Llapingachos in Papallacta...
The last leg of our holiday trip came after heading back from Cabanas tres rios. We had almost a two hour delay after setting out with our driver ~ we decided not to take the bus to Papallacta because the roads seemed a bit sketchy because it had been raining a lot. And sketchy they were ~ there was a mudslide that landed in the road. Our driver told us it was a small one but in that case we were worried what a big one would be like. So, we waited for the bulldozer to arrive and clear a path big enough for a single lane of traffic to pass through.

After that we made it pretty quickly in his truck ~ lots of muddy roads and small bridges along the way. We were happy to arrive and see our cute, hobbit-like cabin with lots of private hot thermal baths right outside.
We stayed in a cabin with a fireplace and here is a view from our little deck that looks out on a bunch of the private baths.


The baths are fed directly by the volcano and really are amazing. They have minerals that are great for your body and skin and are wonderfully hot. We spent a lot of time soaking.

We had about a 45 second view of the volcano Antisana ~ it's massive and beautiful and you can see it's snow capped peak in this picture. It's the only point on the equator where there is snow year round.

There are also great hikes right from the complex ~ all different levels and lengths. Papallacta is higher than Quito ~ over 10,000 feet so it's really beautiful.

We took one of the paths and it was like hiking thorough a magical forest filled with lichen, bromeliads and waterfalls.



We stayed two nights and Chris, Meredith and Michael enjoyed many llapangachos ~ a local specialty involving potato - cheese patties topped with a fried egg and hot sauce (aji).

It was hard to tear ourselves away from the thermal baths to head back to Quito.
New year's eve held the typical Qutio fun ~ burning masks and mannequins that represent the old year ~ although some look like anyone from George Bush to Spiderman. Right on our block families were dousing them with gasoline and lighting them on fire along with many, many fireworks.
And now it's back to work tomorrow!