Baños (de Agua Santa)
From the Quitoloa area, we drove about 3 hours and descended about 6000 feet to get to the charming town of Baños, south of Quito. The town is in a valley adjacent to a steep mountainside, a waterfall and lots of thermal baths. (Hence the name Baños), There are nearby inactive volcanos and at least one active volcano. Residents believe the water has healing powers. We visited the town church which had paintings on the wall depicting miracles of Nuestra Senora del Aquas Santos (our Lady of Sacred Water), many of which had to do with the eruption of the nearby Tungurahua Volcano which last erupted in 2012. Ironically the church is made largely of lava stone.
Baños is named after the thermal baths in the area, so of course we went to one near our hotel. Many locals and other foreign tourists were there. On the main level there were several pools of hot and cold water. The hot water is full of minerals and so it is a murky greenish color. After spending some time in the hot pools, we found a place on the lower level where there was a smaller pool of super hot water, with adjacent little cold water dipping pools. The idea is to alternate between the super hot and cold pools. I did this a few times, it was really invigorating!
Our hotel was at the edge of town, about 200 yards of the main waterfall in the city (Cascada de la Virgen) . Our room had a great view of the waterfall. Looks peaceful, doesn’t it? The only downside was the noise of construction happening in the hotel and the neighboring building, running from about 8 am to 7 pm.
We drove about 35 minutes up a windy road to Casa del Arbol, a tourist attraction on a mountain with great views of the the volcano, weather depending. This place is best known for the tree house and swings, but has a nice garden area as well. The weather cleared enough to see the lower parts of the volcano, but we never saw the top of it.
There are many waterfalls in the area, most of which lie along the main road that heads east out of town. Lots of tour companies offer bikes to ride along the Ruta de las Cascadas, but that looked a bit sketchy to us as the road is narrow. Since we had a car we drove out to the most beautiful waterfall called Cascada Pailon del Diablo (The devil’s pan). We really enjoyed the long hike down to the waterfall. It is truly a beautiful waterfall with the water falling down a sheer face and churning in a bowl at the bottom. We ate at a restaurant near the bottom of the falls, and finished the day with a 1 hour massage back in Baños.
We can see why people like to spend time in Baños. Beautiful sights from the city, good restaurants and hotels and lots of activities and sights in the area. Oh, and homemade taffy.
Cotopaxi
Next, we drove to a hotel just outside the north entrance to the Cotopaxi National Park. The road was amazingly bad, a combination of deteriorating rough cobblestones and dirt road full of pot holes and ruts and erosion. We just barely made it in our gutless, low slung cheap Chevy car. The front spoiler had a few more scratches on it after we were done. A 4×4 would be highly recommended. There is almost nothing out there, so the Hacienda is like an oasis out on rolling wild hills. That day we only caught glimpses of the snow and glacier topped Cotopaxi volcano, which stands at 19,300 feet. The next morning things had cleared sufficiently to justify driving into the National park to get a closer look. Being at 13,000 feet, looking at a cloud and snow covered volcano was an awesome experience.
We then drove back to Quito (again, the first 17 km on that bad road), dropped off the car and checked into the Hotel Vieja Cuba, where we joined three people in our travel group heading to the Galapagos. Our hotel departure time? 3:30 am. Ugh…
Next up, the Galapagos Islands!
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