Banos walk

Tuesday February 3rd, 2015 Banos
After the complimentary breakfast buffet at La Floresta, we decided we'd just take an easy walk through town and maybe across the bridge for a ways. The river is maybe 200m or more below the level of the town in a narrow gorge. It's all rapids with no pools that we've seen. I'd rate it at about Class 3. It's not difficult looking but there are no good pools or big eddies for recovery if a kayaker flipped. Not that we're doing any kayaking today.

Across the bridge, the road rose steeply up along the side of the canyon. Not too far up, we saw a sign for an eco lodge, trails and a viewpoint. That sounded good so we walked up there. At this altitude, we walk up the steep dirt road about 200 m, then stop for a short rest, then carry on again. The narrow road switched back and forth but there was no traffic at all so it was quite nice to be out in the trees. We passed a cow, calf and bull grazing by the side of the road but they were all quite docile. We had already found dog sticks so we were prepared for that too.
We found the little lodge. A lady there pointed us up some stone steps to a dirt trail. We kept climbing and resting periodically until we reached a knoll above the town that gave us a good view. That seemed far enough. There is a smoking volcano above Banos, apparently, but the cloud cover never let us see it. However, even with the overhanging clouds, it was a pretty view of the town, river and mountains.

On the way back to town, we saw some guys all rigged up for jumping off the bridge. Instead of bungee jumping, what they do here is tie a cable out in the middle of the bridge at one guardrail. The rope loops under the bridge and they haul it up across the road at the other guardrail. Then a tourist gets harnessed to it and jumps off the bridge. The looping rope pulls him for a ride under the bridge, like a giant swing. Since this all happens a hundred metres or so above the river, there's lots of screaming and yelling. Then the outfitters lower the rope to a rock way below, unharness the victim and pull the rope back up. We watched for awhile but decided not to participate.
Back in town, we wandered a bit, got a bowl of soup at the Cafe Hood, bought a big beer (608 ml) for $1.10 at the Super Bodega (not the Super Maxi that we've seen in other towns) and eventually went back to the Cafe Hood for pad thai and burritos, a tasty meal. Home early once again although Banos has a much safer feel to it than the Mariscal in Quito. Otavalo, Mindo and Banos, being smaller towns, seem quite safe at night. But, we need our rest anyway.