Ecuador

Quito
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Quito is the capital of Ecuador, with a population of about 2 million people. It is about 2,800 metres above sea level, but after spending much of the previous few weeks at altitude, this wasn't a problem for us. We liked Quito. There were plenty of green areas, good restaurants and lively nightlife. We spent over a week here, taking classes in Spanish and Salsa Dancing (more about that later). We spend a lot of time exploring the city, going for long walks and enjoying the wide variety of cuisine on offer.

Salsa Classes
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We decided to take Salsa classes in Quito, taking classes for an hour each day for five days. We learned five or six of the basic steps over the course of the lessons from Paulo, our teacher. It was great fun - it took us a while to get going but once we did, we fairly burned up the floor! We even managed to bewilder Paulo with a couple of our moves that he never knew existed in Salsa. We are looking forward to using what we learned later in the trip.

The Amazon Rainforest
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The Amazon covers an area of about 7 million square kilometres in total. To put that into context, it's about 90 times the size of Ireland. We went to the Ecuadorian part of the Amazon, about 8 hours from Quito. We visited an indigenous community, where we learned a little about their lives. Many of them marry at a very young age - 12 or 13 - and have up to ten children. We took a canoe trip down one of the rivers, with dense jungle on both sides. After a long hike in the forest, the group finished off the day with a dip at the foot of a waterfall.

Banos
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Banos is a town famous for its thermal springs. We arrived on a Sunday morning, and the place was really busy. There were probably 15 or 20 baths in total, with the water temperature ranging from freezing to quite hot. It reminded us a little of the saunas in Korea, with families enjoying the time spent with each other, moving from one spring to the next.

The Middle of the World
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Mitad del Mundo is a place north of Quito where the equator passes through the country. A 30 metre monument marks the spot, with the four sides of the monument facing North, South, East and West. The latitude is marked with a yellow line, giving a good photo opportunity for the tourists to put one foot in the Northern Hemisphere and the other in the Southern Hemisphere. There is also a museum inside the monument giving detailed information of the indigenous communities in Ecuador's different provinces.