Cuenca

Not too much to add to the blog so far i don´t think.

Today was a 9 hour drive over the mountains to get to a city called cuenca. It is the first capitol city of the Incan empire and one of the first that the Spanish conquered so there is alot of history around the streets.

It´s night time here at the moment but i can see that it will be a very scenic place to wander around tomorrow.

The last few days have been spent in a town called Baños. The word banños is actually toilet in spanish... We were staying with the boyfriend of one of our tour leaders at his lodge he operates just outside of the city. He also runs canyoning trips in one of the local gorges so a group of us did that on one of the days and absolutely loved it. Franco (the boyfriend) is a swiss guy who has movied to ecuador to do exactly what he is doing although he is planning on moving to Africa with Mel (our guide) to start their own tour business... Africa is next on my list of destinations so i might have to keep in touch.

That night was a huge festival in the town center with marching bands and two big concert stages playing all sorts of spanish music with thousands of people all toussling for space near the booze and food stalls which packed the footpaths. I wasn´t feeling too shit hot that night so i didn´t enjoy the whole experience as much as i could have but thats the way the cookie crumbles i guess.

The next day three of us went for waht was supposed to be a 30min walk but promtly got semi lost in the bush and the walk instead took nearer to 2 hours... go figure. I also saw my first wild snake on that trip. I think it was only a small tree python or something similar though so probably posed no danger. As soon as i saw it it bolted into the scrub anyways so i wasn´t in any danger even if it was poisonous.

Well i guess after all that there was a bit to talk about.

I´m going to be on a beach somewhere on the coast of Ecuador near the border with Peru (i think it´s called Punta Sal for those that care) for xmas which sounds pretty cool. We´ll be camping in tents with big bonfires and two other tour busses to share the day with. We´re all looking forward to that alot i think.

Well i might be back online tomorrow but if not then merry xmas to all and a happy new year and i´ll be back online sometie after xmas (Punta Sal has no internet... not sure if it has hot water yet either...)

Later all