Making it happen in Baños

We did it! We broke the cycle of laziness in Ecuador! I have to say, Baños was the perfect place to make amends. It's marketed as the adventure capital of Ecuador and there is heaps of sporty, fun stuff to do.

We managed to complete the Baños trifecta of hike, bike, bathe. We hiked to Runtun & to the two Miradors perched high above the town, we biked along the Ruta de las Cascadas and we bathed in the thermal pools that give Baños it's name. Ok, so bathing is not exactly sporty...but those medicinal waters are healthy so we're counting it.

The biking wasn't exacty strenuous either- pretty much the entire 50km route is downhill- but it was heaps of fun and we did get a bit of exercise clambouring up and down the valley to check out the various waterfalls. The most famous is Pailon del Diablo, but our favourite was Machay, where you could swim at the base of the falls.

Taking the tarabita (cable car) across to see Manto de la Novia & San Pedro falls was fun, if slightly terrifying. Rather than a sedate descent the cable car plummets a few hundred metres before screeching to a halt just as you think you're going to be scrambled against the other side.  

 



It's probably no coicidence that all this activity was accompanied by multiple AFD's. Baños is going to go down as our healthiest South American city!