Down south through Ecuador!

We left Arútam on the 8th of march, it was strange leaving what had been my home for two weeks and my rubberboots which had taken me through tons and tons of mud, but we were on our way to new adventures and that made it easier! First stop was Baños, we started a long a steep hike, first we came to the Bellavista, here we could see the entire city of Baños lying in betweenn the mountains! We walked on to go further up to Runtun where on a clear day you can see the volcano! On the way we saw a huge blue bee eating a huge spider! It looked very dangerous so we hurried on. We got to the road and got picked up by a car which took us all the way up, about 3000m! From here we had an amazing view over the mountains, it wasnt clear that day though so we didnt get to see the volcano, but there was a really cool treehouse and a swing going out over the side of the mountain! We had a grilled corn and shared a beer, and because of the altitude we got quite silly. We started the hike down and after a long time a little truk came by, we hitchhiked and went back into town. Because of Carneval we got soaked by waterballoons and sprayed with foam, so we went back to change! Angélique and I went to have a massage, it was absolutely amazing and well earned after weeks in the jungle and hard work! The next day we travelled on and because of bad bus connections we only made it to Alausi, but it was so worth it… Alausi was a tiny city in the middle of the mountains, it was soo beautiful!!! We walked up to a huge statue and watched the sunset and the sky change color – yellow, orange, red and purple and then black! We walked around town and saw the cathedral, and by the time we wanted to have dinner everything was closed!!! We ended up finding a little chinese place and had a very strange dinner. The next day we made our way to Cuenca, a beautiful city! Angélique and I had an amazing amazing luch, but then she dropped her camera (the second one to break on her trip so far) and in that way we got to know the city VERY well running around to find a place tat could fix it – but no luck! It was quite fun though and on the way we saw the markets and the cathedrals! That night we had cui – guineapig – the national dish of Ecuador! We came to a very little restuarent and the ladies started the preparing, the cui on a stick and then roasted over the fire! It was served whole with the head and teeth and everything, and then no fork no knife – dig in!!! It was a very fun experience and it actually tasted quite good! From Cuenca we made our way to Loja, here we were planning to cross the boarder to peru straight away but we ended up having to stay a little longer because of the tsunami in Japan there were alarms that it would hit the south american coast and so the whole coast was evacuated and the coastal highway was shut down!!! In Loja we walked to another little statue and here we could view the town and the mountains in the back! After a little while a dead huge bug came flying through the air and landed in between us, very strange we thought until we figured out that it was three kids who were throwing them at us… we ran back, the kids laughing at us! And then finally we boarded the buss that would take us over the boarder!!!! Peru here we come!!!!