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 with his Swiss partner - bridge swinging, canyoning and white water rafting. There were 4 trucks staying at the same time as us plus 2 non-truck groups so they're raking it in I reckon! They also seem to be the operator with the best reputation for safety in the area which is always a bonus when you're doing the activities with them!

Early to tent for me (again!) and on Tuesday I went with Anita to the Pilon del Diablo waterfall. Wow, this was impressive, even by my Iguassu standards. I can't remember the stat but it's one of the 10th largest waterfalls somewhere (I'm guessing South America). It was pretty tall and there were several balconied viewing points. We then saw a sign pointing to the 'Grieta al Cielo'. I don't have my dictionary to hand so not really sure what that means but it was a way to reach behind the waterfall near the top. We had to crouch down and walk in that position for a good few metres before being able to straighten up and then crouch down again and do the same again a few times. We then reached a tiny little hole that we had to clamber up and through and there it was - the back of the flow. It was pretty cool as I've never been behind a waterfall before. (Don't elephants go there to die? Not in South America obviously....unless I'm unaware of the wildlife here.) Anyway, it was good fun until a huge crowd of schoolchildren appeared pushing, shoving and giggling (at me, of course because of the blonde hair!) and then scrambling through the hole and pathway beside us! After visiting a swinging bridge that also had a good view of the fall, we had a sap up lunch (for about $4 each) and headed back to camp where I had to prepare for my bridge swing - yes, it's adrenalin time again!

I had decided to do a 25m bridge swing.25m because apparently even if you jump from 100m you only fall the same distance and just swing a bit higher and apparently you get a greater rush from a lower height as the ground rushes towards you at a faster and more terrifying pace. Anyway, that's the theory. I wasn't scared about it at all, probably because I've already done the bungy jump and know I can do it (even though my brain still won't allow me to remember it!). However, once on the bridge, I started to get butterflies. I decided to jump backwards for something different and suddenly it was my turn. Once harnessed up, the hardest thing was actually climbing over the bridge railing onto the tiny platform. This isn't like NZ were everything is set up professionally and any bridge they use is actually closed. Oh no, this is the main road in the area and there are cars, buses and lorries powering across the bridge every minute or so. The scary thing was that the bridge wobbled like hell every time so it made you wonder how sturdy the structure actually was! Anyway, I gracefully (er...not!) clambered over the bridge railing and with a bit of guidance found my feet in the platform. 3,2,1 and I leapt backwards, spread-eagled, screamed my head off and then started swinging backwards and forwards under the bridge, almost to the height of the bridge on the first swing or two. It was great fun although I kept crashing into the tops of the trees and then finally got lowered down to a guy who almost fell in the river trying to catch me! There's avideo (of sorts) on my camera but you'll need to watch carefully to make me (and what I'm doing) out when I post it on picasa.

Tuesday night was horrendous. It started to rain fairly early on. Now I can camp (with my 5-ish years of training!) but in the rain? Nah. I'm a fair-weather camper I'm afraid. The ground was squelchy outside our tent and the rain just battered all night. I hardly slept, it was so torrential. As we discovered the next morning, somehow the peg had come out of the fly sheet (and moved itself a yard or two) but only on my side (I think it was sabotage). Consequently, a load of my stuff was soaking wet, including my laptop, SLR, rucksack and a load of clothes. Not amused! Still, all par for the course I suppose.

On Wednesday, Vee, Nienke and I headed into Banos to do some group shopping and hit the internet (amazing how quickly you get withdrawal symptoms!). Now Banos (not to be confused with the word for toilet!) is home to the Tungurahua volcano which had a serious eruption in 1999 and the town was evacuated for months. Same thing happened in 2006 when a state of emergency was declared. The latest semi-serious eruption was in 2008 and, in fact, the British government advises people not to go into the town as nobody can quite predict how the volcano is feeling at any time. We therefore had to sign a waiver form to go there! It's all very tame and sensible when I think back to Tanna in Vanuatu and the fact that I climbed to the rim of a clearly active volcano that was shooting bright red lava rocks over my head every 5 minutes!

Got back to camp and Vee and I set off on another mini adventure - to see some waterfalls via shopping trolleys. Well, ok, not quite trolleys but they did look like them. They are sort of cable car contraptions called trabanitas and the 1st one we went on is 500m long and is suspended 100m above the river. It's on a kind of pulley system I suppose and it was fun, if very short. The view of the split waterfall below us was stunning. Nobody asked us for any money so we headed off on a 2.5km walk to another waterfall, through muddy jungle I might add! We clambered down a precarious pathway (part of it looked like it had been involved in a mudslide) and suddenly we were at the top of one of the falls - scary! It was actually really dangerous as this thing was about 100m and there wasn't really anywhere to walk or stand safely. Very nice setting though. Found our way to the next trabanita but there was nobody there. We could see the trolley on the other side of the gorge so we stood and waved (and tried to yell but even my foghorn voice didn't reach the other side!). Hmmm, didn't fancy walking all the way back to where we'd started. We walked little way back to a restaurant we'd spotted (well, someone's house offering 'deported fish' to eat - whatever that is) and the little lady in there came back with us to the 'terminal' and radio'ed to the bloke opposite (who was either asleep or having a laugh at our expense). The whole journey (including our bus fare to and from the start/end point) cost us $1.50 each - bargain!

While the boys stayed back at camp to start the BBQ for dinner, a group of us headed back to Banos to go to the thermal baths. We travelled there in the back of a dodgy wagon that had benches (not fixed down so you had to cling on tight!), a maniac driver (and we didn't really have much to hold onto) and what seemed to be petrol fumes being pumped into the back. We also couldn't see out (except out of the back where there was no barrier and you felt you were going to hit the road at any moment) and were being subjected to high volume music fed through tinny speakers. It was a bit Schindler's List esque. The baths were good, although one was so scalding hot that we all felt like we should be on the BBQ instead of the meat and they were pretty busy so not all that relaxing. Great BBQ and I managed to stay up until 10pm - woohoo, late night - and didn't have any alcohol!

Emotional Meltdown

Yep, I seem to be having another one. You can skip this bit - it's more for me to look back on and remember what was going through my mind at the time. I have been miserable for the past 2-3 weeks and couldn't quite put my finger on it. I seem to have lost all inclination to be sociable and am isolating myself from my group - not that there are many I would actually choose to spend my time with in the real world anyway but even so, my professional training allows me to make smalltalk and talk bulls*** til the cows come home but I just can't be bothered. The problem is that I'm craving intelligent conversation (I think I've already mentioned this) and I'm simply not getting much in this group so my brain is turning to mush day by day. The other issue is that I really miss the things I had on the first leg from Ushuaia to Santiago. It was all there - friendship, romance, fun, lots and lots of giggling, a great sociable crowd, lots to do and spectacular scenery. That's it in a nutshell I reckon - all of those things are missing and it's making me miss them and get incredibly lonely at the same time. Hey ho, I just need to remember what could be around the corner - in the short and medium term......!! Life goes on eh....?!