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Buenos Dias! Greetings from Ecudor! Spent 4 days in Guayaquil roaming the city, desperately trying to learn and speak Spanish as much as possible. Matt and Rhys were doing very well communicating, and are improving every day. They are both determined to be fluent in the time we are here, as am I, but have a much longer way to go. It's all too easy to let them do the talking, while I stand behind smiling, and nodding and pointing...
Guayaquil is not the most beautiful city I've seen, but it has it's points of interest. Lots of small family run food stalls, selling local and other cuisines, all for less than $2 USD per person. There are obviously other more expensive restaurants, but we found the smaller ones to be quite plentiful and pretty tasty! We spent most of one day looking for a travel agent to find out about trip to the Galapgos islands, and found one eventually. We plan to take a trip there at some point maybe in January, if we can find a cheap enough way of doing it.
After that we went to find the infamous Iguana Park we had heard about that was in the middle of the city. It was as the name suggests, a park smack bang in the middle of the city, full of Iguanas freely wandering around amongst the happy tourists. At first you didn't see any, but then you spot one and then they all seem to appear everywhere you look, sun bathing in the sun on benches, in the grass, in trees, on the pavement... everywhere! They were completely unphased by people stroking and poking them, and occasionally accidentaly stepping on their tails! They weren't caged in and surrounded all around by fast flowing traffic, but none seemed to want to leave their cosy city haven.
Right next to the park was a beautiful modernish Cathedral, beautiful architechture and stunning stained glass windows. Contrastingly, inside the beautiful building was a garish navity scene adorned with thousand of blinding colourful flashing christmas lights... quite offensive to the eye.
On Sunday, we took the 8 hour bus journey to Banos, a beautiful town set in the mountains, about 40 km from the Amazon jungle. Our friend Michael advised us not to take the night bus, but to experience the journey by day to see the changing scenery for all it's glory. And it was worth it. The bus journey was incredible.... the photos don't do it justice at all, but you may an idea of what it was like.
Arriving in Banos was like a breath of fresh air... literally. Surrounding by mountains, and next door to a live snow capped volcano named Tungurahua. Since we've arrived, we've been waiting for a clear night to go and see the summit. There is masses to do here... yesterday we rented quad bikes and a motor bike and rode tme up to various dirt track view points on the mountains to see the volcano... my first time riding a quad bike was brilliant... I'm ready for a bike next! The boys are planning to do some bridge jumping of a nearby bridge 150 meters above a canyon... and we are all going to go paragliding as soon as there's a clear day. Every night we've visited the local baths beside a waterfall, natural volcanic hot springs channelled into huge baths where everyone sits around chatting under the stars and refreshing rain (it seems to rain at night here). They also have ice cold plunge pools and showers chanelled straight from the waterfall itself. We're also planning on going horse riding and spending a few days in the jungle with the Shamans and tribes people. Will tell you how that goes soon. Ciao till then! x
- comments
Angela Giron Darling E, as grand as it is to see all the photos I love reading your "voice" on this journey - know that I'm following w/great anticipation all along the roads. XXXOOO
Jess Love it Laney! Sounds amazing. Miss you all xx
Jackie Robain Good to see you're having such a great time, Sky , Kia and Jess send their love as do Chris and I, Happy Christmas from all of us.x
Ruth Barmby Merry Christmas Rhys and friends. We are still ankle deep in snow ! X
IeLiang Happy Birthday, dearest Elena and A Happy New Year to you, Matt and Rhys. Take care.
Alan Westerman Happy New Year Matt plus Elena and Rhys - hope Elena had a lovely birthday and hope everyone had a great Christmas and New Year celebration - It was lovely to talk on Skype Christmas Eve. Looking forward to the next blog posting from Elena! Take care all of you Dad