Cloud Forests, Equator, Galapagos and New Years Eve in Quito

Hi All. We hope you all had a fabulous Christmas and New Year?! For us it was very good although somewhat strange. You just can’t quite imagine its Christmas Day when you are sat in the blazing sunshine surrounded by blue sea and sea lions! (not to rub it in or anything!! ;o))
Anyway as you may have gathered we are back from the Galapagos and had a fantastic time but we have so much to update you on that we’d better start from the beginning!! Hope you don’t nod off? So where to start . .

Since we arrived in Quito almost 3 weeks ago (time flies!) we have visited a local market to see the way things are done out here and despite already having overflowing bags there was so much lovely stuff that a few bargains just had to be had! We’ve braved the local buses which are very cheap, about $2 for a 2 hour bus ride and most interesting too. Generally they have loud salsa music playing in them as they often do when you walk round the streets too. Ray and Caro you’d love it. You’d be boogying all the time!

We spent a relaxing couple of days in the Cloud Forests about 2 hours out of Quito just before we went to Galapagos. Our accommodation was a treehouse which was pretty cool and there were also hot pools too which were most relaxing too. We did dwell on you guys back home for a while you’ll be pleased to hear. And then breathed a sigh of relief that we are here!! :o) However you will be pleased to hear that we did have to get up for a 6 am birdwatching tour. (See its not all easy?!) Although it was worth it. Saw loads of very pretty birds – toucans, parrots, parakeets and hummingbirds (which are tiny and so cute, and fast!!) Also saw an Armidillo which unfortunately ran too fast and blurred.

The next day we went to Galapagos which was a long haul – 2 flights, 2 bus journeys and a ferry ride. When we finally arrived though we were so impressed. The boat was lovely, the sun shining, and the sea blue and it was warm 27C . (Quito was about 20C most of the time in the day). Our group were really nice (there were 16 of us) but the most surprising thing was just HOW close the animals would get to you. They were everywhere. Sealions lazing across the boats, pelicans all around, and Iguanas just laying in your path. It was amazing.
They really were not phased by our presence. During the week of sailing around 9 islands we had seen countless sea lions and giant tortoises, Iguanas – marine and Land, Flamingos, Blue-footed boobies (so cute and did a most amusing dance), Frigate Birds with huge inflating red chests, Galapagos Penguins (really cute too), Masked Boobies and many more birds. Plus did some fantastic snorkelling so saw sharks, Sea Turtles, Sting Rays, heaps of colourful fish and swam with Penguins and Sea Lions. For anyone who loves wildlife we would definitely recommend it. We were also lucky enough to have dolphins swim with the boat twice. They were so fast and had great fun racing the boat and leaping out of the water.
The crew were even nice enough to do a ‘half’ Christmas dinner on Christmas eve so we even had turkey and champagne to celebrate. It was great. As they say a once in the lifetime experience.

So here we are now back in Quito, having had a great New Years Eve yesterday. They have a great big street festival from about 12 midday that goes on until well after midnight. Fireworks are everwhere (a vast improvement on Paris last years lack of fireworks!) although you did fear for your head slightly! Then they burn puppets at midnight to start the year anew. The city did look at one point rather like a scene out of the film War of the Worlds!
Also we were able to spend New Year with Sophie and Jose who were on the Galap tour with us which worked out really well.

We are preparing to leave Quito tomorrow and hopefully doing mountain biking down the highest active volcano in the world, Cotopaxi. There are heaps of these volcanos all around here. They look amazing with loads of snow on the top.
We tried to climb a slightly smaller volcano that overlooks the city on Saturday.
There is a cable car that takes you part of the way up, from 2800m to 4100m. Then you can walk for 2.5 hours to get to the very top which is 4700m high. Not an easy feat considering the altitude sickness. We were doing really well and were within 30 mins of the top when the cloud decided to come in so you could barely see 5m in front of you. Not the best on the side of a mountain and certainly not ideal for seeing the views from the top?! It looked like it was going to hang around and did for 1.5 hours so we turned back. One day I’ll get to the top of a mountain!?!
So there you go. That’s the mega update. Hopefully things will continue as they have been. We did have one minor hiccup yesterday when I discovered that my walking trousers had not been returned from the laundrette. That was fun trying to explain to the staff?! They were eventually returned to me 3 hours later. It turns out from speaking to a tour operator that this often happens as the trousers can be sold on the black market for a large amount here and staff generally only earn about $6 a day.

Anyway take care all and Happy New Year 2007! Hopefully you will be able to view all the photos so far on kodakgallery.co.uk. very shortly. However they are taking a long time to download and we have to work out to invite everyone to view them too! Fingers crossed . .