Volcanoes and fog.

After a couple days in Quito I went to stay in the other of the same hostel I was in in Cotopaxi to chill out for a while after 2 weeks of busy-ness. The hostel was pretty expensive, but the food was amazing and the views excellent. It was well within site of the Cotopaxi Volcano, although the majority of the time the volcano was clouded over and you couldn't see anything.

The afternoon I arrived (and every afternoon someone arrives and wants to go) there was a short walk to see some waterfalls behind the hostel, so I figured I should do that. It was pretty nice:

One of the few moments we could see out of the jungle, looking straight towards Cotopaxi.

I believe we were the only guys on the walk, thought we should get a beard shot.

Semi-stream-bashing up to the other waterfall.

The main waterfall we visited. We could jump from the lower one into the pool below but the water was fucking cold and the jump not so impressive, so I didn't bother.

They have a few llamas (I think, I still can't tell the difference between them and alpacas!)

Cotopaxi from the hostel in the morning. 

The next day a bunch of us walked up a wee volcano called Pasochoa. There was also a tour up to see the glacier of Cotopaxi, but it looked like the weather was always shit, and it cost 3x as much (they had to use a registered guide, whereas anyone can go up Pasochoa). There was also, of course, the option of summitting Cotopaxi, but it was stupid expensive and not many people that start actually make it, mostly for lack of preparation. Also I'm not very fit.

Fairy tale jungle the walk started off in.

We came out of the jungle and walked across some nice mountainous plains.

First up the ridge to the right, then along it to the last push.

There was 2 sausage dogs in the hostel. This one runs up Pasochoa almost every day with the groups. And he literally ran, and probably 5 times further than we walked. Fit little bugger. The other one is lazy and doesn't go up much, so is noticeably fatter.

Looking up towards the summit, though I'm not totally sure which one is actually was.

View over the back, you can see Quito sprawling on the left. The view on the other side, towards Cotopaxi, was just a wall of fog.

There's also a dalmatian, who also runs up almost every day. Apparently he caught and ate whole a rabbit on the way down, which had the girls screaming. I lolled.

I spent the next day just reading and writing my diary in a hammock, then returned to Quito the day after. Then it was a bus for a few hours down to Baños, a touristy, adventure-y town in the mountains. This was the bus where it proved to be rather silly to put my camera bag in the overhead storage, as it didn't arrive with me. Luckily I never actually used it for my camera, so didn't lose that or any photos, but it did have my spare lenses and the charger, the latter of which was probably the most annoying to lose.

Anyway, after a morning getting sent around 3 police stations/centres/who-knows-what, I got my police report, and could go visit what's been called "the swing at the end of the world." It was pretty cool, but the weather didn't cooperate so the view was just grey...

Shots of the river next to Baños

I'll stop here, after Baños I just spent a day in another city closer to Peru to make crossing the border a bit easier. Also in 5 minutes I'm going to Bolivia, where the internet is supposedly shit everywhere, so it might be a bit longer before I update again.