The Mindo 12 Meter Jump, Cloud Forest and Tucans

So, it was time to leave Quito for the weekend again, luckily!

Lately because I stayed at home for a bit too long after the attempted robbery etcetera I was so glad I could leave Quito for Mindo this weekend. Mindo is in theory a two hour drive, but when pieces of Andes come rolling down the mountain, blocking the road it becomes a different story! The last few weeks it had rained a lot in the area between Quito and Mindo so at some point there were no buses going there at all. So we were lucky it was a bit dryer this week so that there were buses going!

So after leaving together with Teun aka Toní in the taxi for Quito's north busterminal Carcelén he found out that you can not withdraw money with Rabobank in Ecuador between Friday and Sunday so he had no money to pay for anything, so I decided to play good Samaritan and lend him the lot, luckily I had enough money with me... So after we came across this problem in the taxi, another problem occurred which was that the taxi driver was one of the slowest in Ecuador and we were bound to mis our bus. A thing you really don't want is to mis your bus when it is the last bus of the day, so when we got to the bus terminal we started to hurry a bit, only to find out that the bus would leave half an hour later...


So after stocking up with an ice cold Friday afternoon beer and some chifles (banana chips) we sat down and waited for our bus to arrive at platform 9. After our beer, we hopped on to the bus and we were on our way!It seemed to be a smooth going ride by bus, but about 1 hour in to the ride the bus stopped because another piece of the mighty had blocked our road, so the clean up crew came and moved the pieces of rock out of the way. This took them about half an hour and traffic continued as usual. When we arrived in Mindo, or more to say outside of Mindo as this bus didn't drive into the village the bus driver's assistant was knocking our window and screaming at us that we had to get out... this as we didn't know the stop and I asked him to tell us when we were at Mindo. So we got our bags, got out and took a local cab into town to meet up with Alexandra and Karen who were already at the hostel

So when we checked into the hostel and chilled out in the Hammocks from the hostel, went to eat at this great pizza restaurant in Ecuador it was already time to bed again To go and visit the butterfly farms in the morning which I already saw but is so nice that it is worth going there twice, this time I spotted all the species of butterflies that where supposed to be there!

After getting back from the butterfly farms we had to wait for another group to come out of Quito who had left in the morning and we decided to go to the village and do stock up with some supplies for the waterfall hiking tour we were supposed to get in the afternoon. While shopping for supplies it seemed the others had also (finaly ;-) ) arrived in the village and we guided them to the hostel, arranged a time with our guide and went for a good lunch at the pizza restaurant in MindovOf course. This is at the same time the only good restaurant in town and also caters for the weak Gringo stomach. After the meal we met up with our guide and went with 11 of us on the back of a truck into the Cloud Forest. Cloud Forest is like Rain Forest the only difference is that it rains a bit less and lies at a certain altitude. The cool thing about the Cloud Forest is that because of the humidity and which can't get over the high trees clouds start forming and it lies on top of the trees or in the trees. When we got out of the truck our excursion could begin, so we went through these narrow trails with quite steep drop-offs into this amazing forest with waterfalls, and quite dense plant growth. And then when we were on our way somewhere half way, like already expected it started raining quite intensely and we got really really wet, but that's just Mindo.

As we continued our hike we came across this cliff where you could jump into the river and then grab a rope to not get flushed down the waterfall which would be not such a pleasant experience to say the least. but we went up the platform and I was the first who got the instructions how to jump as you couldn't jump too far forward because you would hit a rock face and you'd have to keep your legs together to prevent your private parts from being smashed so with some more safety instructions it was time. I took a deep breath and just jumped, and enjoyed the experience so much that I jumped 3 or 4 more times... In the group in total there were only 3 more persons who did it as well and one guy whom it took 25 minutes to realize that he really was not going to do it. We were told by our guide that the height we jumped from was 12 meters, but especially Alexandra and I really didn't believe that. This perhaps also because our guide Randy was an American.. But to be realistic the hight we jumped of probably was 8 meters which also is quite high but not as high as 12 meters.

After this nice experience we walked on through the forest having these amazing views of waterfalls and what basically is semi-jungle, the only thing that really was a pity was that we didn't see so many birds and or animals which roam in these woods. But I guess that being with a big group makes a difference as well, as we made more noise all to get her then a smaller group which would not scare the animals away. Next to this it started raining again of course and we were totally drenched this time but also almost at the end of our tour so there wasn't really a problem with that. When we were at the end of the tour we still had to get down the mountain by car to return to our hostel, this was one of the funniest and coldest rides in the back of a pickup I have ever witnessed.

We had to look out for the overhanging foliage, so every time there was something coming someone screamed "Leaves!" and still we got hit a couple of times on the way back down. Arriving back in Mindo we went back to the hostel in our clothers which were totally soaked. Luckily the lady "Big Mama" from the hostel offered to dry all of our clothes for free so we didn't hesitate and used this service. After we dried up, showered and relaxed for a little bit it was time to go to our favorite pizzeria again to eat pizza once again, after this everyone was tired and we didn't went out, we just stayed in the hostal drank something there told some stories. For the other part as well because nobody had any money left anymore, and we still had to return to Quito and get a taxi there.

The Sunday after breakfast together with Alexandra I went out to the village to look for a Mindo bracelet, but it was just nowhere to be found so after this I returned to the hostel to wait for the other who were at the butterfly farm, this was the group who arrived on Saturday as they hadn't seen the butterflies yet. So when a few people almost missed their bus and the others returned to the hostel we went bird spotting, just in the backyard of another hostel we paid two dollars to see a lot, but then a lot of Hummingbirds or Colibrí next to this we saw Tucans (two species) Parrots and a lot of other birds. Actually I never thought I would enjoy watching birds that much :S...

After the birdwatch was over we had to go back to Quito again by bus so after we arrived in Quito we still had to take a taxi to our house, when we finally found a cheap one we got a little bit afraid because he was driving a very unusual route to our house. This route took us through the poorer (dangerous) areas in Quito but we finally made it back home within 25 minutes and we still had to eat something, but then realized there was nothing there anymore that we could use, so we scrounged for ingredients in two different kitchens and prepared something which wasn't tasting too bad ... and then the weekend was already over...