Thursday morning we left early from our Quito hostel and caught a bus to Mindo. This is a beautiful little town, a popular vacation location. Fortunately, we hit it in the low season. We started with food at their famous chocolate place where they actually grow cacao and make their own chocolate. La Quetzal - if you make your way to Mindo, go here, and eat a brownie.
Next, we got tickets for the terabita, a cart hanging on a zip line that carried us across a large drainage and deep into the rainforest. We hiked for about an hour and a half up and down hills to see waterfalls. It was hot and green and awesome!
We rested for a bit during the daily rainfall back in our hostel - Biohostal, a really great place that is super dedicated to conservation, and the lady was so nice!
We went for dinner on a deck where we could eat and watch birds. We didn't see a toucan, though. Birdwatching guides are pretty pricey. But we did see some really beautiful ones.
Our last event of the day was a pretty big deal for Karis. It is called the frog concert - Concerto de Arana. They were so loud and cool. We took a walk with a guide through the rainforest at night, when the weird animals are most active. So we saw frogs (super tiny), stick insects, cool plants, and some really enormous and ugly spiders. The first one I saw outside of the water was a large, hairy, gray wolf spider. Also, I am arachnophobic. I tried really hard, but I had a minor panic attack, I found it hard to breathe, and I almost cried. Tanya offered for us to go back, but I refused to be a pansy. Instead, I just told those in front not to tell me when there were spiders, and I stayed behind Tanya, gripping her backpack for dear life. I still saw frogs and stick bugs, though.
Tanya saw one really cool spider - probably the size of soft drink lid, purple legs, red body, and hairy. Another one was about the size of a half dollar, all black, and chunky.
We were not allowed to take pictures.
That was quite enough for me.
The next morning, we took a long walk down to the Mariposas del Mindo, the butterfly farm. It was so cool!! They were just flying around, and we could pick them up (by legs only), and some were just coming out of their cacoons - so awesome! We have tons of pictures, so I'll try to keep them to a minimum.
After lunch, we caught a bus back to Quito. From there, things got a little sketch.
1. We got a cab to the airport, but it took about an hour and a half. He circled around the airport, and kept saying it would take longer because of traffic or whatever. But then he was lost? I think. He said on the radio a couple times that he had Americans. Tanya started asking a bunch of questions like, how long will it take, are we almost there, etc. The guy asked her what country we were from, and she didn't answer. She just told him that he was lost. Love her. Anyway, we finally made it to the airport, and we didn't miss our flight.
2. We got to Guayaquil, and we were supposed to have a ride to our hostel. But we were early, so we got our own cab. We went exactly to where it was on the map (no address online, though... Weird), and it wasn't there. Nowhere. So we were in the city at 8pm with no place to stay.
3. We found a hotel that fortunately was the same price as our original hostel. It was hot. It is hot and humid here. We were hungry, so we went across the street to a restaurant bar. Loud, weird, lots of drinking and smoking... We didn't stay long after eating.
Whew. It ended. And now we're on our way to the Galapagos. Yay!!
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