Baños and the Route to the Amazon

Overlooking Baños

Baños is a town that sits in a valley that cuts Andes on an East/West route. The town itself is a nice town catering to tourists; a comfortable town. It has a number of shops, a good selection of restaurants, lots of hotels for a very reasonable price. It sits beneath the Tungurahua volcano, which is active; but unfortunately, has not displayed an eruption since June of 2014. I was hoping to see one, as I have never seen an eruption before.

View of Tungurahua from my hike

 There are a number of things to do in Baños. Some of the other items that are available: hiking, mountain climbing, white water rafting, ziplining, biking and jungle tours.

I hiked from the town to a spot called the Tree House and then back down. This was a pretty difficult hike as it has you going straight up the mountain. I actually think it might have been more difficult to climb down the way I went up as it was pretty steep at times. I very much enjoyed it. The Tree House has a very good view of Tungurahua. I saw smoke, but no lava. I walked/ran down the road from there, which was a pretty long ways. I would guess about 7km to the small commercial area that overlooks Baños. There, I ate at Cafe del Cielo, which I would recommend to anyone going to Baños. I then hiked the rest of the way down from there.

Cow Chilling at the Tree House

This hike took most of the day, but afterwards I was ready to partake in one of the thermal baths that are the namesake for Baños. These baths are fed from waters coming from a mix of the waterfalls coming from the mountain and volcanically heated waters from underground. The baths have a number of different pools with varying degrees of heat from very cold to so hot that it is difficult to get in. I started with the very hot one, but then moved to the middle grade one. At first it felt too cold, since I had started with the very hot one; but after a bit, it felt pretty good.

One of the offerings in Baños is biking through the Avenue of the Waterfalls. The Avenue of the Waterfalls is also the route to Amazon region. Most tourists rent a bike in Baños and then ride to largest waterfall, El Paillon del Diablo, then ride a bus back to Baños. I was heading to the Amazon, so I did the waterfall route. From a biking stand point, it was a very nice ride.

Waterfall with zipline across gorge

Vertical of same waterfall above

When the road goes through tunnels, this is the bike route

Another waterfall

Looking down the valley

Watefall El Paillon del Diablo

Water flowing from El Paillon del Diablo

A view towards the Amazon

Baños was nice. It would not be a reason for me to travel to Ecuador. If I were already here or was planning to visit Ecuador, I might make it one of my stops. I could see myself coming back here some day.