Slept in a bit, had breakfast at 9:00, then hired a car to take us to Maria, about a 2 hour drive. We're on our way to Kuelap, an old Inca ruin at the top of a mountain that's not on the tourist trail at all. Maria is the nearest town to the ruins. Awesome road and scenery all the way up. Our taxi driver was from Maria, so he was familiar with the roads, and was racing along the edges of the cliffs, around corners. I thought Kieran was going to faint, he was genuinely scared that were were going off the edge.

Up at 6:45. We had to catch an 8:00am ranchero to La Balsa, the border town on the Ecuadorian side. It's a 1.5 hour ride. A ranchero is a big truck with seats in the back and no sides on it.

At the border, we got our Ecuadorian exit stamp, walked across a bridge over the river separating the countries, into Peru and got all our paperwork done and our passport stamped.

Up about 7:45, packed, had breakfast at another restaurant, then to the bus station to catch a bus back to Loja, then get on our 12:30 bus for Zumba, near the Peruvian border.

Up around 8:00, packed, went for breakfast, to the bus station and asked some bus companies if they are running tomorrow. Everything is normal, all bus companies have their normal schedule. We want to get to the Peru border tomorrow, so we bought a ticket from Loja to Zumba for 12:30 tomorrow afternoon. Zumba is the closest town to the border, still about 1.5-2 hours away. Then we bought a bus ticket to Zamora to see another part of Parque Nacional Podocarpus today. My Rough Guide says the bus ride from Loja to Zamora is worth the price alone.

Up about 7:30, all of us (me, Lisa, Jason and Kieran) went for breakfast, then Jason needed to mail his Panama hat he bought, went to the supermarket for hiking food, dropped off laundry, withdrew some money at an ATM, converted some of it to soles (the currency in Peru). Wé'll need some when we go across the border at some small town in the middle of nowhere. We plan on not using one of the popular border crossings.

Got up, tried to shower, but no hot water. Sad.

Lisa and I met Jason and Kieran in front of the tourist info centre and asked about Loja again. The lady and Lisa are becoming very good friends! Good news!!! The buses to Loja are running, the roadblock has been cleared! The indigineous people and the president of Ecuador met yesterday in meetings in Quito, and apparently the president has said that he'll repeal most of the controversial parts of the new water bill or something.

We went back to the hostal and packed and arranged to meet Jason and Kieran at the bus station at 12:30.

Up around 8:00, had breakfast, then to the tourist info centre to inquire about the highway to Loja. Still blocked.

Lisa and me waited for Jason and Kieran to meet us at our hostal at 10:00am. They got there abou 10:10, we raced to the bus terminal (via taxi) to catch a 10:20 bus to Parque Nacional Cajas. Ended up the 10:20 bus that the tourist info centre told us about does't exist anymore, so we had to wait until a 10:45 bus.

Up at 7:30, had breakfast, then went for a walk in search of a better hostal. Ended up choosing Hostal Majestic (named Casa Naranja in our old guide books), $5 each, but that doesn't include breakfast, and it looks cleaner and the showers look better. The guy at the other hostal was very nice, giving us maps of places to see, areas to stay away from, etc. We felt kind of bad leaving, but since I don't speak Spanish, Lisa had to play bad cop.

Up about 8:00, Lisa and me walked around looking for someplace to have breakfast. Lisa bought a couple of newpapers to see what she could find out about the road closures and protests. Over breakfast, Lisa read the papers. There's numerous road closures around Ecuador (including the one we were on), but the paper didn't mention anything about anyone being shot yesterday.

Up at 7:30, showered, had breakfast, then Lisa ad me walked to the bus depot, saying goodbye to Kirsty. Kirsty is nearing the end of her travels, so she's off to Cusco (Peru) in a couple of days to see Macchu Pichu, then back to Canada. Lisa and I are headed to Cuenco.

We caught a 9:00am bus from Baños to Ambato, then a bus from Ambato to Riobamba, then another bus from Riobamba to Cuenco.

Beautiful scenery, huge mountains, deep valleys. They cultivate everything here, right up to the tops of the mountains, and on steep angles, greater than 45 degrees. It's crazy.