Arrived in Banos from Quito on a lovely 4 hour bus journey,which was a walk in the park at this stage! The thing we noticed (besides the place being called Toilets) was how green it was as we drove down into the valley and how cultivated it was. It was refreshing to see the land being used as a source of income for the locals. We booked into our hostel, Hostel Transylvania, which wasnt that scary at all and didnt have any Count living there!! Banos itself was a ...

The guide met us in the morning after our night bus at Lago Agrio and drove us for 3 hours to the entrance of the reserve at El Puente.The rain that fell was nothing like we have seen before!!Overall we were lucky with the weather but every so often for twenty minute bursts it would absolutely lash!! Then we took a canoe trip down the Cuyabeno River to the Samona lodge arriving late afternoon.The Samona Lodge is located within the protected Cuyabeno Reserve in th...

We arrived in Quito after an awkward night bus. We were stopped twice during the night by police and all taken off and searched which was a bit intimidating!! We arrived in early so we checked straight in to our room and walked around to see what the place was like. We were staying in the new town and our hostel was right in the middle so we could walk everywhere. We were very impressed with the City. The old town was very colonial style and the new town...

When we arrived in Guayaquil at 5 am we managed to get on a bus to Montanita 5 mins later!! We got to montanita at 830 and headed straight for our hostel. When we got to our hostel we were not very impressed so we looked around and for a better place and found one nearby for the same price. When we were fully settled in we needed to sleep for a while as we had not slept all night. For the afternoon and the evening we just walked around the town and took it easy...

We arrived in Mancora after a night bus from Lima where we splashed out and got ourselves cama seats which meant we had a pretty good nights sleep on the 16 hour journey. We were definitely not disappointed when we arrived in the sunshine. It was all we needed after the strenuous week on the Inca Trail. The beach and a good book was definitely in order for a few days. We stayed in a dodgy place the first night,which I think Bob and Vivienne will most definitley...