Banos, Ecuador, South America I left Quito this morning at about 10am and got a taxi to the southern bus terminal, Quitumbe. From there I found a bus that was going to Banos in about ten minutes, so I hopped on. This bus was a bit nicer than the one I got to Quito, but still not as nice as the Colombian busses. It was about 3.5 hours to get to Banos, and it was a really nice ride through…
Quito, Ecuador, South America I had a good day checking out the old town in Quito today. I found a free walking tour of the city put on by another hostel that started at 10:30am. It worked out really well that the hostel was very close to mine, it was an Ecuadorean guide (who spoke perfect English), and there were 18 of us who all spoke English as well. It was a great chance to get to meet people while…
Quito, Ecuador, South America I went to the middle of the world today. I got a couple of local busses, one to the terminal Ofelia ($0.25), and then another one to Mitad del Mundo ($0.15). It took a total of about an hour and fifteen minutes to get there, and I was starving. I grabbed some lunch when I first got there, and then made my way into the park. It cost $3 to get in, and it wasn’t quite…
Quito, Ecuador, South America I had a pretty busy day today, without actually seeing too much. It started out with a bus ride ($3.60) out of Pasto, to Ipiales. As we were driving out of Pasto, I witnessed my first and only mugging in Colombia. It was hard to see what happened because we were driving by, but an old man in his 70’s or 80’s was carrying a bag full of plantains. A young guy, around 20 ran up…
Pasto, Colombia, South America I woke up this morning after getting about 4-5 hours of sleep on the bus. It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. It’s nice that my bus was direct from Bogota to Pasto, because it’s so annoying when you have a bus that is continually stopping to drop people off and pick people up. The only thing that woke me up was the coldness on the bus sometimes. They put the A/C up…
Bogota, Colombia, South America Today was my last day in Bogota. I spent the morning packing up my things and getting ready to head out. I left my bags at the hotel and went to the bus terminal to get my ticket for tonight. I’m taking an 18 hour bus ride from Bogota to Pasto. It’s a little expensive ($116,000 pesos (£40)), but I have a really nice bus with the company Bolivariano. It has wifi, that actually works, and…
Bogota, Colombia, South America I didn’t do too much today. I went up to the nice shopping part of the city to try and find a place I can get my camera serviced. There are some specks of dust that are showing up in the pictures and I can’t seem to get them out by myself. I found an authorized Nikon dealer and they said that for me to get it serviced by them I would have to give up…
Bogota, Colombia, South America I had a great night’s sleep at Colombia at Home, so I felt really energized this morning. I went out and did my laundry near the hotel, got some breakfast, and then got a bunch of stuff done back here that I’ve been procrastinating on. Just answering emails and filling out hotel reviews, things like that, but they’re all things I needed to get done and have been putting off. I went up to Melissa’s office…
Bogota, Colombia, South America That was one of the most uncomfortable night busses I have ever been on. The bus itself was okay, but the winding roads through the mountains made it absolutely impossible to get any sleep. The driver was absolutely flying as well, because what was suppose to be a 7.5 hour ride only took 5.5 hours. I would usually be happy about arriving somewhere early, but to get into Bogota at 4am really didn’t help me at…
Armenia, Colombia, South America I did almost nothing today, and it was great! I got a good night’s sleep at my hostel, which was inevitable after such a big day of hiking yesterday. I went downstairs in the hostel to the cafe below and had a really good breakfast, at a very reasonable price. The people working there are really friendly too, so it was a nice place to relax for a bit. I spent the rest of the day…