Baños (Ecuador) - work, work, work

Volunteering at Fundacion Arte del Mundo is proving to be an absolute blast and so far from real work it is hard to believe. A well run organisation, great crew of people and an excellent work space really make it almost too easy. I have found myself three quite different jobs to keep myself busy with, though none of them are too stressful.

In the afternoons, I hang out in the library (the BIB) and play games with kids, read to them in Spanish and try to get involved in craft type activities. Sometimes we play games in the yard and on Friday I was the wolf in an Ecuadorean version of 'what's the time Mr Wolf'. Lots of fun and I scarily quite enjoy spending time with the little ones. At night, I teach a Spanish class to an odd selection of local tourist guides, hotel owners, single mums and teenage girls. Their standards are so different it is quite a challenge. Otherwise, I am heading up the publicity activity for our upcoming Ciro de Los Titeres (circus of the puppets). I managed to write a press release in Spanish last week and have lined up a radio interview and free coverage in the local rag - actually a ten page photocopied newsletter, reminscent of school newspapers.

In total, none of this takes up more than 3 or 4 hours a day and my weekends are free. So, lots of time for hiking, visiting the hot spring baths, taking a few Spanish lessons, cooking and playing cards. It really is an easy life.

Misahualli (Ecuador) - amazonian adventure

Around 3 hours by bus from Baños lies the little town of Misahualli (more easily remembered as Miss Hawaii), perched on the edge of the Amazonian rainforest. Although the town can't have more than a few hundred residents, it has a handful of tour companies more than willing to take you into the jungle, a few basic restaurants and a scruffy parque central complete with a gange of thieving monkeys.

My crew and I chose to miss out on the 'indigenous museum craft workshop' type attractions and instead get as far into the primary forest as possible in one day - which is really not that far. A 3 hour 'canoe' ride (I'd call it a motor launch) takes you a fair distance up the Rio Napo, a tributuary of the Amazon itself. From there, we slowly trekked with our toothless guide, for 3 or 4 hours seeing a host of colourful insects, gigantic butterflies, noisy birds, shy monkeys, tropical edible fruits and some collosal trees. This was the real deal and I enjoyed it, although I still didn't have a real feeling I had actually spent time in the Amazon rainforest. Perhaps I needed a close encounter with a boa constrictor or puma to make it seem real.

Baños (Ecuador) - rumble near the jungle

Roughly in the centre of Ecuador, in a valley of volcanos, lies a small town named after the thermal springs which are prevalent here. Right now, the mother volcano Tungurahua herself is pretty lively, spewing out flaming hot rocks and rumbling day and night. The locals don't seem to be concerned and so I am following their lead. Besides, the authorities have an efficient evacuation plan and, given this is Latin America, that puts my mind at full ease. I might be the only one fleeing anyway. Apparently the villagers have been evacuated before, only to return to find their houses looted by the local cops. It was a band of grannies that last time refused to leave and marshalled the rest of the population.

This town is touristy, very touristy and I have not even seen a weekend yet. But it does this in a very tranquil way and most of the visitors are from other places in Ecuador - not gringos. The hot topic in town relates to the ravenous 'gringa hunters' who work as guides for the many outdoor pursuit companies. They are pretty successful too, with many a dreamy-eyed backpacker believing they are the special one, only for said guide to notch another mark on his bedpost and hit the bars the following night. Amusing stuff and, I guess, a change from the opposite happening in touristy towns in most other parts of the world.

Cotapaxi (Ecuador) - first taste of real altitude

After loosing my dorm bed in a hostel in Quito, I took the option of heading to the countryside for a few nights. Slap bang in front of Volcan Cotopaxi, lies a homely backpacker retreat with a roaring fireplace, four hilarious dogs, three meals a day and a stunning view. A farmstead with pigs, cows, chickens and, erm, llamas adds to the country feel. They also grow most of their own produce.

Whilst there were several action activities to take part in, including scaling the volcano itself, I settled for a walk up to the local waterfall (only a little one, but hopping on the rocks up the creek to get there was fun), a short hike to a minor ridge and lots of lounging around. At night, a crew of mainly Australians and I entertained ourselves with various games of charades, vampire, scrabble and the rest. Shockingly, we never got around to playing poker, despite having a professional dealer in our midst.

Perhaps most interesting for me was the result of plenty of peaceful thinking time about my future. I came up with the fairly broad-based idea that, by age 40 (scarily less then 3 years), I want to be running by own business in the food / travel space. Who knows if it will ever happen and what exactly it might be, but it gives me some kind of focus. Restaurant Bolivar is the opening gambit offering food, music, film and art from the former Gran Colombia.

Quito (Ecuador) - centre of the world

I honestly had never thought why Ecuador was called Ecuador and felt pretty stupid when I read that the Equator runs through the country. In Quito a visit to the 'mitad del mundo' is clearly a must do, although there are clearly other places in the world that can make the same claim. Admittedly most are in the ocean, darkest central Africa or Central Sumatra.

In actual fact, just an hour outside Quito, there are two equators. One was the site officially sanctioned by French scientists in the 17th century (pictured), complete with tourist shops, cafes, bars and great big monument. Right next door (about 250 metres away) is a sight declared the real equator by American military experts, complete with GPS technology, about 12 years ago. Some bright spark bought this sight and has built a quaint little musuem featuring a raft of test that prove it is the Real McCoy. Indeed, water does flow without swirling slap bang on the line, whilst it goes anti-clockwise and clockwise in the southern and northern hemispheres respectively. Many still dispute this and I find it hard to believe that two metres could make any difference. But I saw it. And it did.

The colonial old town of Quito is the other big attraction and even though I have seen a raft of these on my travels, this one really is special. Amongst other spots, I made the effort to visit both the 15th century convent and monastery. Both are still active, although unexpectedly the former was for the monks and the latter the nuns.

Cali (Colombia) - final stop

After nearly five months in Colombia, there were worse places to bow out than Cali. Especially with both the Feiria de Cali and Año Nuevo happening. It also felt like the most Colombian of places I had been, though that is hard to explain.

After a disappointing first night - I just didn't meet anyone interesting - the partying really revved up on nights two and three. In the end, I visited two of the big 'going out' spots, which in Cali means salsa. Bizarrely, the scene only three blocks from my hostel didn't get a look in.

Besides some very late nights (it's been a long, long time since I came out of a club to be greeted by a bright, sunny day), I made it to an outdoor water park, a pacific coast festival and climbed a hill in the old town. Not much of a list of achievements for 3 days - I didn't even make it to silicon valley (in this case not a centre of IT industry) - but a good time was had for sure.

It was sad to leave Colombia, but equally exciting to be crossing a border once more. Hasta Equador.