We headed from the Amazon back into the Andes. Banos is a small town, surrounded by mountains, and a very active volcano. Unfortunately clouds obscured the view of the volcano most of the time. Banos is also action central, with horse riding, canyoning, zip-lines, canyon swings, mountain biking, as well as hiking. We did the short walk to a spectacular view, and mooched around town. Peter went mountain biking, but they cheated, went up with a truck, and rode down. He got to see the smoking volcano just before his descent.
From Banos we drove to Cuenca, the third largest city in Ecuador. We had a private bus for this trip, so we each had a seat to ourselves.
The trip was about 7 hours of driving through the Andes, with stunning views, but unfortunately too much cloud to see the "Avenue of Volcanoes". We did get glimpses of one.
During the afternoon, we stopped at the Incan ruins at Ingapirca.
In Cuenca, we visited the old town, here the lavish new cathedral was built in the 1940's. We also visited the market and a Panama hat factory.
