Buenas tardes mis amigos!  Today I am in Ecuador!  I was quite sad to leave Peru the other day - a land where the height of sophistication is to be served coffee as a cup of tepid water with an individual sachet of Nescafe, and where you can buy hand-knitted finger puppets on every street corner.  However, the move into Ecuador has been a complete change - pretty much instantly the landscape changed from the desert to the rainforest!

As per usual, there's been loads going on - knowing where to start is the difficult bit.  Last time I wrote I was on a massive high after just completing the Inca Trail.  From there we had an epic driving day to get us to the Colca Canyon.  Although it is meant to be one of the deepest canyons in the world, I couldn't help feeling slightly underwhelmed.  There I was expecting something vaguely resembling the Grand Canyon, and this was a bit more like the Cheddar Gorge!  Although we did see condors (massive vulture-type birds about 3 metres across) flying in the wild, which made it worthwhile.  From there we went to Arequipa, which is possibly the nicest city in Peru.  Loads of the buildings, including the cathedral are made of 'sillar' which is a white volcanic stone, which looks very impressive.  The city itself is really cosmopolitan, with loads of nice shops, restaurants, museums, etc.  We had a great few days there - making the most of the excellent food, and generally chilling out.  The museum with 'Juanita' was amazing - a few years ago they found a mummy of an Inca sacrifice - a young girl - perfectly preserved in the ice.  The mummy herself and all of her clothes and the offerings of jewellery, pottery, etc were displayed and everything looked so new.  In fact they have dated it all to about 600 years ago.

From Arequipa we went to Nazca, where the line patterns were found spanning hundreds of metres in the middle of the desert.  Even though I have taken the flight to look at them before, they were well worth a second look - even just to go up in a small 4-seater Cessna plane!  I disgraced myself however, and was feeling a little green that day, and had to make use of the sick bags on board!  Thankfully I felt better once I got my feet back on terra firma, as we headed straight to the rather oddly-named Huacachina - a town on the edge of the desert with the most enormous sand dunes.  Perfect for getting in a dune buggy and getting the most mental driver in South America (and that's some major feat!) to drive us into the desert.  It was great fun!  We climbed seemingly un-scaleable dunes, only to drive down the other side at top speed, to be met at the bottom by a face full of flying sand!  Trust me, it's better than it sounds!  We attempted some sand-boarding - basically surfing on your belly on a 3-feet long piece of plywood with velcro straps on it, hurtling at top speed down the dunes.  Fortunately most of us came out in one piece, although Duncan in his wisdom tried to be a 'pro' and surf standing up...  only to break his arm falling down at the bottom!  He was promptly carted off to the hospital, his arm set in plaster, then less than an hour and a half later was back in the desert drinking Pisco with us!

Onwards, we headed to Lima, where having seen most of the sights during my first visit, I spent a couple of days chilling out.  We did however manage to get into town in time for a major fiesta, which saw all the streets in the city centre closed off for carnival-style dancing, marching brass bands, colourful costumes and more sequins than you can imagine!

Leaving Lima we headed north along the coast to the ruined city of Chan Chan, where the Moche people lived about a thousand years ago, and the largest mud-brick city in tact anywhere in the world.  We then followed the coast further still past some beautiful scenery to Punta Sal - our beachside idyll for a couple of days.  Punta Sal really is how a beach town should be - a couple of small hotels, a few houses, no shops, no internet, no hassle.  Just a long stretch of soft sand, clean (but a bit chilly!) blue sea and nothing else!  The most energetic thing I did the whole time we were there was to go horseriding along the sea shore!

That pretty much brings us up to date.  We crossed into Ecuador a couple of days ago and arrived at a place called Rio Verde, just outside Baños.  Our campsite is called Pequeño Paraiso, which means Little Paradise.  I thought it sounded a bit cheesey to start with, but now we're here I really understand it - it is really quite blissful.  Just a small campsite with a cute little bar and kitchen, in the middle of the jungle - in a beautiful spot.  What I have seen so far of Ecuador I really like!  A few of us went canyoning in the river yesterday - jumping off of and abseiling down waterfalls, which was brilliant.  We've done some hiking today through local indigenous villages and to some spectacular waterfalls, and tomorrow I am going to do some more riding, followed by a visit to the natural hot springs.  I've only got just over a week left in South America, before leaving my current group and truck, and heading up to Central America to join some new people.  Although I really get on well with everyone in this group, I'm really excited to meet some new people.

Anyway, gotta dash now.  Thank you again for keeping me in touch with everything that's going on at home.  You know I miss you all.

Speak soon.  Love
Nikki xxxxx