A day on the bus!

Lord, what is man, that thou takest knowledge of him! or the son of Man, that thou makest account of Him. Psalms 144:3

"When you bend your knee in prayer to God, limit not your petition to the narrow circle of your own life, tried though it be, but send out your longing prayers for the church's prosperity." 

Charles Haddon Spurgeon

I can't even count the way's God watches over us in one single day!

A couple of the figurines in Shell.

This morning we set off at 6 am in the rain, (I said, well since we are starting off the morning wet, the rest of the day won't matter) for the bus, we hopped on at 6:30 and arrived in Tena at 8:30 and set off to find the huge waterfall that we heard was close by, we stopped to ask directions and very few people had ever heard about it! The few that had, had different opinions about where and how far away it was. So we ended up in the tiny police station using an officers laptop to find a map and show them we were not crazy! There was a waterfall and it was only 30 klm away. So with some directions on a paper we tried to find a taxi, but most still didn't know where it was and they kept telling us it was farther and was going to be really expensive! So as we considered our options we decided it would be smarter to go to a cave that they had mentioned, so we found a taxi and set off. He dropped us off at a water park.....which should have been our first clue! But we proceeded  and bought our tickets, but as we were walking in the lady told us, "your going to get soaked!" Really walking through a cave? How wet can you get? So we walked to the cave and the tour guide is wearing a wet suit and everyone is kind of laughing at us. Obviously we are not wearing water clothes, but we have traveled.on the bus for two hours and don't want it to be for nothing so we leave our bags and sweaters at the counter and tell them we will be fine if we get wet. We were still in denial, how wet can one get? The guide asks us if we can swim? O, that's just for emergency's  So we set off! 

The group starts walking into the water, O so our shoes are going to get wet, ok we can handle that! We both have extra shoes! We roll up our pant legs....and walk. We start making our way through the cave and it is amazing! Then we see the group in front of us go over their knees in water, but they are Ecuadorians after all..... So we roll up our pants higher and make it through dry! :) So we carry on..
Then suddenly we see the waterfall.....so we drop into the water up to our waists holding on to a pipe, then grab a rope and climb up the falls...ok so we are pretty wet! I guess they were right but thats ok, today we were up for adventure and we got it, without even knowing about it! So we enjoyed the rest of our climb, hike, squeeze, crawl, throught the cave! 

The guide had everyone turn off their headlamps and it was so dark! I couldn't see my hand in front of my face! I was surrounded by people but yet in the darkness you are so alone! Finally you could see the light ahead....so after a quick hike through the jungle we made it back and hopped on a bus toward town again!

When we arrived in Tena again we hopped on a bus to Banos at 12:30. Four hours later we arrived in Banos, we have left the jungle behind. So we bought tickets to Latacunga with a little time to spare so we were able to wander the streets, checking out the shops and stands. 

It never gets old!.I was amazed by all the different things they sell here, there is a lot of taffy! We were able to eat some fresh. There were so many people standing in the doors of shops pulling huge balls of taffy on hooks! We got some fresh sugar cane to chew on, it is pretty good! I have always wanted to try some! So after a nice supper we made our way back to the bus station to find out the bus has a small mechanical problem and they are still figuring things out...I can just see us getting stranded here! But only half an hour late we were able to pull out of the station. 

We were able to see the mountains until it got dark, but I have to say we have seen some pretty good views from the bus window! After a very long day, a very sore shoulder and meeting some girls from Iceland we arrived at FHC in Latacunga at about 9 pm......


So after unpacking, drying some laundry, we are going to collapse our sore acing bodies into bed, so we can be ready to do some more traveling tomorrow!