Arrived in Guayaquil at 5:30am & decided to shoot straight on through to Quito. So grabbed a particularly grim breakfast in the bus depot & then caught the 7:30am bus to Quito, arriving at about 4ish in the afternoon. Checked into a hostel (2nd one we tried) & chilled out for a while after our 30hour bus trek. I'm still not sorted, so we just nipped into the main gaudy 'gringo' square of multiple bars & restaurants & flashing lights for some g...

It was touch-&-go this morning as to whether we should leave or stay another night. But in the end, we decided to crack on & caught the 10:30 am bus to Piura (3.5hrs), where we hung out in a restaurant until our overnight bus left at 6ish to Guayaquil. So by the end of the day we'd entered our 47th country, Ecuador.

Today wasn't much better than yesterday I'm afraid to say. Lots more laying around interspersed with 'sitting down'!! However we went for a spot of brekkie downstairs & to the bank, after which Rach popped to the shops & sorted out the bus tickets. I did make it out again for a spot of dinner, but then spent the rest of the night watching TV in the hotel, with Rach watching the laptop.

I got VERY little sleep on the bus, due to my stomach cramps & not being able to go to the toilet for 13 hours!!! So as soon as we arrived, things became 'dire' due to my rear! But we found a nice hotel & I spent the entire day in bed/the toilet, in pain & watching sh*te TV with the odd doze here & there. I couldn't eat anything & was struggling to even get liquids down me. So bless Rach. She had a very boring day, but a relaxing one, just rea...

Unfortunately, I decided to throw a wobbly last night, which is a real b***** as it'd been about a year since my last one! Oh well, one a year, I can handle! So this morning we were going to take it easy until we found out that TAME had charged us 3 times for our flight to Panama & not actually booked us on the flight!! So the morning was spent on the phone with the banks trying to sort the mess out. We then caught a cab into the main centre/plaza. We just mi...