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And still half drunk from the yesterdays christmas party I head out for Banos, a famous place in Ecuador for its astonishing views and hot springs... I had my share of hot springs and already got sick from the place in Costa Rica, so I decide that this time I will only shoot for the views.. I just see that how right I was to choose to go for the views... These are some more views from the road with gorgeous green cloud mountains of ecuador... And some ethnic views of walking indigenous people... I am telling you culture is an interesting thing.. No one in the world would be able to force a turkish old lady to wear those ugly hats... Or at least according to my understanding of an old Turkish lady =)...
Oh by the way I decided to open a section here for my ma... Until Ecuador, I have always thought that the Turkish drivers are definitely the worst in the world... Sorry guys, we lost the world cup in driving.... These are the pictures I took while we were passing some vehicles in ecuador... And trust me in each of those pictures there was one other vehicle exactly near us, and we never ever backed up.... Thanks god I am still alive to post those pictures =)... I should admit that ecuadorian drivers are "brave"... BTW the last picture shows our driver and his seat belt, that belt moves to the front only if there is a cop in the horizon... =)
So I finally arrive for Banos, at the same time the hideout for the furious volcano Tungurahua, Tungurahua erupted in 1998 killing many people and making the area closed until 2001... Now people are back, but the volcano is still carefully observed... This time I was hoping to see some lava, my dreams are ruined immediately at the hostel, apparently there is no lava. And for the reasons I will explain later, the first picture is the only picture of Tungurahua I have from my whole trip!!! =( .. When will I have some good luck with volcanoes, right now my only remaining chance is if one erupts all of a sudden from nowhere when I am close to it in Brazil =)...
The remaining pictures are from the city of banos, which is exactly in the middle valley of a bunch of volcanoes.. There are a bunch of vista points, which take around 3.5-4 hours with some hard core trekking, and this is exactly what I am shooting for... In the last picture you can see how some other people cheat =)
And now I get my rewards for my hard work of walking. Man I am telling, these walks were really some hard core walks... I walked through Bella Vista, village of Runtun, and Vista Virgen in 4 hours... But I am telling, it is worth it still for the green mountains with clouds, which really made my life in whole Ecuador...
Anyways, the Luna Runtun sign is there for its hillarious writing.. The """Adventure Spa""" !!!! I am having soo much adventure in my spa that I am feeling like Indiana Jones... This is what I exactly can call Ecuadorian Marketing =)..
And now the surprise time!!! I was going to head for Riobamba after here, to take a train ride from Riobamba to Nariz del Diablo. This is a famous touristic train ride that goes through some gorgeous scenic views in Ecuador... Guess what, I learn that train is every two days only and the next one is immediately the day after at 6 am!!!! Soo what do I do? I am not the easy traveller, I take my shower in my hostel, the guys are happy as I left the room paying for the whole night, and I immediately shoot for riobamba 2 hours drive from Banos.... I really need to learn when I get tired.... =)
Anyways you will say who the hell those guys are??? These guys are the cool german guys I met on my way from Banos to Riobamba just before entering my bus... We talk with each other in a combined language of German, Spanish and English ( Apparently for each language there is at least one guy who doesn´t understand very well=) , and they invite me for a dinner at their place. They are working as teachers in Ecuador ( there are many europeans in Ecuador working in elementary schools and also work as english teachers in different schools)... Anyways the result is I am way out of the beaten path close to some university in Riobamba eating with 5 german guys in south America while listening to some interesting classical-opera mixture (you guys need to send me the name of the CD we were listening there)... They have awesome pancakes and cool accompany definitely.. In the first picture you see Johanna explaining us how she teaches "heads and shoulders knees and toes knees and toes" to her students =)... The second one is a group picture, only Jan´s girlfriend is missing as she was tired early for sleep... Hi from here to Jan, Johanna, Fritz, Fabian and Judith... Let me definitely know when you come to Turkey... Hasta Luego...
There is a story about how I was able to get into this train. Please check Perfectly Ecuadorian Stories Section to learn more about it. First picture is me waiting for my train.
And now an important breakpoint in my journey... I met my first Turkish throughout my whole journey!!!!!!! ( I don´t count mehmet as he was with me from the start).. Please welcome Senol, who lives in Germany and works as a designer and has a head as crazy as me to go to Iquitos to the middle of amazonian jungle off the beaten path of peru!!!!! You will soon see more about the trip to iquitos... We immediately warm up for each other, and soon we decide to go there together, los turcos en Amazona!!!! Anyways, let me go on with Nariz del Diablo train... As you can see from the third picture, it is not from the usual trains that we are used to =)).. And of course we are not usual tourists, we will find some creative ways to get on it =)))... (The remaining of this section is again dedicated to my ma=)
The views from the train and the valleys we pass through are absolutely awesome... And it is cute to have our red light in front of us, it feels more like a toy train going through hard roads by itself.. I can even imagine its face in front smiling while carrying us in amazing vistas.
I told you, ecuador is beautiful.. And I absolutely love those mountains... On the road, we go through some villages, and apparently people in the villages are as much interested in us as we are in them =)...
Some more of the gorgeous local views and some local entrepreneurs for tourists... And they make good money for ecuadorian standards there...
Chuuuf Chuuuuf!!!! Ola amigos....
This trip lasted for 4 hours, and I took around 250 pictures, deleted like 150 of them and could only select 40 of them for your view,, soo don´t ever say that there are too many pictures here.. Each of them is a separate beauty....
And yes Ma,,, I was in the middle of the top of the train all the time holding absolutely nothing on the sides!!!! I guess the trains brakes were not working properly anyway, so I was in no more danger than the other people there =P
We finally come to the final section of our journey in this train... The famous scenic railroad for Nariz Del Diablo (The nose of the devil)... I personally believe that the earlier parts were also really scenic too... But for this part, I really have to strongly assert this, those picture are nothing... The place is way too beautiful huge and gorgeous to be able to capture with any camera that humans have made soo far... soo if you like those views and feel a little crazy blood inside,, you know what you need for it...
In the final part of my trip, my battery was dead (I can hear some people saying pheew finally =) )... So there is not much I can do, I have some pictures taken with the nariz del diablo and our cute train, thank nariz for those gorgeous views we have seen and adios for our next adventure in the colonial city of Cuenca...
