnico, which was both wonderful and terribly saddening, since all the animals that we were introduced to had very little chance of surviving naturally in the wild. Still, it was great to see some large wildlife since that's not really possible around Tena, and also to see that somebody, the amazing volunteers, still cares about these remarkable animals.

We were taken back by canoa to the Lodge where lunch was incredible. Actually, all the meals there were incredible, and as they gave me the same size plate of rice that was used for groups of up to four people to serve themselves from, I never went hungry ... Anyway, after lunch I wrote some postcards and then went on another jungle tour to a local Quichua community to see their way of life - their plantations, how they used to hunt with blowguns and to sample their drink of preference - chicha de maís, which is ... different.

Day Two saw a much longer (and personally, I thought more difficult) trek through the rainforest. It was about four and a half hours long ... with an additional break for lunch for an hour on the Rio Rodríguez. Good stuff, saw a lot of very cool foliage and insect life, even if we didn't succeed in seeing anything larger than a hunting snake and some apparently omniverous fish which cleaned the food containers and forks for us. Impressive. After that, we walked back to AmaZOOnico and caught some inflatable liferings down the river back to the Lodge, which was a lot of fun. I was only slightly concerned that we'd end up in Perú ...

Later that day a large group of us took a river ride up the Rio Napo, which feeds into the Amazon much further downstream, to a little island where birds nest at night. They fly over the river at dusk from the hunting grounds, and it was at this time that we were waiting. Unfortunately, in my opinion at least, there were too many of us, and they didn't all have my patience, so we failed to see the promised squalls of parakeets who supposedly fly over. Okay, so we did see some, but nowhere near the promised numbers. But there were a few brave birds who crossed the river, and it was a pleasant enough spot to sit and stare at the sunset anyway.

Day Three, which was only yesterday but seems like a lifetime away, saw me taking a shorter trip to a Mirador over the Napo province with Eliane, the Swiss intern from the Lodge and our faithful Quichua guide Edwin, who was a lovely chap. The walk was a lot of fun - we spent the best part of it wading down a small river surrounded by beautiful secondary forest. I saw a lot of cool insects and the occasional bird, but I only have photos of the former, I'm afraid. After the walk we swam the 400-odd metres back along the river to the Lodge, which I can assure you was extremely tiring, even with the current. I must be more out of shape than I thought.

In the afternoon Edwin took me up the river to a beach where we made a traditional Quichua raft out of balsa logs which we used to float down the river to the Lodge. That afternoon, there was a rainstorm, and I got absolutely soaked to the bone, but it was well worth it - so tranquil, just drifting with the current and enjoying the rapids, and actually the rain was rather nice and warm.

But all good things must come to an end, and so this morning I left Liana Lodge for good, hitching a ride back to Tena with a young German couple who I'd done a few of the tours with. It was rather sad, but I feel I'll be back in the jungle at some point in the future.

Ahh, the future. By the end of today I'll be halfway through my trip, which is sad. Tomorrow I'm planning to go rafting on the Rio Napo, but whether or not that'll transpire is another matter and it might be Thursday before I get to go. But I don't mind waiting around in Tena, it's a nice enough town even if it is damnably hot here. After that, on Thursday or Friday, I'll be off for a little R&R in the bizarre town of Baños del Ambato, where I have been before last year, and then off to Riobamba for a ride on el Nariz del Diablo ... the world's most difficult railway track. Supposedly. Then again, maybe they never tried to design the Channel Tunnel.

Right, that's about all I have to say, except - go to the jungle, be nice to animals, don't buy property in Vilcabamba and come to Ecuador to meet me for my last three weeks. Oh, and that I can't upload my photos for at least another week, since no internet café seems to have SD ports. Too sad.

Hasta luego,
Marcus.

'Stoy en Loja, de nuevo

Buenas tardes novia, amigos varios y famila mios ...

I'm in Loja. It's actually the second time I've been in Loja this trip, but I am only here on transfer to Vilcabamba, which I'm promised will be Gringolandia. I feel a little out of touch with other tourists, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but I'm heading down to the Valley of Longevity anyway to recharge my batteries, which feel a little worn down today.

Last Saturday, the day after I blogged last, I spent almost a whole day travelling from Machala to Puyango where there's supposedly the world's largest petrified wood. There was indeed a lot of petrified wood lying around, but also on my 10km walk from the main road to the village there were more butterflies and things scampering in the foliage than I could name, count or even photograph. Lovely place.

Whilst I was there I met a few other English-speakers, no less than three English teachers from Loja who were kind enough to take me under their wing and chat with until what seemed like very late at night. It actually wasn't, but when I'm getting up at 7am everyday even 11:30pm feels ludicrously late, especially in Ecuador where the sun sets at about 6pm - so by 8 or 9 it's pitch-black outside. No street lights in Puyango, either. Oh no. Spent that night in a cabin at Puyango which was ... interesting. It did have running water and electricity, but not necessarily as we know it. 'Nuff said.

The next day I left quite late with the three teachers from Loja in the back of a pick-up truck to the tiny town in the clouds of Alamor. Beautiful - and somewhat interesting - place, but I didn't get to see any of it as I was being taken by bus to Loja that afternoon, which was a shame as it's obviously way off the beaten track. The busride to Loja was quite horrendous, with some rather rude Ecuadorians lying their seats almost completely flat in front of me. I felt a little stiff after 6 hours of the same cramped conditions, but fortunately once I'd arrived in Loja it wasn't too difficult to locate accomodation for the night in the form of the rather attractive Hostel Londres, which is actually about a block away from where I am now.

Monday saw me looking around Loja for quite a long time. It's a lovely city, rather reminiscent of Cuenca in some of its architecture but quieter and with more focus. Not really very easy to explain, but it's a rather delightful place. Unfortunately by lunchtime I was so stiff from the day before that I could barely walk, and I decided to call it a day and sit in the hostel reading. Rather dull, I know, but they hadn't even opened the museum for the afternoon.

The next day I left Loja for another city in the clouds, Zaruma, which is a long way off the tourist track but inexplicably so, except that it's devilishly challenging to get there from Loja. It's an old gold mining town and apparently mining carries on there even today, but I saw no trace of that. Instead I stayed at a lovely hotel with an amazing view over the valley below, as well as a swimming pool and other general mod-cons. Too nice for the likes of me, really, but I needed a bit of a rest after the journey.

I probably stayed too long in Zaruma but it's a nice town, if a little high up in the mountains. Very steep roads leading through wonderful narrow streets retaining their original colonial architectural charms. Weird but quite nice museums. A beautiful church. If I'm going on it's because it actually is a very nice place, and I really want to tell everyone to go there!

Then this morning ... aye aye aye. Had to get up before 6am to get the bus to Loja which was not much fun, but at least the bus was basically empty and I could sleep for a while. Yay.

So here I am in Loja, sitting in an internet café having some contact with the northern hemisphere. Today I'm off to Vilcabamba, will probably spend tomorrow resting a little bit ... then maybe so short day hikes etc. And meeting other tourists! Hurray.

Can't get my photos on this time, but I did try and make the last batch public. Hope that worked.

Ya estoy en Machala ...

Hola novia, familia y amigos mios ...

I'm in Machala tonight. I like this town. It's pretty crazy; it feels all poor and everything until you see the main square surrounded by stuff and you kinda remember that actually, it's probably not too bad to live here ...

Machala describes itself as the world banana capital. I can see the association. On my way here I saw pretty much nothing but banana plantations, which was awesome but kinda weird. There don't seem to be that many bananas for sale here, but I guess I'm not looking in the wholesale markets where apparently there are prodigal amounts of bananas on offer. Thanks, Rough Guide.

What did I do today? Well, I caught a two and a half hour bus from Machala to the Reserva Ecológica Manglares de Churute. It's a mangrove reserve, for those I've not told about it, although I didn't succeed in seeing any mangrove trees today as I couldn't arrange a boat trip in advance as finding the Ministry for the Environment in Guayaquil proved a little difficult. Actually, it proved impossible. Anyway, I digress - instead, I took a walk through a dry forest. I don't want to ruin the photos which I'm sure you'll check out when I can upload them, but I saw lots of cool stuff. And nearly got lost! And nearly drowned, but only in sweat. It was HOT today.

Anyway, afterwards I had to get the coach back. Needless to say, the people sitting next to me were none too pleased about the smell, but it couldn't be helped. Next time I'll have to douse myself more in insect repellent.

Yesterday I spent most of the day travelling from Guayaquil to Machala (a route, incidentally, I basically made twice today) but I did get around to seeing the famous Guayaquileño districts of Las Peñas and Cerro Santa Ana. The latter is set about (and above) 444 steps at the northern end of Guayaquil's downtown. It's very, very pretty architecturally, but the downside to both districts is the heavy presence of armed guards, which kinda detracts from the place and makes it so no Ecuadorianos can set up street stalls ... which they would do otherwise, and which makes the place feel more like Ecuador.

Actually, from my promenades up and down el Malecón 2000 on Wednesday and Thursday, I've come to the conclusion that Guayaquil is really very like a European city, just a little bit more dirty in parts, and perhaps a bit more enterprising. And yes, maybe a little more dangerous, but it's nothing as can't be sorted by keeping your wits about you. In particular, the Malecón put me in mind of Geneva, but the rest of downtown Guayaquil reminded me more of either Wien or maybe the bits of Zürich that I ventured through.

Yeah, Ecuador is nice. It's pretty nice to be here. I've seen some pretty cool stuff so far. Tomorrow, with a bit of luck, I should be going to a petrified forest a little further down south, near the Peruvian border. In the event of my failing to locate the bus station, or their refusal to drop me off at Puyango, I'm off to Zaruma which is almost in the Andean Sierra. I think.

Anyway, that's it. Hope it didn't make you feel TOO jealous. It would me.

New Year's Reflections

Alright, so sue me - we're some 4 weeks into the New Year, in reality, so it shouldn't really be referred to as anything vaguely relating to the New Year, but ... well, I haven't blogged in absolutely ages, not since I had my accident in Ecuador. A lot has happened since then, most of it good.

The first amazing thing that happened was meeting Andrea, my current girlfriend, who was working as a barmaid in my favourite nightclub in Cuenca. I won't bore you with the details - or should that be sicken? - but suffice to say she's someone very special to me, even now when I'm living so many thousands of miles away from her. We spent a lot of time together, including a whole week in Quito and most of my waking hours outside of class in Cuenca. In the end when I had to leave it was, well, quite hard to do, but we worked through the hard times together and we're still at that stage, despite being so far away from each other.

All this means I get to go back to Ecuador, erm, this Summer to spend a few weeks with her. I know, I know, environmentally-speaking relationships like this are a disaster, but I think I need some Love Miles as they're referred to somewhere by somebody. Gracious knows I'd been single for long enough prior to that moment. So yeah, I deserve it.

Life didn't really return to normal once I got home from Ecuador. My chin did scar over, unexpectedly, I maintained contact with some of the lovely people I met on my trip, I spent 3 weeks in my parents' house in Nottingham before I sped off up the motorway to Sheffield to embark on my Civil Engineering with Structural Engineering course. After a ... pretty hectic Fresher's Week I found myself settling in, slowly, to the old academic routine which I had been out of for so damn long.

And it's great! I really do love it. True, some of the cultural things about being a student don't really appeal to me. I'm not a great one for drinking, for example, since I don't like the effect it ultimately has on me, so some of that I've had to abandon. And as always my social life has been very different to the typical student stereotype - as opposed to meeting hundreds of new people (which I suppose I have, in reality) I've made very good friends with a hardcore clique of about four people. That's always the way I do things anyway, since I was a youngling back in the day. And I imagine it'll continue like that for years to come.

Civil Engineering is also something that has come really naturally to me. I love this course - I love the way I can see the interlinking bits and how everything affects everything else and ... Oh! It's simply marvellous. True, I get driven mad by having to write coursework and do exams and have early starts and stuff, but, well, it's all jolly good fun. And that really is what counts, since I know I'll enjoy doing it all in the future.

Right now I'm supposed to be revising, but there was a party in our flat last night and I don't feel up to doing any work right now. It was a good party, dino-themed, but some things are just tricky to come down from. I imagine I might go out later to the library to do a bit of studying, but it's always a challenge to motivate oneself. Plus Andrea might come online later.

So as it stands, that's my life. I don't do New Year's Resolutions, so I can't tell you about them. The immediate future is full of revision and exams - three in the next week and another the week after - and after that, back to the daily grind of lectures, tutorials and labs. Oh, and all that social stuff too, and finding somewhere to live next year. And blogging occasionally, I would imagine. Getting on with roleplaying on Adellion, PanEarth 2040 and at NoDDSoc. Watching anime. You know. Life.