Baños is a small town named after its thermal springs. It sits in a valley at the base of a volcano which has been continuously mildly erupting for the last 8 years of so. Although the town and surrounding villages are on high alert it is thought that there is plenty of evacuation time should it decide to blow. We arrived in the town and settled into the first reasonably priced and clean hostel we found, though there were plenty to choose from, this being a hot ...

At last… I am back on two wheels. Today we went mountain biking down the side of Cotopaxi which is classed as an active volcano. It was an early start with a 2 hour jeep ride to the refuge at 4600m. There was only myself and Katie doing the ride on this day so our guide was having to follow us down with the jeep rather than leading us down on his bike so it was up to us to follow the correct path and not ride off the side. Luckily for everyone involved it was...

Arriving in Quito we were struck by it´s location tucked into a long valley and the surrounding mountians. It´s a very beautiful setting. Unfortunately it was poring with rain and the mountains where hidden by cloud but we caught some wonderful glimpses in the three days we were in the city. It has two centers, the old town, which is full of colonial buildings, plazas, churches, and monasteries. Then the new town which is where most of the money is, with new bu...