Day of waterfalls, night of getting stuff stolen

Day of waterfalls, night of getting stuff stolen

Banos, Ecuador, South America

I had a really good today, until it was marred by finding out some of my stuff was stolen out of my hostel room. The day started out with a really good breakfast at a little cafe in town, then I rented a mountain bike, and met Katharina at 9:15am to go see some waterfalls.

It was a really nice ride, almost all downhill, to see a series of waterfalls just outside of Banos. We saw Agoyan waterfall, then Manto de la Novia waterfall, and finally Pailon del Diablo. The ride took us mostly down the main road going out of Banos, but there were a couple of side roads we could take that was only for bicycles. It saved us from having to ride through the tunnels going through the mountain along with the other cars, busses and big trucks. There were a few other small waterfalls we saw on the way, and the scenery was stunning. We were riding through the green mountains that were towering above us, and the river flowing below us. It was beautiful.

The main waterfall to see is at Rio Verde Village, and it’s called Pailon del Diablo. It’s hidden around the side of a hill, so we never even saw it when we rode through the village. We just kept riding and fortunately we stopped to talk to an old couple who was walking along the bike side road. The man asked if we were going to Machay, which is the next village along. We said that we were going to Pailon del Diablo first, and he pointed to a cliff face and said it was on the other side of that. And that was back where we had just come from. We were a little surprised that for being the biggest waterfall that we would see for the day, that there were virtually no signs for it in the village.

We went back to Rio Verde Village, found a place to leave our bikes, and started the hike down to the waterfall. There were two ways to view the fall, from the lower viewpoint, or the higher one. We ended up doing both, but we started with the lower one. It cost $1.50 to get into each viewpoint, and the higher one was definitely better. The lower one was pretty cool because you could feel the power of the falls as it was right next to us. It was a pretty good hike to get down there, and then there was this weird little tunnel that you could crawl through, literally, and it brought you down to behind the falls. I stood there for about 30 seconds, just long enough to feel the power of the falls, and get completely soaked, and then we headed back up.

We went back through the village and found the upper viewpoint. It was terribly signposted, and pretty difficult to find, which is a shame because I’m sure a lot of people miss it because they don’t even know it’s there. This viewpoint consisted of a couple of Indiana Jones style wooden suspension bridges, and they gave a great view of the falls. It was very impressive. We had the chance to hike all the way down and go behind the falls again from this viewpoint, but we decided against it. It wasn’t that hot out, so we didn’t need a refreshing cold water soaking.

We went back into the village and had lunch at the place where we had left our bikes. It was a good almuerzo of fried chicken, rice, salad, potatoes, and juice, all for $3.50. It was a good way to recharge the batteries. Luckily for us though, we didn’t need to ride our bikes back up to Banos. There are trucks waiting in Rio Verde Village that will bring you and your bikes back up to the village for $2, and it was well worth it. That uphill journey would have taken a few hours to get back. We got back into Banos and organized a tour to the volcano viewpoint for tonight. We split up then and I went back to the hostel to chill for a bit.

Katharina and I met up again at 9pm to go on this Chiva tour up to the viewpoint of the volcano and to see the city of Banos at night. This was a terrible tour. It only cost $3, but it really wasn’t even worth that. The Chiva picked us up and it’s this big colorful bus with colored lights flashing and music blaring through speakers right next to our seats. There were about twenty of us in the bus, and we first went up to the viewpoint to see the city. Unfortunately, the weather was terrible, so it wasn’t a great night to see the city. There were clouds over the city, and between our viewpoint and the city, so it was a pretty bad view.

I guess the weather was too bad to go up to the other viewpoint, because when we left this viewpoint, we just headed down the hill back to Banos. The tour finished at 10:30pm instead of 11pm, and we hardly got to see anything, so it was disappointing. I said bye to Katharina and headed back to my hostel. This is when my night REALLY turned bad.

I went to look for a usb cable in my small backpack and I couldn’t find my bag of cables. I opened up another small pocket in my backpack and found that my tablet and my passport holder were gone as well. Luckily, I always carry my British passport with me, so I didn’t lose that, but my USA passport is gone. Also in that holder was my expired British passport that had all my stamps and visas from my last round the world trip, so I’m disappointed to lose that. I also had small denominations of currency from each country that I’ve visited so far this year, and that’s all gone too. It’s not a lot of money, and it won’t mean anything to whoever stole it because they won’t be able to cash it in anywhere, but it meant something to me.

I went downstairs to tell the owner of the hostel and she felt absolutely sick. She is the only one who works there and she cleaned the room herself, so she can’t understand how someone else could have possibly gotten into the room to steal anything. I don’t understand it either, but it happened. I was lucky in the sense that my computer was also in my nightstand drawer in the room and the burglar didn’t take that. They also didn’t take my GoPro camera that was at the bottom of the backpack, but they might not have seen it.

There was a guy at the hostel who spoke english and spanish so he helped translate between me and the owner, but there was nothing that could be done. I’m going to have to call my travel insurance company tomorrow morning and find out if I need a police report. I’m sure I’m going to, so I’ll have to get the police out here tomorrow. That’s going to be a pain in the neck, but it’s probably going to be necessary. Not a great way to end a really good day. I just keep trying to tell myself that it could have been a lot worse, but it’s still not great.

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