From Quito we organised a tour to the Amazon Jungle for a few days. We took a very bumpy and uncomfortable overnight bus to the border of the jungle and then spent the better half of the day in jeeps and boats to get deep into the jungle, as far from any of the other tourist lodges as we could. After sitting in the direct, blazing sun in a boat speeding down the river for three hours we were questioning our decision to go to the furthest lodge, but when we finall...

Before and after our Amazon trip, we were in Quito where we could easily organise day trips to various surrounding areas. Sonja took the chance to go on a tour to Quilotoa Lagoon, a crater lake, and Cotopaxi Volcano. Cotopaxi is supposed to be a very iconic looking, snow topped volcano with incredible views from the top but the weather, which is very unpredictable and can change by the minute, decided to stay vey cloudy for the whole time. None the less, it was s...

We chose to structure our time on the Galapagos Islands by first spending a few days there by ourselves to independently explore Santa Cruz island. We then had a 5 day cruise booked that would take us to a number of the other islands with plenty of snorkelling and walking to do each day. One thing that we've found often happens when going to a destination to see its wildlife is that the animals are few and far between, very difficult to spot, leaving us pretty ...

Another night bus took us from Huaraz to the coastal town of Trujillo in Peru, known for being a place to surf. Along with our group of Australian and Canadian travellers, we arrived at 5AM, which is never a very convenient time to arrive anywhere and search for a hostel. After a brief search we all set up shop in the garden of a hostel and eventually got on to breakfast, after a snooze on the benches to recover from the lack of sleep on the bus. Just a very sh...

We took an overnight bus from Arequipa to Lima, arriving in the morning. Having been there before, and with no particular fondness for the city, we only hung around there during the day, and hopped on another night bus immediately northwards to the mountain town of Huaraz. There are plenty of outdoor activities to do in Huaraz. Sonja took advantage of many of these, going rock climbing and two day hikes (Pastoruri Glacier and Laguna 69) during our time there...