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 spot for tourists and travelers from all over. Being gringo central has it´s obvious down sides but it mean´t there was plenty of food variety which was certainly welcome after eating the standard meal of chicken or meat with rice and plantain for several days in a row! We had bean burritos which were marvelous, but did mean we were soon adding the the already sulphurous air...

Our first day in town we decided to relax, take a look around and visit one of the thermal baths, we were looking forward to warming our bones after the chill of Quito! The baths were hot as promised and there was a cold shower to cool down in, piped directly from a stunning waterfall overlooking the baths. Surprisingly exhausted, we took a short night trip up to a view point over the city. We were promised views of the volcano but it was too cloudy so they had some fire jugglers entertain us instead.

They next day we decided to take a walk up to a radio mast where we were told we could find the best view of the erupting volcano. After taking a wrong turn and atttempting to fight our way through some undergrowth at a 45 degree angle we turned back and found the drivable road we needed to take. It was a two hour slog steadilly uphill on a switchback road. We passed a couple of small farms, several terratorial dogs and chickens, and a couple of donkeys and cows. The view from the top was very much worth it though with great plumes of smoke and the occasional firey spit from cracks in the adjacent mountain.