Here we are in Baños. Although this may look like a high fashion photo shoot, we just pulled these old things our of our backpacks. The coordinating purple tights were not planned, but our sexy bike helmets definitely made a nice addition.
Day one in Baños, we are still feeling really sick and more mucous is coming out of my nose than I thought possible. Yet we have had some super mellow days (if you count a 12 hour bus trip mellow) and felt like we needed to get out and explore. A good introduction seemed like a 15 mile mostly downhill bike ride with a short hike to some waterfalls at the end. So we set out of our hostel to rent some bikes. It was a bit cold and rainy, so all the best gear came out (I am wearing 100% Patagonia, including my undies, how about this for a catalogue pic?). The bike rental shop set us up with some squeaky breaks, dead sexy helmets and a fanny pack to boot. Looking and feeling our best we set out on the mountain bike adventure past 8 waterfalls. After a few photo shoots and some peanut butter-nutella sandwiches, we went on a 3 km trek beside a tumbling river. We saw absolutely nobody else and spent a few minutes getting our fill of the rapids` roar.
According to our bible (Lonely Planet) hitching a ride back to Baños was supposed to be easy and commonplace. After waiting an additional 30 minutes (with some fellow bikers who had already been waiting about 40) we rode up the steep hill to the closest town. There we found a truck to take us the remaining 12 miles up to Baños. Once we set out for a romantic and sniffly dinner of pizza, signed up for the morning spa treatment advertised at our hostel for $2.50, and snuggled into bed with a book.
Day one in Baños, we are still feeling really sick and more mucous is coming out of my nose than I thought possible. Yet we have had some super mellow days (if you count a 12 hour bus trip mellow) and felt like we needed to get out and explore. A good introduction seemed like a 15 mile mostly downhill bike ride with a short hike to some waterfalls at the end. So we set out of our hostel to rent some bikes. It was a bit cold and rainy, so all the best gear came out (I am wearing 100% Patagonia, including my undies, how about this for a catalogue pic?). The bike rental shop set us up with some squeaky breaks, dead sexy helmets and a fanny pack to boot. Looking and feeling our best we set out on the mountain bike adventure past 8 waterfalls. After a few photo shoots and some peanut butter-nutella sandwiches, we went on a 3 km trek beside a tumbling river. We saw absolutely nobody else and spent a few minutes getting our fill of the rapids` roar.
According to our bible (Lonely Planet) hitching a ride back to Baños was supposed to be easy and commonplace. After waiting an additional 30 minutes (with some fellow bikers who had already been waiting about 40) we rode up the steep hill to the closest town. There we found a truck to take us the remaining 12 miles up to Baños. Once we set out for a romantic and sniffly dinner of pizza, signed up for the morning spa treatment advertised at our hostel for $2.50, and snuggled into bed with a book.