¡Baños!

Last weekend, our destination of Baños was sold to us as the "tourist destination" of Ecuador. And it was just that. Every block had multiple Ecuadorians yelling in terrible english to "come with us on jump off bridge. Will be real fun, I promise this." I'm not sure about you, but this seemed a little sketchy. So, we did it anyway. A picture of the bridge I jumped off (I'm the farthest on the right on the platform), about 500 feet above the small stream below:

The way this worked was similar to bungee jumping, but not quite. the ropes that we were connected to were connected on the other side of the bridge, so you have to jump out, not down, until the rope catches you and swings you back and forth. So, right after jumping, I swang down to the left, then back and forth. The next picture is one of the swings.

After each weekend in somewhere new, I keep saying that I did the most extreme thing in my life to date. Well, last weekend I topped myself again with this jump. I literally jumped into oblivion, and just waited until the rope caught me, so insane! Next steps: bungee jumping, then I can't wait to go skydiving.

Another really interesting thing we did: played with monkeys. Again, I'm not sure this is allowed in the states, but we walked through an electric fence, and were immediately met by a ridiculous amount of monkeys that climbed on us, bit us (just barely) and stole my soda! I couldn't believe what was actually going on, these monkeys have all the room in the world to roam and to pick our hair, which was pretty cool. Afterward, the only thing I wanted to do was shower, but that wasn't an option; we had another hour bus ride back to our hostel in Baños.

Before the bus back, though, we stopped by "La Casa Del Arbol," (literally treehouse) by recommendation of the taxi driver. At the treehouse, we each paid $2 to enter, of which we thought would just get us into the treehouse. However, to our surprise, we were led through batcaves, in the pitch black, crawling on hands and knees, all while feeling the sleeping bats glide along our back. This was the point where I almost lost it. It's not that I'm afraid of the dark, or particularly cholstrophobic, but the thought that went through my head as the tunnels got smaller and smaller was "If this Ecuadorian is leading us to our deaths, nobody in the world will know where we are. We'd never be found." This was because nobody knew we left Baños for Puyo (city of monkeys and this treehouse), and especially no one knew we went to a damn treehouse. (Mom, I'm sure you're loving this right now!) After a while in this stupid tunnel, we were told to stand up, and a light turned on. Turns out, joke was on the gringos, and it was fake the whole time. Even the bats were fake; they hung belts from the ceiling. This was a bit too much for my friend Caitie, who couldn't hold herself from crying. Thankful to be done with that horrific experience, we were very ready to see the treehouse, which turned out to be 11 stories tall:

The view from the top was absolutely amazing.

Currently my profile picture on facebook: the view of Baños from a café that we hiked all the way up to. The hike started with a 700 stair climb to a Virgen Statue, then across the hill to this café, then straight down the hill, pretty much in the middle of the jungle. The hike was really a lot of fun, despite the girls whining the whole time!

At the end of the hike, there was a nice house being built with this nice sign in front of it. Translated: "Theif.... if captured, you will be BURNED!!" Not messing around in Baños!

The end of our hike. If you're lucky, you can see the Café on the ridge, and the last part of our hike was pretty much straight down that hill. Such a good workout.

Also that weekend: Went to the natural hot baths (literally "baños," what the city is known for). A little weird, because there were only locals and we were definitely feeling the stares.

This weekend, off to the coast (finally!) where the forecast is calling for 90 degrees and sun. Should be a nice getaway from this chilly 65-70 degree weather in Quito!

Go Dawgs, time to turn things back around with another W!

Blair