Baños - Week 43

9th - 11th July
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After eight hours on buses, we arrived in the beautiful spot of Baños. The town is surrounded by green, lush mountains with waterfalls all around - it is stunning. We were staying for two nights in Isla del Baños which is a nice but overpriced hotel at the back of the town. On Tuesday we did a 2 1/2 hour walk out of the town and up one of the mountainsides which was gorgeous. The river was flowing through a deep gorge beneath us and we had beautiful views of the surroundings.
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The afternoon was spent trying to get hold of people on the phone to organise a venue for the wedding! After finally getting somewhere we thought that a relaxing dip in the thermal springs would be just what the doctor ordered:

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We intended to go on a long bike ride on Friday but the weather was terrible when we woke up, raining and very low cloud, so we enthusiactically 'sacked' that idea and went for steam cheasts instead! This involved being literally locked up in a cheast full of steam with only our heads poking out:

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then we sat in some cold water for 4 minutes:

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then we had a freezing cold shower and then got locked back up for another ten minutes! Absolutely weird but very lovely and sort of relaxing if you could miss out the cold shower.

We had a very nice time here but the only problem was the customer service. Every place we went to from hotels (except Hostel Eden where we stayed on our final night - they were very nice) to cafes and restaurants had very rude staff. Very strange because we haven't come across much of that at all on this trip.

The local super sticky, filling loosener toffee

Books we read: A year in Provence by Peter Mayle

Books we read: Are You Somebody? by Nuala O'Faolain