It feels good to have successfully completed the first place on our two month adventure. Until you leave that first place it is quite easy for it to feel like just a normal week long or extended weekend holiday. But no! This is an adventure holiday.
Today was meant to be just the crossover day but we actually managed to fill it with quite a lot. We got ourselves booked onto a free walking tour of the old and historical area of Quito. Getting to this tour proved to be a bit more of a nightmare than the previous two days of tours. Unlike the previous two days it did not start at 7am (which was a relief), but instead at 10am; or so we thought. So they had arranged and informed us that there was a pickup point that was quite near to where we were staying; also the same place where we got picked up for the previous tours. However, we actually arrived on time (for once); maybe even a little early, yet there was no-one holding a sign to inform us that we had to go with them. We waited patiently for roughly ten minutes before we decided to just ditch and head to the old town and try to find our tourguide start point.
Upon getting on our $0.25 cramped bus journey into unknown territory we had already forgotten where we were meant to go after departing the Ecuadorian wagon. We spotted someone on the bus who was wearing an official Ecuador tourism jumper, hat and bag - the whole nine yards. So, in a completely normal and not at all strange way, we decided to follow this man in the hope that he would lead us to our destination and was in fact, our tour guide... he wasn't. Thankfully we were able to somehow wander towards the right spot after using a predownloaded map on Emma's phone after we stopped our questionable activities. On a side note our stalking abilities were not too shabby and he did not notice us following, nor did we lose him. Nevertheless we successfully embarked on our walking tour with a local man who used it as a good opportunity to walk his very well behaved dog and share his knowledge of the country of Ecuador.
After several hours of listening to this very helpful tour guide, Emma was too sunburnt and hungry to continue (I think it was basically finished anyway). So we got some lunch and tried to work out our bearings.
For several days in Quito we had repeatedly seen a large statue atop a small mountain which separated the old town from South Quito. This was only a short walking distance away from our lunching location - approximately 20 minutes and 185m of vertical climb. How wrong that seemed... It must have taken at least double that time and maybe a litre of sweat between us by the time we made it. On the way we encountered some locals, one of which was a policeman, who told us to take the bus. Yet we declined in the pursuit of saving a bit of money - definitely less than a dollar between us and walking instead. Nevertheless I'd still probably say it was worth it as the views were fantastic and led to some great picture opportunities.
For those of you who are actually still reading (probably none of you), I will now move onto the bus experience and what a strange one that was. Often it is not the large things that show off the stark differences between cultures and countries but it is the things you expect less - the small things. The small things were definitely blindingly obvious on the bus journey.
So before the coach departed from the terminal we were treated to two beggars. Not like normal beggars, but beggars who had actually asked the permission of the rotund bus driver before coming onto the bus. They both proceeded to tell their life story in Spanish (not that I understood more than 3% of it - something about their family). They weren't overly harassing and after doing a loop of the bus they then quietly left to go to the next bus.
The two beggars were not the only surprise guest appearances on the bus though, for we were treated to two authorised vendors. The first was selling fruit and the second we picked up after about 25 minutes. He then stayed on the bus as we drove along for about 10 minutes or so before he departed. Probably to sell some more wares to the next unsuspecting bus riders.
We will arrive in Baños in the dark so it will hopefully be a nice surprise tomorrow morning to wake up to it's wonders.
