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Oh I forgot, before reaching Otavalo we stopped at the Equator, very cool to think we were stood at the middle of the earth and we were hopping between north and south of the equator, it was really windy, not too sure what I was expecting with the weather, you know me, not the brightest of sparks. I was hoping to see the toilet water experiment where the toilet water goes in one direction one side of the equator and the other direction on the other side but there was not anybody there to amuse me with such antics, good fun all the same!
So after Otavalo we headed into the depths of the amazon jungle, driving along the andes on some very scary roads and into the ecuadorian side of the jungle. Our truck "Bernie" couldn't take us right into jungle so we took motorised canoes to our jungle lodges. We were both set with only our day packs with us to survive the next four days and three nights, all ready for a life without electricity and hot water and washing in the amazon river.
Well what can I say, we had clearly watched too many horror movies and listened to too many other people and let them scare us into thinking that we would have tarantulas in our rooms, crawling into our boots :-) (you know who you are) but the time in the amazon was amazing, we embraced everything from eating ants and drinking animal hunting poison to hiking through the jungle for four hours in big chunky wellies. It was a fun action packed four days where we experienced and learnt a lot about the culture, the tribes, the survival techniques, the different species. We also built a balsa wood raft and rafted down the amazon where we quickly learnt the current is a lot stronger than it looks. There is so much to tell about the amazon jungle but it would take us hours to write it. We tried so many different foods and fruits but we are still yet to try cuy (guinea pig) but we will. :-)
The heat in the jungle was horrific and there was a real drop in temp on the night time. Quite scary when you went to bed and turned off all torches and blew out candles and were lying in bed to the sound of rattlesnakes, mozzys, monkeys and all other kinds of creatures.
From the amazon we headed to Banos, a big tourist city in Ecaudor. Here we went canyoning where we abseiled down 45 metre waterfalls, amazing experience but terrifying when you are hanging over the edge of a waterfall looking down at a 45 metre drop. Ali and I loved it and are considering taking it up as a hobby on our return to the UK. Oh and we may see Ali do a bungee jump in the next couple of weeks, so watch this space.
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