Lickable Wallpaper

When our few days in the rainforest came to an end, we headed back to Quito to resume our search for a Galapagos trip that wouldn´t break us entirely. After two long days of traipsing around the many travel agencies of Quito´s Mariscal district (known as ´gringoland´) and a world of pain trying to withdraw money from as many ATM´s that would give us it, we had a five day cruise booked for the following week through the Happy Gringo travel agency (the first and last agency we went to – they were excellent and the cheapest we found). It was great to have it finally sorted. To make the most of the few days we had to spend on the mainland before heading off, we took a bus to Mindo, about three hours north of Quito.

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About three weeks ago, we started out on what has been a wonderful few weeks of wildlife watching. After two days of shopping around among the many tour companies in Quito (and making definite progress towards securing a boat trip in the Galapagos islands), we boarded a night bus to Lago Agrio near the border with south-east Columbia, and then continued for three hours by bus and two by boat to finally reach Samona Lodge in the Cuyabeno Reserve.

Samona Lodge is the real deal, it´s definitely not a place to go if you´re shy of snakes or spiders or any kind of creepy crawlies. We spent four wonderful days there and both agreed that it beat our previous jungle trip back in Borneo by a mile. By the end of the first day we had already seen much much more than we had anticipated – gangs of squirrel monkeys crossing the river jumping from tree to tree, a huge Anaconda about 6 meters long, sloths sleeping on branches along the river bank, huge vultures and loads of other birds.

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Ten hours and three buses after leaving Mancora in Peru we arrived in the city of Cuenca in southern Ecuador (Mancora-Tumbes-Machala-Cuenca), where we checked into Hostal Macondo tired and hungry. The border crossing and overall journey was pretty uneventful but it was great to see the landscape change after we crossed the border; from arid and dusty coastal Peru to the lush greenness of Ecuador. Like any good Irish cailin, I love a bit of green I do!

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