I jumped off a bridge today in Baños but since we're more than a week behind on blogging I'll wait and tell that story another day. What can I say; I'm a sucker for a dramatic first line.

Almost 4 months into our trip we realized that our leisurely pace won't cut it anymore if we want to hit all the stops on our list and still make it to Patagonia and back home before Thanksgiving. So lately we've been on the move.

We had a great last few days in Quito: We visited a moving museum, Chapel of Man; played silly games with other tourists at the equator; and went high up in the sky to climb a small volcano on the city's new attraction, a Teleferico gondola ride.

The museum sits on the deceased Ecuadorian artist Guayasamin's private property - he intended it as a tribute to the suffering and hope of the Latin American people and people around the world. His works are categorized into three periods - the path of tears, the age of anger, and the age of tenderness. To me the evolution of his painting seemed to mirror personal stages of grief but Josh's academic mind likened them to the different periods of the 20th century - dictatorships, anti-colonialism, and cosmopolitanism. It was both our favorite museum of the trip so far.

Our guide book said we couldn't get this far and not visit the actual equator, so not wanting to be bad backpackers the next day we headed outside Quito to visit the famous line. Apparently it's the only place in the world where the equator runs over land and not sea. We slapped on the sunscreen and prepared for a day of salsa music under the sun - supposedly lots of Quiteños come out on Sundays for the big fiesta. Unfortunately that day was cold and dreary and after just a couple half-hearted Gypsy King covers we had seen enough. We fulfilled the requisite tourist activities (namely cheesy photos with our feet on each side of the line) before we headed to the nearby interactive museum and supposedly true sight of the equator - Inti Nam. There we learned more about Ecuador's many indigenous cultures; got to try to balance eggs; shot cactuses through blow sticks - I shocked myself with a bull's-eye; and saw real live shrunken heads. Now this was fun.

The next and last day in Quito we got a late start, as usual, and rain was coming down when we rode up in the Teleferico with two burly, silent German soldiers, but the day improved after that. The altitude up at 4,800 meters was intense but we were able to hike farther than we had expected. The wind blew away the rain, leaving us with perfect hiking weather and beautiful views of Quito and the surrounding mountains. The volcano was covered with moss and wild flowers, and made for a pretty spectacular destination. Little did we know at the time what a small warm-up this would be in comparison with the excitement of Cotopaxi - the world's highest active volcano.