Let me take you back to 2007 when at 19 years old I began my first of many stints in South America. At this time I moved to Ecuador for the summer to work as an Intern for a Non-Profit-Organization. It was more like an excuse to go travel and ease the worries of my parents. I only worked four days per week. During my first month in Ecuador I had not yet discovered the key to meeting locals, which is going out to party at night. At that time I was excited to go exploring like a toned down Indiana Jones. Whether that meant the jungle, rainforest, or cloud forest (I am thinking about you Mindo) I was game.

That is why during my third week I took the bus from Quito to Banos, the adventure sports capital of Ecuador. I spent the first night solo. But while eating my wimpy breakfast on the hostel rooftop terrace I met another British solo traveler named Harry. He invited me to join him on an ATV tour up the mud soaked mountains all the way up into the clouds. We rode for hours armed with just a hand drawn map

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At breakfast the next morning we decided to up the ante. We chose to rent bikes. And I mean that lightly because these were closer to girls bikes or even kids bikes. But when in an exotic foreign country you don't complain.

Harry and I paid five bucks each for the rental and started the sixty kilometer ride from the mountain road to Puyo, an unattractive jungle town. The road is advertised as mostly downhill. It surely is not.

The start of the ride was exciting. The road was flat and we knew we were about to do something great.

Years later I realize this was just a bike ride. But as a nineteen year old kid it seemed much bigger than that. The road slowly became more steep. I was out of my element but because of peer pressure from Harrie I kept going.

At one point we reached a waterfall. Woo!

After out short break we kept on. At many points I walked my bike. I just could not do it. At around the seventh hour Harry was way ahead of me. While riding down one of the few hills I hit the brakes and the tire caught a rock, which in turn bent the rim like a dislocated finger. The rain poured. I was miserable.

I walked my bike a few kilometers until I found Harry waiting on the side of the road. He bent my bike back into workable condition. We rode on. And we pedaled more. A few kilometers later we reached the jungle town where we celebrated with Sprite. Hey, I was only nineteen.

Turn on your sound! Listen.

Click here to view the embedded video.

For once in a while the travelers playing music in the hostel actually sounded good. I was glad to fall asleep to this group of Chileans singing outside my room. But many times it’s not quite as enjoyable when crusty backpackers bang on their bongos late at night.

I see it like this. You have the type of guy who plays an instrument at peak time in a hostel to impress people. Then you have the really dedicated person playing something annoying like a drum or harmonica at odd hours because its their passion. Both are equally annoying. But there is a third kind which is a group of people playing music together to be social and have fun. That’s what the video I posted is. I have no problem with this third group. I was lucky this time.

After a busy weekend of going out the pace slowed down. Mark and I met Carolina and her friend at a movie theater. I couldn’t make out the name of the film we were going to see when Carolina told me on the phone. Itrusted whatever it was would be cool.

I have never been more wrong. She and her friend expected us to see the film, Coco Channelle, a biography about a famous fashion designer. As fate would have it the movie theater literally closed down maybe that day or something and so at the other theater they were not showing it at the right time. Instead we went for coffee at Juan Valdez inside this trendy mini mall and talked for a while.

Seeing as our humor is not quite adjusted for Latin America we learned a few new responses for when people ask us what we do. Rather than tell people I work at McDonalds flipping burgers we learned it would be much funnier to tell people:

“I sell Cuy (guinea pig)”

“I am a lottery vendor”

Determined to see some movie other than on my laptop I tagged along with Mark to see Avatar in 3d for my second time. But my highlight of the day was sitting in the living room watching The Motorcyle Diaries with a group of Argentines. The best part came when they passed me a cup of mate. This happened no more than 2 times in the 4 months I spent in Argentina last year.

Lately work has increased and on Wednesday that meant waking up to 24 new emails in my inbox – no spam either. To give you a better idea I earned US$1,200 profit in 2 days. Not that I enjoyed spending 9 hours each day working with no break.

In contrast my time in Ecuador was  coming to a close as I booked my flight to Bogota, Colombia for Thursday morning. I say in contrast because I made sure to enjoy my free time as much as I could. On Wednesday night Mark and I went for drinks in the main plaza. Carolina joined us soon after, followed by another few friends even later. Another example of my many going away parties.

Like tradition we ended at Bungalow 6 for their insane ladies night. The place was absolutely packed and I muttered this is insane an infinite amount of times that night. By 1:30 I walked back to my hostel where I rested for a few hours until 3:30 AM when I took a taxi to the airport. I was exhausted and had a headache. I never wanted to miss a flight so badly but once I was stamped out of Ecuador there was no calling it quits.

I set my alarm for 6:15 AM and fell asleep laying across 3 seats only waking up just in time to board my flight to Colombia. The travel gods hate me because in Bogota public transportation went on strike turning a 20 minute taxi ride into nearly 1 1/2 hours through the city inch by inch. But at least I made it to Colombia!

If you remember a few posts back I wrote about going swing jumping in Banos, Ecuador. I also posted a few photos but now I have uploaded a video for you to all watch me jump in terror. It doesn’t show but believe me I was scared. Enjoy.

Click here to view the embedded video.

I cannot stand long bus rides any longer. A lot has changed since I last traveled in August. Now that I am making a lot more money it has changed some fundamentals of traveling. My time is now far more valuable than money and so if I can get somewhere faster (i.e. airplane) I will do it regardless of price.  Or to frame it differently money is no longer an issue. Why should I take a bus when I can fly?

Now that the ad text is inserted, the text should read as:
I bussed it back to Quito in about 4 hours and checked back into Centro del Mundo in the old town. I even got the same private room…or closet would be a more appropriate term. Not exactly the accommodation you would get in any normal hotel special offers. Usually you have some space to move! In most cases, at least. At least the company was better. Once in the hostel I chatted with an American couple and a few Chileans. In my notes when I wrote “pretty boring” but have since run into the American couple here in Bogota and have had some great conversations with them. So maybe I was actually the one who was boring the night I first met them?

The next evening during a boring TV watching session I was eying the crowd trying to see if anyone looked like they were up for a night out. Many people are content to stay inside and just talk but to my surprise an Israeli guy, Mark, asked if anyone was interested in going out.  And that’s how I made a great new friend!

Mark (Israel), I, and a Chilean guy Joaquin were a good fit for going out. All three of us had no interest in going out in the “Zona” where all the trendy bars and foreigner filled cheap discos were. We wanted to try the best nightlife in Quito and landed at a club called “CientoOchentaDos” (182) a short taxi ride away. I have never seen a better looking collection of people in my life. This includes discos in Brazil, Colombia, Canada, etc. It looked as if everyone was a model and the three of us could not stop staring.

The following night we found another fun guy from Portugal to make us a group of four. It was such a relief that all of us were on the same page. Cost was not an issue which is a nice thing when it’s pretty common to get stuck going out with other foreigners who would rather walk around for an hour rather than pay a $5 cover to get into a place.

This night we went to another disco outside of the “Zona” which was called Flashback. The name gives it away as it turned out to be a nice disco filled with people in their 30’s to 50’s. It was still a nice place with tons of people and a live cover band playing hits from the 80’s which I can’t pretend I really knew all that well. Being the youngest guy there I was naturally a target for some of the women. One even played the bait and switch game leaving me with her less attractive friend. I can’t believe she really thought she could pull that trick and not expect me to walk away. Regardless it was a great night that ended back at the hostel where the four of us shared stories until 6AM.

On Saturday night it was our last hurrah together. This time we chose another great disco away from all of the cheap backpackers called Juliana. This was more of a middle ground between the previous to disco with most people being in their 20’s rather than 40’s, and a more normal looking group. I quickly struck up a conversation with a very cute student named Diana. We danced salsa and reggaeton together for the next few hours until the club closed.

Overall another great weekend in Ecuador with some great new friends.

An alarm clock is usually unnecessary. I wake up when I am no longer tired and only then do I start my day. I made an exception for the first time in three weeks when I set my cell phone to wake me up at 8:30 AM so that I could go white water rafting in some class 4 rapids in Banos, Ecuador.

I could not have asked for a better group to spend the day with: William from Miami/Ecuador, his two Ecuadorian relatives, a Swiss man, and Colombian girl.

I really got along well with William, the kind of guy who wants to immediately become your best buddy. Imagine a chubby, older Latin guy from Miami always making conversation. He has this really fun personality that can build a strong bond in no time. He’s the type that asks questions and is genuinely interested in the people he meets.  We had some great conversations on the way to the river, at lunch, and back to Banos. He is what you would call a people person and really was a great person.