We have been busy little cultural visitors over the last few days. Three archaeological visits in two days, plus a tour of the colonial houses of Trujillo.

First, we went to the El Brujo temple complex. (Other info here.)These are Moche adobe buildings dating from about 1700 years ago. The initial impression of the site is not good - it looks just like a few large hills set in a dry and sandy plain pitted with many holes dug by grave robbers. Then as you look at it closely, the scene seems to flip over (like an optical illusion when you finally see it) and you realise that the hills are really very large stepped pyramid temples which have silted over in the centuries since they were last used.

The Moche were a blood-thirsty lot - quite literally as one ceremony involved the ritual slaughter of prisoners followed by the priest drinking their blood. The main Moche deity was called the Decapitator and is always represented with a knife in one hand and a severed head in the other. Wall reliefs (shown on the left) at the primary temple (Huaca Cao Viejo) show prisoners being led off for slaughter (It´s difficult to believe they weren't enjoying the process given their obviously, ahem, aroused state. The guide claimed that this was because they had been drugged.)

We were allowed great access to the site, with the guardian pulling back the coverings to show us the many coloured reliefs. The site is still being researched and original textiles and skeletons poke out of the fine sand.

The other two huacas were less impressive - one was from the Moche period (0 - 600AD) but had been extensively damaged by the Spaniards, and the other was from 4,500BC and was the first evidence for settled agricultural life in Peru. But, basically it is a giant prehistoric rubbish heap.

As we drove away, it was interesting to look back at the site , but with new eyes. As at Bartholome, having some knowledge about the terrain allowed you to see things that were just invisible beforehand.

The next morning we set off for the Huaca del Sol and Huaca de la Luna (although we only looked around the latter. These are also Moche temples. The difference from yesterday was that the inside of the Temple of the Moon was being excavated and there were some truly astonishing, pristine images (mostly of the Decapitator). There are lots of wall reliefs, with more being discovered all the time. We were shown an altar area which was only uncovered in the last few months and was the place where the priest would have drunk the sacrificed prisoners' blood.

Like El Brujo, the temples of the Moon and the Sun completely dominate the surrounding plain (which was occupied by at least 35,000 people). Standing at the top, looking out, you had a real sense of the power of the priest.

In the afternoon we went to Chan Chan. This was very different - first, it was Chimu (the successor culture to the Moche) and second, it was a palace/city complex rather than being dominated by the temples. This was the largest adobe city in the world and covered about 25 square kilometers. We had a look around one particular palace complex.

The Chimu used a lot of marine symbolism - nets, waves, fish and pelicans - which was a contrast to (and a bit disappointment compared to) the Decapitator.

It was difficult to keep an overall image of the layout of the palace as we went down seemingly endless, deliberately anonymous, corridors, but the large openb spaces included a square where taxes were presented to the king, another where he selected his concubines, priests' rooms, a cemetary and (surprisingly) a reservoir - like an oasis in the desert of adobe.

Interestingly, when the king died (and after his body was buried along with lavish funerary goods and the corpses of volunteers) the city was closed down. One king, one palace. The death of one was the death of the other. It is assumed thart the majority of the life of a future king would have been spent building his new palace. There are nine palaces and therefore nine Chimu kings.

Chan Chan is interesting but less fascinating than the Moche sites. It's got scale (but that makes it difficult to hold in your head) but it lacks the colour and detail of El Brujo or Huaca de la Luna.

Many excelent pictures of Tujillo and the surrounding sites can be found here.

On a continuing cultural note, I am working my way through the complete works of Shakespeare (currently on Henry 4th part 1, completed King John, Richard 2nd, The Tempest, Hamlet, and been completely stumped by the Merry Wives of Windsor.)

Today is our last day in Trujillo. Steve has told me that he is doing a detailed blog about the archeological sites that we have visited so I shan't say much about them other than that I have really enjoyed them and if you do come to Peru you should visit the north. Whilst the pre-inca sites may not be as big as the inca sites they are nevertheless impressive in their own right and give you good preparation for the later inca sites.

Onto other matters. We have been staying in quite a nice hotel. Or at least I thought it was until last night. It was about 8:50pm and we were playing cards. I got up to go the toilet and as I went to turn on the light switch about an inch from my hand was a cockroach. I shouted to Steve to get rid of it and then we saw another one on the wall. At this point I stood outside in the hallway whilst Steve performed his manly duties of getting rid of the cockroaches. As I helpfully gave encouragement from the other side of the door he called out that he had found some more. I went off to get the receptionist and he sent a man down with some very strong bug spray. It must have been strong because it killed the cockroaches instantly. We checked around and couldn't see anywhere obvious that they were coming in. The guy sprayed the room liberally and declared it cockroach free. After about ten minutes I plucked up the courage to go into the bathroom again and just as I was about to sit down I saw another cockroach on the floor. We went off to get the insect spray man and he said that it must have been one that was hiding and that they were coming in from outside. We all had another hunt around and it seemed okay. Then at about 9:20pm we saw another two. This was just too much for me. I asked to be moved over to another room (not on the ground floor) and they moved us straight away to a larger room up on the second floor. Amazing how you can manage to cobble together enough Spanish in times of emergency.......

The whole cockroach thing gave us both the creeps for a bit and it took us a while to get to sleep. To be fair the hotel is clean and nice and we hadn't had any problems for two nights. It is just unfortunate. And they did deal with it quite promptly.

Tonight we will be leaving Trujillo for Lima. We are going on the nightbus which leaves at 10:30pm. We have been able to keep our hotel room until 9pm (for a small fee) and so can have a shower before we go and won't be sitting around all evening with nowhere to go. We have splashed out a rather (comparitively) expensive 50 soles each for the bus cama to Lima. I have high hopes for this bus due to price tag and the pictures that they showed us. I know that it won't be half as swanky as the pictures suggest but it should be a bit better than the other buses that we have taken. We'll get to Lima at 6:30am - 7am and have breakfast somewhere whilst we wait for the South American Explorerers Club to open. The club is really useful for finding out which hotels are good/not good and also some hotels have special offers/discounts for members.

The rest of the day we are going to spend looking inside some of the beautiful houses here and visiting the museums in the city.

The insect bites are still present but less swollen.

Today we are in Trujillo. We didn't get an early a start as we would have liked as we both ignored the alarm clock when it went off and stayed in bed until gone 9am. This meant that we didn't get to the bus office until just gone 10 am. We thought this meant that we would have to wait for the 11am bus but fortunately we were ushered to the front of the queue and able to board the about to depart 10 am bus. This is not the first time that we have been sent to the front of the queue. When we have visited cambios or banks we have always been escorted to the front. The first time that it happened it was a bit bewildering as an armed guard escorted us and we didn't understand what was happening. We had handed over a $50 note to be changed to smaller ones and the member of staff went off to get his supervisor. Steve and I were chasing the man worried that we had lost our $50 and the armed guard was chasing us trying to explain to us what was happening!

We arrived in Trujillo after a three hour bus journey. The hotel that we had had our eye on was shut! So we trudged through town and found an okay one in quite a good, central location. As it is Sunday the tour operators are closed so we are going to do our email and then go and put our feet up.

Steve had been getting a bit ratty with the taxi drivers as they seem to find it a crime that a gringo could walk anywhere and they pip their horns at us as we wander down the street. Although they pip at everyone they seem to slow down and give us a few extra pips. What really annoys him is that we obviously tell one taxi driver that we don't want a taxi and another one immediately pulls up even though it should be obvious that we don't want a taxi. Today we had two taxi drivers who were finding it difficult to understand the word ´No´ and were kerb crawling us!

Tomorrow we will get up early and try to arrange a tour for tomorrow (should get a good descuento being as it will be very last minute). We are planning to be here for two full days but the length of the stay is really determined by the days that we can do tours. Then it's off to Lima for some museums and city life.

Trujillo is really pretty. For some reason it reminds me of Lisbon. I think that it may be the colour and style of the buildings. It is very colourful and quite bustling (even though it is Sunday). A general note about Peru is that many people told us that it would be more expensive than Ecuador but we have not found that. There seems to be a greater choice of accommodation and the food costs about the same and is less carbohydrate heavy. The buses seem to cost about the same and the taxis cost about the same. Some of the buses are a little more expensive but these are the deluxe services and frankly, they look worth the extra money. The roads are much better too.

Anyway, that is the end of a rather boring blog as we haven't done much today.

Well greetings from Peru. We are in Chiclayo and will be moving onto Trujillo tomorrow. So since the last time that we updated the blog we caught the nightbus and then a connecting bus to Chiclayo.

We had a wander around the town of Loja whilst we waited for the bus and had quite a nice meal in town. We tried to drag it out as long as possible so that we wouldn't have to sit in the bus station for too long but at 8:15pm we had to admit that we could no longer stretch out the meal. So our gin rummy tournament continued in the bus station. The shoe shine kids were fascinated by our playing cards and especially by Steve's 'fancy' shuffling of the cards. I should point out that one of the dreadful things that we noticed in Ecuador was that some of the kids are put out to work very young (some of them can be no older than four or five) and that the shoe shine kids were of this ilk. It is very heartbreaking when you see kids so young out working with very old faces.

Unfortunately, about an hour before the bus left, despite my best efforts, I was struck down with travellers tummy. I shan't go into too much detail except to say that (1) I was extremely glad that this happened before I got on the bus, and (2) I never realised that the body could be so vile.

The bus was not very deluxe but we managed to get some sleep and the border crossing was quite quick. You had to get your exit stamp on the Ecuador side, walk over a bridge and then get your entry stamp for Peru. Most of the people on the bus must have been Peruvian as there weren't very many of us queuing up at the immigration points. I think that the river must have attracted lots of insects because whilst we were waiting at immigration I could feel them biting me. When we finally got to Chiclayo and I was able to take my clothes off and have a shower that I realised just how much I have been bitten. Steve counted 140 bites on one of my legs as we applied antiseptic to them. It is very itchy and I am going to go to a pharmacist this afternoon to see what the local cure for bloody irritating and torturous itching insect bites is. I should point out that Steve, jammy as ever, didn't get a single bite and he was standing next to me the whole time.

Anyway, we checked into a ´good value´ hostal here and are moving on tomorrow. Yesterday we went up to the Chiclayo mercado which is the biggest market that I have ever been to in my life. It seems to stretch on forever and you can buy anything there (there is even a witchcraft section). It really is very impressive and despite being so large is very well organised. All the vets are together, all the hat sellers are together, etc., etc.

This morning we went out to the Bruning Archeological museum. The museum is excellent and it really is worth including Chiclayo on your itinerary if visiting Peru if only to see the museum's fascinating collection. Steve's blog includes all the detail on the museum itself. Getting there and back from the town centre itself was also quite entertaining.

First we got on a collectivo, which is basically a minibus crammed with as many people as possible dropping off whereever they want (with a general same direction). After being on this for about ten minutes the guy who had lured us onto it admitted that it wasn't going the right direction. (Another trade mark of South America seems to be that you don't have to search for transport, it finds you. Taxis and buses alike are always touting for your trade.) So we got off and decided that as we were so hot we would get a mototaxi out there. For those of you that don't know what a mototaxi is, it looks like a large motorised tricycle. The front half is the front half of a motorbike and the back half is a seat with a wheel either side (bit enough for two people) that appears to be welded to the back of the motorbike half. There is a canopy as a roof. Whilst this is not the fastest or safest mode of public transport is it the most refreshing on the air conditioning side of things, which is why we got a mototaxi back to Chiclayo as well.

As you may have guessed it is very hot here and we wilt with the slightest exertion of energy. Tonight's plans are to pack up everything (shouldn't take too long), drink tons of water and then get to bed early so that we can make an early departure tomorrow morning.

We have arrived in Peru after a surprisingly ungruelling journey here from Ecuador. We´re currently in Chiclayo, but tomorrow we move on south to Trujillo. We are now near the coast after being high in the Andes for the last few weeks and the difference in temperature is fantastic. I think it is about 10 degrees celsius hotter here than it was in Cuenca.

Although we´ve only seen one Peruvian town, and we´ve only been here a few days, we both prefer Peru to Ecuador. There seems to be less cynicism in the attempts to tax the gringos and less resentment of our presence.

Chiclayo is certainly a lot higher octane than the Ecuadoruian towns we´ve been in. The street traders are much more vigorous, the taxi drivers much noisier and proactive and the moneychangers more persistent.

The main reason for stopping at Chiclayo is archaelogical. We wanted to see the results of excavating the toimb of the Señor de Sipan. (Details, just in Spanish, are here.) The "Lord of Sipan" was a Mochica religious leader who died 1700 years ago and whose grave was discovered, unlooted, about ten years ago.

The Mochica went in for excessively lavish funerary rites with the Señor laden down with vast quantities of gold, silver, turquoise and gilded copper. It was as if they wanted to cover every possible piece of skin with something shiny. The ornaments are exhibited over three floors in the Bruning Meseum and the best pieces include the five or six sets of ear ornaments (made from gold and turquoise), the many intricately beaded (and meticulously restored) collars, and the many representations of the main Mochica deity "the Decapitator" - usually pictured with a severed head in his hand.

This is a fantastic collection - anyone who is in northern Peru should go to Lambayesgue to see it.

After getting some grief from Linda, it is time for me to put in another entry on our progress log. We are currently in Loja (Ecuador) as part of our mad dash to get to Chiclayo in Peru. We've just endured a six hour bus journey over a very bad road in a coach with very little space between the chairs. We're spending a few hours looking around Loja - which is a bit strange, we've walked for about twenty minutes and not seen a bar at all - before we catch the coach to Piura in Peru at 10:30pm. This should get us there at between 7 and 8 tomorrow morning. Just in time for the early morning coach through the desert to Chiclayo. Where I think we will sleep for at least 24 hours.

We're both really looking forward to Peru - it's the main reason we wanted to come to South America, for the wealth of precolumbian artefacts and the jungle. Ecuador has been okay, but apart from the Galapagos, it has not been spectacular.

Just posting a blog as we have a few hours to kill in Loja until we can catch our overnight bus to Peru and we are a bit bored. Of course, no matter where you are in the world it seems that you can find an internet cafe. We caught the bus from Cuenca this morning and it was a long six hours. We are booked onto the 10:30pm bus to Piura which will take a bottom numbing 9 hours. Once we are over the border we hope to catch another bus to take us to Chiclayo (3 hours from Piura). And then it will be weeks of history and culture for us. I am really looking forward to Peru - I hope that it lives up to my expectations.

I have to say that if feels like we have arrived in a strange place. It took us ages to find (in the bus station) the bus company that runs the buses to Peru and the bus station (same as bus stations the world over) had more than its fair share of shady characters. In the other bus stations that we have been to the ticket offices are all trying to catch your attention and shouting out destinations to you. But not here. Peru wasn't even listed as one of the possible destinations on the bus company's booth (which might explain why we spent ages wandering around). Then we came into town to get a drink/snack but bars are proving hard to find.

Anyway, the next blog will definitely be from Peru.

It is all change today. We had a look at our original itinerary last night and realised just how much we have fallen behind. We spent too much time in Quito and have been a bit lazy as we have moved south through Ecuador. As Peru is to be the highlight of South America for me we are cutting short Ecuador and leaving for Peru tomorrow. This is a two bus journey : 5 - 6 hours to Loja and 9 hours from Loja to Piura. We are hoping to get the night bus for the second leg so at least we can sleep on the bus (quality dependent!). We will spend a day in Piura and then head on down to Chiclayo (a comparatively brief 3 hour bus ride).

Today we are off to visit the various museums of interest in Cuenca. The sun is shining today (it has been a bit overcast lately) so we shall probably just walk everywhere.

We will be out of touch for a few days due to the long journey travelling down to Peru and also depending on the internet cafe availability.

Well here we are in Cuenca after a 6 and a half hour bus ride (!). I have to say that from the minute we stepped off the bus the place has given off a positive vibe. It is the nicest of places that we have been in Ecuador. The city is very pretty and has a vibrant atmosphere. I would recommend to anyone visiting Ecuador to include Cuenca on their itinerary (and leave Riobamba off it). It is really pretty and everyone we have encountered as been friendly and helpful. I have seen loads of stuff that I want to buy but Steve said that if I buy it I have to carry it, so have so far been restrained.

We had a look at two hotels when we got here and plumped for the second one because it is just so nice compared to all the others that we have stayed in. The url is here. I should point out that after much huffing and puffing and shaking our heads regretfully about the price we did get the room for (a fair bit) less than they are offering on their promotional rates. It was a little bit more than we have been paying but is relatively much nicer. We actually ate properly yesterday and were able to have a hot bath. We spent the night luxuriating and recovering from our rather horrible time in Riobamba.

The bus journey down here was not too bad. We had plenty of time to observe the Ecuadorian countryside. Everything is on a mountainous slope. Unfortunately the cloud was low so the views were not quite as dramatic as they could have been. I should point out that some poor people had to stand for nearly the whole journey. I felt sorry for them (but selfishly not sorry enough to give up my seat).

This morning we got the bus ($0.20 - what a bargain) out to Banos (not the Banos) which has the hottest commerical sulphur baths in Ecuador. We are both feeling much more chilled out and less taut (muscle wise) than before we went. We went into the Turkish sauna and the sulphur pool. The water is thermal water from the volcano. It was lovely and warm. I have to say that we have been a bit spoiled by having had the luxury of visiting Baden Baden thermes when we lived in Germany and the Ecuadorian ones are not quite up to those, but nevertheless it was well worth a visit and has had a beneficial effect.

Tomorrow we are visiting the museums around Cuenca and the day after we will be hopefully doing a day trip to the National Park (if our muscles have stopped hurting). Then we are getting the bus down to Vilcabamba for more outdoor pursuits. A url to Vilcabamba is here.

This is a joint blog from both Steve and myself. We are in agreement that the only phrase that describes the last 48 hours of our lives is ´pain, mud, complete nightmare'. The only highlight was this evening riding in the back of a camionetta with four students from Quito (our guardian angels).

But to explain, we need to go back four days to our arrival in Riobamba. We caught a coach down with the "Aulasi cooperativa". This is a care in the community scheme designed to give atrociously poor drivers a chance to contribute to society. To be fair, we shaved more than an hour of the guidebook´s indicated journey time.

Anyway, we came out of the bus station and went to one of the hotels in the guidebook. Of course, the owner tried to rip us off but quickly backed down (I think being in South America has improved our haggling techniques substantially). It is not a great hotel (but tonight it looked like heaven - we'll get back to that later). We decided to walk into town as we needed something to eat and wanted to buy a few provisions for the Sangay National Park. But everything was closed! We felt like we were Clint Eastwood rolling into town. Eventually we found somewhere to eat (and were the object of some attention) and went back to the hotel (ignoring the two dead dogs lying in the main street - this should have been a warning to us) to prepare for the adventure of a lifetime.....

It´s difficult to get out to Sangay National Park. So we hit on the ingenious idea of hailing a taxi. An old Lada estate to be precise. Linda had laboriously translated "Take us to Sangay. And come back on Monday" into spanish and she handed the piece of paper to the driver. He said $20 and we agreed. Along the way, he indicated an erupting volcano and we should have taken this as a warning sign. At the next village he stopped to chat with someone and came back to say that the road to Sangay was closed and we would have to pay double to go via the back road. We tried negotiating but finally reluctantly agreed.

The back road was very hairy and we didn't disbelieve the story that he had given us. We finally got to the park station and agreed that he should pick us up tomorrow (like fools, paying $10 in advance). We were keen to pick up the trail to El Altar volcano. The sun was shining, we had ample provisions and this was to be my (Linda) first time camping. Off we set, laughing and joking like little children. Joking that the skull we saw on the trail was the skull of the last gringo who did our route. How we laughed....

It took about 100 metres of the very steep trail for us to realise that we had packed far too much stuff. In fact, all of our problems over the next days have some root in this fact. (Probably over 20kgs each). We didn´t manage to make the first campsite the guide books suggest. Instead, we camped on widened part of the track, which was quite flat and was visited by a large herd of cows during the night. Linda woke up at every snuffle or chewed grass stem. And woke me to ask what the noise was. So our first days camping ended.

Still, we had had a laugh and set off in high spirits. We got to the Collanes plain and asked a local shepherd how far it was to our target for the day. He said about two hours. So off we set and it started to rain. We should point out that lugging a 20+kg pack up steep tracks at over 3500 metres in altitude is no joke. The rain made the going very difficult and before we knew it three hours had passed, with no sign of our landmark, pouring rain and no suitable camping site. At this point we remembered that the guidebooks had warned about people dying of exposure on this trail. We were both extremely worried as darkness was not far off and the trail was very narrow. Our backs were killing us and tears were not far off.

Fortunately we found a cave which gave some shelter and allowed us to pitch our tent. We were both extremely relieved as I think we had both resigned ourselves to death by hypothermia. Linda only had one camp duty - compared with my fetching water, pitching the tent, cooking the evening meal and so on. But did she complain about having to move the cow pats from the cave floor. Still we slept very well - especially as no animals approached thanks to my patented territory marking system.

We woke up this morning and both felt refreshed (clean clothes, pot of tea on the stove, thankful that yesterday afternoon was over). We decided that our best bet was to head down to the start of the trail and stay in the refuge tonight. Two other walkers passed us and stopped to say hello. These were Juan and Jerry the students. They had eventually camped on the open track and were covered in mud and looked thoroughly soaked. Made us feel much better. So off we set. The rain started almost immediately and visibility was zero.

In dry weather the trek back down should have taken about three hours. Today it took six hours. The streams that we had crossed on the way up had all swollen with the rain and we made some treacherous crossings. Bear in mind that our worldly possessions were in the back packs. The mud was very thick and we made very slow and heavy progress. Once more the merchant of doom was looking over our shoulder and I (Linda) had a cry more than once on the way down. Steve wasn't far off tears either. The packs were really cutting in and our feet were very sore from the effort of trying not to slide off the trail.

There are at least four different types of mud - depending upon how much water the soil retains. There´s sliding mud, sticky mud, sucking mud, and another one that I have blocked from my memory. We encountered them all. Our backs hurt, our shoulders hurt, our spirits were low. We finally got to the refuge (only falling about 100 metres from the end) to find it closed. We were not happy. Several times we´d described it as the worst day of our lives.

As we slumped by the roadside we spotted a camionetta containing a couple (also extremely muddy). We asked where they were going and like a mad day dream they said "Riobamba". They were looking for Juan and Jerry (who they had been walking with until they decided that the going was just too tough). Juan and Jerry were about an hour or so ahead of us. They said that they could share their lift back into town. We set off keeping our eyes peeled for Juan and Jerry whom we eventually found. We stopped in Penipe and got some rum. They were all students and spoke english and we had a good laugh with them. It took all the trauma out of the day. They turned what was an awful day into a nice ending.

We came back along the supposedly blocked route - it seemed perfectly okay - we were just scammed by the driver who seemed perfectly genuine and friendly. Anyway, we are off to Cuenca tomorrow and planning on lazing in a quality hotel for a few days. We have a new motto to guide our travelling: "Never stay in a town with more than one dead dog in the street".

We'll email everyone when we get to Cuenca as we are absolutely shattered this evening and starving (nothing to eat all day). Best go back to the hotel and provide the inhouse entertainment.....

We are still in Quito but are itching to move on. We had to stay a day longer than anticipated as we had not realised that due to the carnival that Monday and Tuesday would be public holidays meaning that we couldn't get our packs out of the clubhouse until today, nor buy the bits and pieces that we need for our camping. On the plus side it means that we were able to hand our washing into the laundry for washing and drying. The adverse aspect to this is that we are a bit squiffy at the moment as we have been wearing what we have got on for a few days now........Still laundry is back in an hour so a hot shower and crispy clean clothes will be in order!

We went up to the IGM this morning. This is the military's geographical centre. We ended up buying twelve 1:50000 maps as we need them for the next part of our trip. The staff/army personnel at were very helpful and made sure that we got everything
that we needed. They were very patient with us especially given that our Spanish is minimal (ie practically non existent).

Tomorrow we are catching the bus (4 hours) down to Riobamba. We are hoping to do a one day hike the day after on an organised tour up to the high refuge (5000 metres) on Chimbarazo. Then we are off hiking and camping for three days in Sangay National Park on our lonesome. Not to worry we have a GPS with us! Then we heading down to Cuenca to hike and camp for another three days in a different national park.

Steve saw a sign outside PizzaNet saying that there will be soccer on the large screen tv (Ecuador vs Turkey) at 1:30pm this afternoon. I think this has sorted out our afternoon's activities.....

I am not sure when I can next update the blog as I am not sure what the internet café situation is down south and also we will be enjoying the wonders of camping.

Well we are back in Quito today after our trip to the Galapagos. I had a really good time on the trip : a lot of fun with a great group of people and saw some amazing sights. I will summarise the trip in three parts - the highlights, the boat, the islands.

The highlights for me were as follows :

1) the snorkelling session when we saw three hammerhead sharks, and about 20 to 25 white tipped reef sharks. It was absolutely amazing to be swimming along and then look down and see these sharks beneath you. The hammerhead sharks were between 2 - 3 metres in length and about 15 metres beneath us. They were just swimming along gracefully and elegantly. Incredibly beautiful. About five minutes after the hammerheads we looked down and saw some white tipped reef sharks sleeping on the bottom of the ocean (about 25 metres down). They were about 1.5 - 2 metres in length. Then we saw some others swimming along. The ones swimming along were closer (although a safe distance away!) and you could see them in quite a lot of detail. There were lots of them and they were just swimming about minding their own business not at all concerned by us lot looking down at them. In this same snorkelling session I also saw a turtle swimming about 5 metres beneath me. Although we have seen lots of turtles (including some mating turtles) on the trip I had yet to see one whilst I was actually in the water. This snorkelling session was definitely the number one highlight for me.

2) the same morning of the number one highlight we had got up and done a short walk to see some flamingos (this was all on Floreana island). Nearby was a favoured nesting beach for turtles and our guide said that we might be able to see some turtles. We went over to the beach and saw lots and lots of turtles. The sea seemed to be full of turtles just bobbing along. Three of them were in the very shallow water and we were able to walk right up to them. They are very shy animals so it was great to get so close to them.

3) the afternoon when we went swimming with baby sealions. There were at least 20 sealions and they were all young. They had no fear of us and were quite curious about us. You would be looking underwater at them and they would just suddenly stop darting about and look right at you. Absolutely gorgeous. If they had been moving slower (and if we were allowed) we could have touched them. They were very playful and seemed quite excited to see us. Two of them were biting Hazel's (one of the people in our group) flipper and tugging away at it. They were so cute and it just seemed dreamlike to be swimming with them. The only nervewracking bit of it was that the bull sealion for that territory was swimming about (and he was a big bloke) and kept swimming past us to check that we weren't harming the baby sealions. Every time he came past me I felt butterflies in my stomach wondering if he was going to prove his dominance by biting me!

4) a general highlight is how close you can get to the animals and birds. They have absolutely no fear of us. You can stand right next to them. Obviously you are not allowed to touch any animals or disturb them in any way. They just look right back at you or ignore you (since you are neither prey nor predator) and get on with whatever they were doing. The list of birds and fish that we saw is quite long. Additionally we also saw loads of turtles and sealions. It is quite difficult to convey what it is like to be standing so close to the animals. By the end of the week we were getting very blase about ti all - oh another sealion, another blue footed boobie, another frigate bird, etc. But now that we are away from the Galapagos it is becoming magical again.

5) The night that the sky was really clear and we were not moored in a port and so could lie on the top of the boat and look up at the stars. Absolutely wonderful. So clear. The milky way really stood out. The sky was brimming with stars. I have never seen it like that. I think that in the end everyone on the boat ended up on the top of it just marvelling at the sky.

Now for the boat :

We were on a 16 passenger boat. When we arrived at the boat it looked nice - a bit faded - but quite nice. Airconditioned double cabins, private bathroom in the cabins, apparently hot water whenever we wanted, etc, etc. Then we got going. Steve and I and another couple (Gilad and Marliss) were at the back of the boat. The boat travels at night. The sound from the engines was incredible. I was standing next to Steve and had to shout so that he could hear what I was saying over the sound of the engines. After that night all four of us at the back of the boat decamped to the sundeck to go to sleep. In the end I had to say that it was quite nice sleeping up on the sundeck (apart from the night that it rained!) so every cloud has a silver lining. The fumes in the cabins were quite bad too. On the first night the generator broke down so there was no airconditioning or running water. We thought that this was a one off but it was not. It was recurring event on our trip. One evening we had no lights either. I could bang on and on about all that was bad about the boat but at the end of the day the things that went wrong (quite a long list) brought the group together quite quickly and we had a lot of fun and laughter. The crew worked hard to keep the boat going and I take my hats off to the mechanics. Just a warning to anyone planning to go to the Galapagos is to avoid any boat owned by the company Galasam. All that was needed was the boat to be taken out of commission for a week or two and be given an overhaul. But the need for more and more profit prevented that. We had a really good time despite the boat problems and it did not take anything away from my Galapagos experience.

Now for the islands. Each island was very different. I wish that I knew more about geology so that I could have known more about the history of the islands. We saw mostly birds on the first two islands that we visited and didn't really walk very far. Later in the week we saw more variety and walked more distances which was nice (being able to stretch our legs after being on the boat). I would definitely reccommend visiting the Galapagos islands but I think to come all the way to Ecuador just to do the Galapagos on its own would be a bit much. I am very glad that I saw them and had an amazing (I know I keep using the word amazing but that really is the only fitting word for much of the trip) time but I would have not travelled all this way just for them.

That's all for now.

We're back in Quito after a fantastic time in the Galapagos. Saw some amazing sights, met some good people and had some terrible conditions on the ship. But the good things first.

We had an eight day cruise on the Estrella del Mar around the western islands of the Galapagos archipeligo. Some islands we visited were Bartholome, Genovesa, Santa Cruz, and San Christobal. For me, the highlights were:

Going snorkelling.

There was an astonishing amount of marine life that we could swim with including sea lions (about twenty to twenty-five young pups frolicking in the water, pulling someone's flipper), a Galapagos penguin (followed it for about 10 metres as it seemed to fly under the water), sea turtles, rays and sharks (saw three hammerhead and about twenty white-tipped reef sharks).

The geology of the islands.

Although they are all volcanic, they all look different. After a while you can begin to "read" the land to see how there must have been a lava flow here, that eroded there and was disrupted by an earth tremor over there. The colours of the land are incredible from the black of glassy new lava to the browns, greys and reds of the older oxidised and weathered lava. And the plantlife - the bleached white-grey of the dry incense trees, the greens and browns of catci through to the reds of some succulents.

The tameness of the animals.

It is easy to become blase about the wildlife's apparently complete disregard for your presence, but the shock of the first time that you stand in a sea lion colony, with females nursing cubs just there no more than a metre away, still gives a sense of awe.

The worst aspect of the trip was the Estrella del Mar - the owners had obviously skimped on maintenance and only one of the two generators was working. Well, working intermittently. Most days the power went out - which meant the airconditioning, the water supply to toilets and showers, and the lights all went out. Usually for hours on end as the crew worked desperately to try to patch together the generator. Also, wen the power went, the freezers stopped working, leading to the food defrosting and being refrozen multiple times. Half the people on board got stomach infections.

Still, all this trauma seemed to bring the passengers together - and we all seemed to have a great time.

Coming soon, a day by day account of what we did and saw, as soon as I can distill my notes into something approaching an interesting narrative.

Had fun at the "Mitad del Mundo" yesterday, or rather next door at the Museo Inti Nan. But first, the real adventure was travelling there and back on the bus. We caught the bus about 10 blocks from our hotel, near the Central University of Ecuador. There isn't really a bus stop - if you see a bus going in your direction you wave and if the driver feels like it he'll pull over. The buses are all run by private companies and so they are very competitive (including racing at high speed over potholed roads to get to a common pickup point first. Linda was very concerned about this.) The buses are fairly delapidated and the state of the roads has caused terrible trouble to their suspensions, so that they pitch about like boats in a storm.

Well after a journey of a (very long) hour, we arrived at the Mitad del Mundo - the centre of the world. This is a monument marking the location of the equator as determined by a French expedition of 1763. It's quite impressive - at least twenty metres tall with a large globe on top. The only problem is that it's in the wrong place. The real equator is about 150 metres north. Not bad 200 years ago - but just not good enough for that authentic "foot in either hemisphere" photo.

So, GPS in hand, we went hunting... We found our way to Museo Inti Nan - just outside the Mitad complex. This is a combined ethnographic and geographical museum. We were shown round by a very pleasant guide who explained about the pre-Inca tribes, about current Jungle tribes etc etc Also showed us the equator line, showed water flowing straight through the plug and not spiralling etc etc. Linda felt very pleased with herself when she managed to balance an egg on a nailhead. Apparently this is virtually impossible away from the equator due to Coriolis forces.

Tomorrow we are off to the Galapagos. We return Monday afternoon and Tuesday morning we plan to catch a bus to Riobamba (we're considering whether to lash out $4 for a deluxe ticket), so we're not sure when the next progress log entry will appear.

Today is the last blog that I will post for at least a week as we are off to the Galapagos tomorrow for 8 eight days. We just picked up some snorkelling gear that we have rented for the week. I am really looking forward to it. I feel that we have exhausted Quito now and I am looking forward to being in some clean sea air!

We went to the bus terminal this morning to help us decide whether or not to go to Riobamba or straight onto Cuenca. The buses that go to Cuenca are very deluxe but we weren't sure about the buses that go to Riobamba. We caught local buses yesterday when we went to Mittad del Mundo and although the journeys were bargains (35 and 50 cents) the journey back was like a rollercoaster ride (without the safety harness). My legs were like jelly when I got off the second bus and I felt very, very sick. For some reason the buses seemed to be racing with one another. I would like to get to Riobamba with Steve, me and our luggage all in tact. As it happens the buses to Riobamba, although not super deluxe are a step above the ones we got yesterday and so we are going to brave the three hour journey to Riobamba.

We went to Mittad del Mundo yesterday to experience the delights of the Equator. The highlight of my day was getting an egg to balance on the head of a nail. It took a few attempts but I felt very elated when I managed to get it to balance. The heat out there was incredible and we both got a bit sunburnt.

This morning we went to the Basilica which offers some really good views of Quito as well as being a very beautiful building. A service was going on when we got there and I was very surprised that the hymns were sang to very upbeat and quite funky music. A priest was playing the electric keyboard and singing with a microphone. It made going to church look like fun. We climbed quite high up into the church but I refused to walk across a wooden walkway that led to the tower. Steve braved it and also climbed up a ladder at the end of the walkway that led you out into the open. I felt really sick watching him climb up the ladder. I could hardly watch him. He was incredibly brave. My legs were shaking just watching him.

Oh well, time to go and put my feet up and sink a few beers I think. Life is soooo hard.....

Some random observations of Quito:

• Street sellers with strange goods - slimming devices, puppies, boot laces. The strangest had to be an Indian woman in full traditional costume trying to sell a tray of nodding dogs.
• As we were dashing through the old city yesterday (Linda was panicking) I looked in through a door and a man was standing, staring intently at a roast pig's head on a platter
• Around the monastery chapel's entrance yesterday were a number of underdressed and overmade up women who did not appear to be in any rush to seek spiritual salvation. Is there some association between going to church and wanting a prostitute?
• The internet cafes here all seem to have a "pervert's station" screened off from everyone's view. (Haven't been able to see whether they supply tissues) As Linda said: what kind of person goes out in public to view porn?

It is a bit overcast today. We were going to go up to the Basilica to take some pictures but might wait until a clearer day. One problem that we have run into here is that there seems to be a shortage of low denomination notes. So when you go into a shop and want to buy something, if they haven't got change (eg. it costs $6 and you have $10) they just won't sell it to you and don't really seem to care that they are losing a sale! It is very frustrating and seems to happen quite a lot. A visit to the bank is called for.

I think that a lazy day is called for today as it is extremely humid and I am wilting. My shins are also a bit sore from doing so much walking (absolutely shameful when you think about it).

Last night we had a bit of a ding dong with the taxi driver. He didn't put his meter on (and therefore was going to rip us off - once bitten twice shy - this had already happened in the morning) and was insisting on an unreasonable price. I put my foot down and actually got my way. I think one look into my panicking wild eyes must have scared him off!