Back in Ecuador

Hola!
Stace and I are back in Ecuador now, and are having a blast. After about 30 hours of travelling on buses and stopovers we eventually made it to the little town of Vilcabamba in southern Ecuador. We took a taxi to Hosteria Izcayluma, a beautiful paradise hidden in the hills outside of Vilcabamba. Exhausted from our travelling, we rolled into hammocks hanging in the common area and slept for the better part of the day. The German owner then showed us to our dormitory room, leading us down a cobblestone path lined with beautiful plants and flowers of all different shapes, colours and sizes. The dorms were clean and comfortable with 2 levels and a massive stone bathroom. Hammocks lined the deck outside the rooms. It was just complete paradise! We spent 3 nights here, stuffing ourselves with the restaurant´s wonderful food and relaxing in the chilled out atmosphere. They had a pool and a massive chessboard (We had fun playing with that). I was perfectly content to sit in a hammock for hours and read my book. It was AWESOME!

Here is Stacey kicking my royal bum at chess...

One thing I really wanted to do was go horseback riding and I conned Stacey into coming with me. It was a drizzly day, so we opted for the half day tour instead of the full day. Our guide picked us up a the hostel and lead us into town where we were equiped with rubber boots and cowboy hats and shown our horses. In no time we viewing the world from a different height, and on our way. Now it´s been a good 5 or 6 years since I´ve ridden a horse and I was just getting my bearings when they started trotting...bouncy bouncy. Stacey rides past me on her horse "Vikki, what do I do??" Pretty funny. Once we got outside of town and into the country side, the path narrowed and we slowed down, enjoying the views and calmness of the area. Our guide took us to a beautiful secluded waterfall and gave us fresh fruit from an orange tree, which we gobbled down before heading back. Once we entered the town again, the horses took off, eager to be home. This would have been fine if I didn´t have to badly go to the bathroom. Not a good combination when you´re bouncing up and down in a saddle. All in all it was a great experience (I´m not sure Stacey would agree with me), and we both had extremely sore bottoms the next day.

Doesn`t she look like a pro??

After Vilcabamba, we took a six hour bus up to the beautiful city of Cuenca. After staying one night in a fairly unsettling hostel, where the rooms were tucked in between doctors offices (Weird!) we moved to a cute little hostel by the river. It´s a beautiful area, and you can see families washing their clothes in the river and letting them dry on the grassy banks. Today we took a fairly long bus ride to the Inca ruins called Ingapirca. Not as brilliant as Machupicchu, but they were still incredible!
Ok, I have more to say but the computer cafe is closing.
Hopefully soon we will meet up with our climbing friends and do some climbing in the surrounding mountains.
I miss you all and hope you´re smilin and enjoying life!

Much Love,

Vikki