Josh hit on some nuns just before we came here to blog. "Hola hermosas," he greeted them as they walked into the restaurant. As in, hey there beautiful. Similar but not quite the same as "Hola hermanas" or hello sisters. My lecherous boyfriend :)

Aside from Josh's unintentional pick-up line the last week has been fairly uneventful. We spent a nice few days in Cuenca but weren't blown away by the city. Don't get me wrong, it's a beautiful place, and probably worthy of its designation as a Unesco Heritage site. The only thing is it couldn't quite compare to the grandeur of Quito and some of the other places we've seen in Ecuador. Plus there just wasn't much to do in Cuenca, at least for two travelers not too gung-ho on the museum circuit. Josh had been pumped for a museum featuring shrunken heads but his enthusiasm waned as the days went on and he never did make it there. We're getting a bit lacksadaisical in our traveling ways...

After Cuenca we came to Vilcabamba here in southern Ecuador, a supposed valley of longevity notable for its many centaurian residents. There's very little to do here except relax so we did our best to comply. We skipped out on a hike in favor of a lingering Mexican meal of mainly chips and guacamole and a yummy brownie with homemade whipcream. Then while Josh went horseback riding I did some yoga by the pool, had a wonderful and cheap massage and relaxed in a hammock overlooking the mountains. This longevity stuff is good times.

Tomorrow we're leaving this little slice of paradise and Ecuador for a 24-hour bus journey to Peru. Our first stop will be Huarez and the Cordillera Blanca, supposedly the most beautiful mountain range in South America, if not the world! (according to Lonely Planet). We were lucky to meet a German couple early on in our journey who highly recommended Huarez and it's been on our list ever since. Interestingly most other travelers have never heard of Huarez, probably because Peru has a little attraction called Machu Piccu soaking up all the fame and glory.

Ecuador's physical beauty is awesome but I'm excited to move on to a new country. While people are generally very polite they are also quite reserved for the most part (at least in the highlands, maybe it's a different story along the coast?), and certainly not nearly as friendly and outgoing as the people we met in Colombia. Perhaps they are just jaded by the number of tourists pouring into their country - or maybe Colombia just skewed my perspective?

We did use some of our down time this week to get some "work" out of the way and I'm proud to report we have purchased our plane ticket home. That's right, we will not be living in South America forever and ever as some predicted. Rather we will be back in New York on November 18, one day before Josh's birthday and a few days before we head to Iowa to celebrate Thanksgiving. We also plan to visit the Bay Area and Los Angeles for the holidays in between looking for an apartment and yes, even jobs. NYC here we come!