June 10, 2025
Hostal La Casa Amarilla
Baños, Ecuador
I got up at zero dark hundred to meet the taxi to take me to my 6:30 bus to Quito. That part of the journey went as planned. I had a little trouble finding a taxi at the Ofelia bus terminal and almost forgot to reclaim my suitcase, but managed to trundle my luggage down the hill and locate a taxi on the main road. Traffic was terrible because of construction and it took an hour to drive from La Ofelia in the north part of Quito to Quitumbe in the south. The taxi ride cost me twice the bus fares, but it was still only $20 and well worth not having to wrestle my luggage on and off city buses.
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| The Quitumbe Bus Terminal |
The Quitumbe bus terminal is huge, clean, and modern. They keep the riffraff out by charging 35 cents admission to the terminal and an additional 20 cents to enter the gates. That 20 cents is included if you buy a bus ticket. I had planned to take the 11:20 bus and had arrived in plenty of time, but the bus was cancelled. For $10, they sold me two seats on the 14:00 bus. I told the hostel I would be later and went to find something to eat. I ordered the tigrillo, which consisted of mashed plantains with onions and short ribs and a couple of poached eggs. Despite the fact that I hadn’t eaten since the previous day’s breakfast, I couldn’t finish the huge plate of food I got for $4.
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| Dogs Loved the Quitumbe Bus Terminal |
The terminal had plenty of seating and was very spacious. The only odd thing was the collection of dogs making themselves quite at home. One was even sleeping on the seats. I waited until 13:45 and then made my way out to the gate indicated on my ticket. My bus was not there. The employee was confused and finally called the office. They told me to come back to the office, which was the equivalent of returning to the ticket counter from the gate at an airport. Apparently, the 14:00 bus had also been cancelled. They refunded my $10 and sent me to a competitor who sold me one seat on the 14:15 bus for $5. The bus was very full and I didn’t get a window seat, but at least I got to Baños.
We retraced the route we had taken as far as the Cotopaxi turnoff and then continued south on the Panamerican Highway as far as Ambato. There, we turned east and headed towards the Amazon basin. At first, the scenery looked much like the area around Cotopaxi. Like Colombia, the farmland in Ecuador tends to be at higher elevation. As we dropped lower, the mountains got steeper and the canyons narrower. I saw greenhouses constructed on such steep hills that it would have been exhausting to walk from the bottom to the top. I was told they were used to cultivate tomates de agua.
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| My Room in Baños |
Baños is situated at about 6,000 feet. I arrived about 17:30 and it was already quite cool. My hostel was only a few blocks from the bus terminal and I was able to walk there even though the airline had busted one of the wheel off my suitcase. Fortunately, it was a front wheel, so I could still tow the bag effectively. Baños had fairly level sidewalks, although they were sometimes obstructed by power poles. Eventually, I located the hostel, which sat at the end of a breezeway. It was nice enough, especially at the price of $22/night. I was tired and only wanted to rest and write.
June 11, 2025
Hostal La Casa Amarilla
Baños, Ecuador
I was all ready to leave my hostel and go look for some coffee when my host greeted me with an unexpected breakfast. He served me a roll with butter and jam, fruit with yogurt and granola, scrambled eggs, and coffee. The listing hadn’t mentioned breakfast and the price was so low that I didn’t expect it. It came as a pleasant surprise.
After breakfast, I walked into downtown Baños to meet the tour that I had booked. Baños is a spa town with an almost European vibe. The cliffs towering over the town are nearly vertical. Tour operators offer every sort of extreme sport. I had only allowed myself one day in Baños, so didn’t have time to enjoy any of them. I had opted for more of a sightseeing and hiking experience with the Route of the 8 Waterfalls tour.
It seems that June is the low season in Baños and the national tourists mostly come on the weekends. I was the only customer, but we went, anyway. My guide was an engaging young man named Santiago who drove a nice Peugeot. It was a very comfortable way to explore the Baños area. Baños sits at 1800 meters (5850’.) The Amazon region begins at 1,000 meters. Our route followed the Rio Pastaza, a tributary of the Amazon which eventually flows into Peru.
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| Baños from the Cascada |
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| La Cascada de la Virgen |
We started the tour with the Cascada de la Virgen, which is located right in town, next to the thermal baths. After climbing the stairs, we got a good view of the town of Baños. A few minutes further down the road, we paid a woman a dollar to drive across her land to the trailhead and hiked to the Cascada Rio Ulba and Cascada el Silencio. We took off our shoes and waded across the stream to get to the Cascada el Silencio. It was a pretty spot where the water fell in three streams.
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| Cascada Rio Ulba |
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| Cascada El Silencio |
The hiking grew more serious as we progressed. Our next stop was El Pailόn del Diablo (the devil’s cauldron), a tall waterfall that drops into a seething bowl before continuing on to a second stage. This waterfall gave off a lot of spray and the steep stone steps down to the bowl were very wet. We donned waterproof ponchos that whipped in the breeze from the falls and sometimes made it tricky to see the slippery steps. It was a good climb down and back through a forest of guayabas. We saw an interesting species of stick bug about six inches long that resembled an evergreen twig. We crossed the river on a hanging bridge to get a different perspective before toiling back up to the parking lot.
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| Stick Bug |
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| Cascada Machay |
The Cascada Machay was the last and tallest waterfall, plummeting about 90 meters or nearly 300 feet. The hike began with a steep switchback trail and then became a series of steel framed stairs and ramps when the terrain became vertical. Santiago told me there were 310 steps, but I think that only counted the metal ones. There were plenty of stone and concrete ones, as well, and lots of ramps so steep that rebar had been nailed to them every six inches or so to prevent slipping. It was a daunting descent, knowing the return was inevitable. The view of the falls, however, was worth it. We rested for a half an hour at the bottom. I soaked my feet in the cold water and Santiago went for a swim.
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| Cascada Machay Stairs |
Climbing back up the cliff was a workout, but I made it in pretty good time. It was good training for the Inca Trail. I needed all the exercise at elevation I could get. Back in the car, we drove back up the old highway to Rio Verde and stuffed ourselves with a grilled trout lunch.
Santiago dropped me off in downtown Baños about 14:30. I really wanted to visit the church but there was a police funeral going on. I watched the procession, complete with police band, enter the church and then I went for a walk around town. I finished my walk with a visit to the church’s museum. The museum was on the second floor of the cloister and I really enjoyed the music from the funeral mass.
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| Beautiful Costumes |
The museum was fairly interesting, aside from some boring religious art and the usual precolumbian figurines. There was an entire large room devoted to costumes for the madonna and child. It took me awhile to figure out why each set had both adult and child sizes. The costumes were incredibly ornate and very beautiful.
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| Two-Headed Calf |
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| Taxidermy Zoo |
There was also another room filled with every sort of taxidermied animal and snakes preserved in formaldehyde. The birds looked pretty moth eaten, but the lambs with extra legs and two-headed calves and pigs were interesting. A life-sized diorama of forest animals was guarded by a stuffed rottweiler.
By the time I finished visiting the museum, the funeral finally let out. The mourners headed to the cemetery and gave me a chance to visit the church. The church was constructed in the early 20th century after the original one was destroyed by an earthquake. The building and the altarpiece were quite beautiful, but most of the artwork was fairly primitive. Many of the paintings depicted local miracles. The explanations were interesting.
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| Church Interior |
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| The Church in Baños |
Rain was predicted and it was getting late, so I walked back up the hill to my hostel and spent the evening posting pictures and writing. The rain finally began in earnest about 21:00.
June 13, 2025
Cotococha Amazon River Lodge
Puerto Napo, Ecuador
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| Hostel in Baños |
It wasn’t a long bus ride from Baños to Tena, so I had a leisurely breakfast and then walked to the bank to get cash because I knew my hotel in the Amazon was far from town and I might need cash to pay for food and tours. After I got cash, I stopped and had a nice latte in a coffee shop. I left the hostel about 10:30 and walked to the bus terminal. A bus was leaving for Tena in five minutes. This was not an express bus. It was pretty empty until we reached Puyo in the Amazon, but then the bus became crowded with locals and schoolchildren going home. It was 15:30 by the time we got to Tena.
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| Tree Fern in Puyo |
Tena was not a very attractive place. Another tourist with whom I spoke had stayed there and she reported no bars or coffee shops to hang out in. I went straight to the taxi stand and caught a taxi to my lodge. Apparently, the name had recently changed and it took some time before the taxi driver determined where to go, despite my showing him on Google Maps. It wasn’t in his list of saved places. Eventually, someone informed him of the name change and we were off. We back-tracked across the Napo river and then followed the river upstream to the lodge. The highway was well paved and the scenery beautiful. It almost looked landscaped. Everything was very green and much more civilized than expected.
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| My Room Was Upstairs |
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| The Library |
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| Lomo Saltado |
The Cotococha Lodge is beautiful. Palapa roofed cabins made of split bamboo were scattered through the jungle and there was a lovely pool and (not very) hot tub. The main building housed reception, the bar and restaurant, and several lounges and viewing platforms. The place was nearly deserted. I really wanted to do a canoe tour on the river, but no one else was interested. I ate lomo saltado, a sort of stir fry with steak and french fries and drank a cold beer before signing up for a hike through the jungle, the only activity with any takers for the following day.
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| My Room |
After a big meal and a large beer, I was ready for a nap. My room was on the second floor of a cabin. The room was lovely, but the king-sized bed was so hard that I ended up sleeping on the cot that served as a couch. There were nowhere near as many mosquitoes as I had expected and I was able to sit on my balcony in a hanging chair and read until it got dark. I spent an hour or so doing laundry, thinking 2.5 days would be long enough for clothes to dry, and then fell asleep early to a chorus of frogs and crickets.
I woke up early, since I had passed out by 21:00 the night before. My clothes were still as wet as they had been the night before. I started to doubt they would ever dry. I showered, dressed, and went up to the lodge for breakfast. Breakfast seemed to be a big deal in Ecuador and I was once again served, granola with yogurt, fruit, rolls, scrambled eggs, coffee and juice.
The tour operator, a woman named Karin from Austria, picked me up at 8:30 and drove me for about 20 minutes to her lodge where we met the other participant, a twenty-something from England. We were outfitted with rubber boots, met our guide, and drove a little way further into the jungle before climbing straight up a muddy path that I would never have even seen.
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| Hiking in the Jungle |
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| 600 Year Old Matapalo |
The terrain was much rougher than I had expected. While we never climbed very high, the hills were extremely steep with sheer drop-offs beside the trail. Our guide told us about the plants and a few birds and insects we encountered. The rubber boots kept us safe from poisonous snakes and allowed us to wade through creeks, but didn’t provide the securest footing. The views from ridge tops were stunning. There were a lot of very large trees, including one humongous 600-year-old matapalo with a 12 meter diameter that sheltered bats in its hollow core. While wading through a creek, we came across the carcass of a poisonous snake, the bite of which our guide said would kill in five minutes. We returned to the tour operator’s lodge and drank iced tea while I waited for my ride. While it wasn’t particularly hot, we were completely soaked from the humidity. When I got back to my room, my clothes were as wet as my laundry.
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| The Pool at Cotococha |
I decided to check out the pool, since I was the only soul around. The water was actually too cold, but the spa was a pleasant temperature and I enjoyed sitting there and experiencing the jungle around me. I spent the remainder of the afternoon sitting on my balcony, reading. Then I went to the lodge for a fabulous steak and glass of red wine.
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| My Balcony |
No one else had signed up for any tours for the next day. Karin had told me that I could go alone if I paid 1.5 times the normal rate. I agreed to this, as I only had one more day and wanted to see more. The concierge had trouble reaching her and I went back to my room not knowing if I would be going the next day or not.
June 14, 2025
Cotococha Amazon River Lodge
Puerto Napo, Ecuador
Shortly after I awoke at 6:30, I received a message that my tour for the day was confirmed. As the poor concierge didn’t work the morning shift, he was unable to answer my question as to how much it was going to cost me. I began to be concerned that I wouldn’t have enough cash.
After another lovely breakfast, I attempted to pay for the tour with my credit card. Unfortunately, the hotel didn’t have a credit card machine. They sent me a payment link, but my bank won’t allow me to make online purchases without two-party verification. They won’t send a code to my Mexican phone, so I have to call them. I couldn’t call them because I was out of minutes. I couldn’t buy more minutes because I couldn’t use my credit card online. I had enough cash to pay for the tour, but that left me without cash to pay for my incidentals at the hotel and travel back to Quito. I decided not to worry about it until I got back because I did have enough money for a taxi to Tena, if necessary.
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| Our Canoa |
Karin's husband, Roberto, picked me up at 8:45 and drove me for about 20 minutes to the Rio Arajuno where I met Junior, my guide from the jungle hike the day before, who would be my boatman for the day. He was assisted by a teenage kid that I believe was his son. Our vehicle was a 14 meter long canoa that was maybe six feet wide in the middle. It was powered by an outboard, but the water was low and Junior sometimes had to raise the motor and rely on his helper to steer us with a long, bamboo pole.
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| Running the Rapids |
Going downstream was pretty easy. We followed the river and negotiated a few rapids. A little way above the confluence of the Rio Arajuno with the Rio Napo, we beached the canoa and the kid and I took inner tubes down the river while Junior went ahead with the canoa. The water was cool, but I got used to it after a while. The current was slow aside from the rapids and my young guide nudged me along. I got pretty soaked going through the rapids, but it was fun. Before we joined the larger river, we pulled out and spent a few minutes swimming in a quiet spot. Then we continued on to the Laguna Caiman.
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| Amazon Fashion |
I felt pretty silly parading around in my bathing suit and a pair of rubber boots. Junior introduced me to many of the native plants, including the achiote that is used as a seasoning in parts of Mexico. He broke open one of the seed pods, which contained seeds similar to a pomegranate. He used the red juice to paint my face. Before we visited the caimans, Junior gave me a demonstration with a blow dart gun. He offered me the opportunity to try it and I think I surprised him when I scored a bullseye on my first attempt.
The pond containing the caimans was coated with a greasy sheen, possibly from the meat fed to the caimans. My young guide enjoyed baiting them and I got to feed one with a piece of meat on the end of a stick. They were smaller than crocodiles, but just as toothy.
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| Tapirs Love Water |
We climbed back into the canoa and continued a short way upstream to Amazoonica, a wildlife rescue organization for rainforest creatures. A German volunteer took me on a tour. Their mission is to return the animals to the wild, but many of them are too injured or too domesticated to live in the wild, so they remain at the shelter.
I especially enjoyed watching the tapirs. While I had seen tapirs in the wild in Costa Rica, I did not know that they loved the water. The male tapir was having a grand time swimming around the muddy pond in their enclosure.
The organization also had peccaries, but they were hidden in the brush. I saw a couple of fairly tame coatis and lots of toucans and parrots, most of which were either injured or former pets who repeatedly approached humans if left in the wild, leaving them vulnerable to trafficking. Wildlife trafficking is illegal in Ecuador.
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| Wooly Monkey |
The center had three types of monkeys: wooly monkeys, yellow bellied spider monkeys, and one squirrel monkey. There were also numerous wild spider monkeys swinging through the trees. I even saw one mother with a baby on her back. With the exception of the alpha wooly monkey, who followed us everywhere, they were too quick to photograph.
The center had a large anaconda which had been captured in town after someone released his pet. She was very undersized for her age when she came to the center because she had been kept in a small tank. Released into a large enclosure, she had grown three meters.
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| Anaconda |
Back across the river, we stopped at an establishment that appeared to be run by Junior’s female relatives. Before serving me a nice chicken lunch, they demonstrated the making of chicha, a fermented alcoholic beverage made from yucca. The yucca was boiled, mashed, mixed with some grated yam (They used one of the spiky trees I had seen the day before as a grater.) and some of the cooking water, and left to ferment for three or four days. I tried a little of the finished product. It didn’t have much flavor or kick, but it was popular for indigenous festivities.
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| Making Chicha |
The women and girls of the family then performed a dance for me and the two youngest (maybe 6 and 2) took my hands and urged me to join them. I had donned my clothes at Amazoonica, but it was still difficult to dance in rubber boots.
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| My Cup of Chicha |
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| My Lovely Lunch |
For lunch, I was served chicken, patacones, yucca, and salad. It was only about noon and I had eaten a big breakfast. I couldn’t really do the meal justice, but I did make sure to eat all the chicken. The presentation was beautiful.
After lunch, we headed back up the river. Running the rapids downstream was fairly easy because the current carried us and we had only to steer. Going upstream, Junior had to find a channel deep enough to use the motor. A couple of times he had to gun it and then pull up the motor to get over shallow spots. I worried that we were going to have to get out and push, but we made it. It reminded me of several dinghy landings I had made in rivers over the years.
Roberto met me back at the spot where we started and I managed to convince him to take me to the bank in Misahualli. There was just one problem: the bridge across the Rio Napo to Misahualli had washed out. Roberto took me to a landing where I boarded a canoa to cross the river to Misahualli. Fortunately, Misahualli wasn’t very big and I found the bank with no trouble. I withdrew some money, bought a few snacks to get some change, and then took another canoa back across the river. I was back at the lodge before 14:00.
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| Canoas at Misahualli |
I spent the afternoon on my balcony, following the No Kings Day protests on the internet. About the time I got hungry, it started to pour. I didn’t want to go out in the rain because I was leaving the next day and nothing would have time to dry. I ended up skipping dinner and making do with the snacks I bought in Misahualli.
June 16, 2025
La Rabida Hotel Boutique
Quito, Ecuador
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| Rainy Morning |
It was still pouring when I woke up on Sunday morning. I had a long trip back to Quito, so had to get going. I put on my raincoat and dashed up to the restaurant for breakfast. I checked out and the staff was very helpful about carrying my suitcase and calling a taxi, but it was raining so hard that everything was soaked by the time I was installed in the taxi. The taxi drove through the rain back to the bus terminal in Tena for $10. I tipped him extra for coming out in the rain and not overcharging me.
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| The Tena Bus Terminal |
I got to the bus terminal about 9:30 and bought a ticket to Quito for $8.60. The next bus left at 10:30, so I hid in the terminal building and watched it rain. The bus left on time, but something happened (a flat tire, maybe) and it took us an hour to get out of Tena. We drove up the E45 to the E20 instead of passing through Ambato and Baños as I had come. The bus stop in Cosanga was flying pride flags. This route was much rougher than the way I had come. A few times we had to drive through streams and past mudslides. It continued to rain on and off and there were waterfalls everywhere. Much of the time, we were in the clouds and couldn’t see anything beyond the highway.
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| Crossing the Mountains |
The road got steeper and steeper. After about 4.5 hours, we crossed the mountains and stopped at what I believe was Pifo. Most of the passengers got off there and I was concerned that maybe I had missed something until I entered the Quitumbe terminal into Google Maps and saw that we were still half an hour away. I got off when we reached the terminal. I really needed a bathroom, but the only restrooms in that whole, huge terminal were closed for repairs. I quickly grabbed a taxi. I showed the driver which hotel I wanted to go to on Bookings.com and he used my phone to navigate. Unfortunately, Google sent him to some random apartment complex in Quito. Fortunately, it was close to the terminal and not too far out of the way. I was very relieved to finally make it to La Rabida Hotel Boutique before the bathroom situation became dire.
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| La Rabida Hotel Boutique |
