Banos (full name: Banos de Agua Santa) is a town of c. 15,000 permanent residents in the middle of Ecuador. I use the term permanent, because Banos is a tourist town, famous for its supposedly miraculous hot springs (the central church is 'Our Lady of Holy Waters'), its spectacular scenery, its hiking and adventure venues, and its many lodges and restaurants. This means that tourists both local and foreign flock there, so the actual number of human beings can be several times the base. Oh, and there's a dinosaur park. Because.
Raine was having some issues after Quilatoa, so we told Lincoln (our guide) that we wanted to keep things light on the hiking front. It wasn't an issue-- everything we saw (and there was a mirador every fifty feet, it seemed) was easily accessible. Our first major stop was La Casa del Arbol (lit. translation: The Tree House). Previously the spot where watchers kept an eye on Mount Tungurahua, the local volcano (continuously active since a 1999 eruption), it's now a gorgeous mountaintop spot with fantastic views, swings, a zipline and incredible gardens (which in turn attract massive numbers of hummingbirds (see below.) The weather was perfect and you could see forever.
After that we drove east along the waterfall route, following E30. We stopped at Salto Agoyan with its spectacular gorge and endless succession of extreme sports offerings (if you want to bike it, hike it, dangle above it or whitewater raft on it, this place is for you.) We declined to take the cable car over the gorge, which in retrospect was a missed opportunity.
After that we drove to El Pailon (del Diablo), at that time the tallest waterfall in Ecuador (apparently the title switches off, depending on rainfall and time of year.) This time we got out and hiked, which was fairly involved as there were paved and unpaved trails, stone stairs leading down next to the cataracts, and several suspension bridges (which were pretty bouncy.) But the trails were lined with blooming orchids and the thundering falls themselves were brilliant (see below.)
Happy, tired and quite wet, even with our gear, we stopped for lunch. The proprietors were clearly used to hungry tourists, because we got almuerzos the size of our heads (and ate them all, in case you were wondering.) Now replete, we took the "old road" south. It was memorable in a terrifying way (one or two lanes, dripping tunnels, stone walls which had clearly been driven through in places) but a while later we got back onto the modern freeway and an hour after that we made it to Riobamba-- our last nightly stop.
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