Baños

October 18, 2009:
This weekend was really fun. We went on a trip to Baños, which is a small city in the jungle about three and a half hours South of Quito. On Thursday after classes, everyone left the city, except for Kyler and me, because we were on a field trip to the National Museum. When we got back to CIMAS, we immediately began to look for a bus to Quitumbe, which is the bus station in the Southernmost part of Quito, and where you can catch a bus to Baños. We could not find a bus, and just as we were about to give up and take the trolley (which we didn’t want to because we would have had to stand in the crowd of 200 other people on that packed bus), Kyler yells to a bus that is passing “A Quitumbe?” (you are going to Quitumbe?) and the guy on the bus says yes, so we jump on. So now we are headed South on a bus that may or may not be going where we want to, but still we decide to stay on it as long as it keeps heading South. Lucky for us, the last stop ended up being Quitumbe, and from there we got on a bus to Baños. When we got there, we found the hostel that everyone else was in, and though some people went out, the people in my room decided to stay in and watch “Mexico’s Next Top Model”.



The next day, we all got up at 4am, and went to the mineral baths that the town is famous for. It was all locals and us, and it was so cool. We left at about 6:30 and got breakfast, and then some of us went for a horseback ride. It was ten dollars, and we were gone for four hours. We rode up in the mountains to a waterfall, and then halfway back, where we took this little trail down to this hostel that had a swimming pool and all sorts of cool stuff. Ironically, as we got to this hostel, the other half of our group who had decided to go hiking that day, just happened to be on the trail just above this hostel. So without meaning to, we met up and hung out for a while at this bar in the hostel.



And by the way…to get to the hostel you had to cross a river, so they had this chair thing that was on a wire that you sat in and then a guy would pull the rope and pull you across the river, feet dangling from 30 feet above. It was really cool.



We rode our horses back, took showers, and went and got Mexican food for dinner. Everyone was tired so we all basically just went to bed.



The next morning, half went back to the hot springs, and half slept in. Then some people went hiking and the rest of us went white water rafting. It was $20, five hours and lunch included. And it was quite possible the most fun thing that I have ever done. The river ran right through the rainforest, so it was total jungle with tons of waterfalls and really steep canyon walls up each side of the river. And the river itself was all class four rapids, so it was really exciting. It was also pouring down rain, which was better because the water didn’t seem as cold. It was soo fun.



We were totally disgusting after the river (not to mention Kyler knocked an entire pitcher of rice-milk stuff on me at lunch) but we had already checked out of the hostel. So to take showers, we went back to the mineral baths and used the showers there. From the baths, we caught a passing bus back to Quito. The bus ride was pretty uneventful (I had to sit next to a man who was quite possibly the most smelly man on earth) but we got back alright. We were supposed to go out in Quito that night, but I was too tired to go.



Today is Sunday, and now I have nothing to do. Apparently, we are going to visit some relative later on tonight, but who knows…And more school tomorrow. Also, we have our first school trip this week to La Zona Norte. I don’t know what that means, but it should be fun!