The land that time forgot Wow, wow, wow! I knew this was going to be amazing, awesome, stunning, spectacular, out of this world....but I didn't quite know how much. What a fabulous place. We arrived on our boat via plane, mini ferry, taxi and zodiac - it was a 22 berth G4 but there were only 10 of us on it - plus 9 crew - the naturalist guide (Wilo), 2 chefs (Avel and Edison), 2 sailors (Alfredo and Arnaldo), the cabin boy (Francisco), the waiter/barman (Wilma -...

On 1st June (bloody hell, can't believe how quickly time flies) we left the thriving metropolis of Otavalo and headed for Quito, stopping off at the equator on the way. It's called 'la midad del mundo' (the middle of the earth) and, perhaps stupidly, I didn't even put 2 an 2 together that 'Ecuador' means equator in Spanish. Duh! Of course it does (if you think about it!). The original equator line was drawn in the 1700s and that served as the official marker u...

We headed north over the equator (haven't stopped there yet to jump across and back again and marvel at the change in water direction - that's for Tuesday!) to Otavalo, a famous market town north of Quito. It's basically where all of the wares are made that are sold throughout the rest of South America - from mantelpiece tourist tat to jewellery and art to alpaca clothing, pashminas and sofa throws. Everyone else in our group has gone mad buying stuff.I'd love to...

We drove to an eco-lodge called Shangri-La just outside the small town of Tena. When we got to Tena to have lunch, there's been so much rain recently that the whole main street has washed away! The lodge was pretty cool - like a higgledy piggledy wooden house. We dumped our bags and then went for a jungle walk. There were 2 groups as one involved an obstacle course at the end and I didn't fancy that so 5 of us did an easier trail. You still needed to hoist yourse...

On Monday we had another long-ish drive to Rio Verde, near Banos where we were staying in a place called Pequeno Paraiso. This is a hostel and campsite run by Richard (a Scot and ex-Dragoman driver) and his French wife Bea. Beautiful setting in a lush garden. Apparently they built their house for about $500 and now it's worth $20k. Bea seems to run the guest side of things (although she was a bit miserable for my liking!) and Richard runs an adventure business wi...