The mighty Cotopaxi

Arrived in Latacunga to a lovely, but very quiet hostel. Pretty deserted. So went on a city walk, first to the cemetery which totally freaked me out, think the lack of sleep and too much booze had given me the Vulnerable Effect. Then to the market where the locals play volleyball for money, and then to the museum of culture, which was closed but you could walk around the small gardens. This I did, only to come back to the gate to find it CLOSED and LOCKED. Well, due to the claustrophobic issues I have, along with the fact it was a Sunday, I tried really hard not to panic, but after 30 seconds I was screaming out to passing cars with my hands waving through the iron gates. NO ONE stopped and my panic increased as I realised I wouldnt even be able to climb over the railings cos there were spikes, plus, it being Sunday, who on earth would know how to contact the owner of the keys?

My face was getting hot and my heart nearly jumped out of my chest. Then, about a minute later, I leant on the gate and it opened ;) JESUS. OK so the interior door of the gate was the part that was locked, the gate itself had just been pushed to....I was shaking for about half an hour afterwards ;). Think I need vertigo and small space therapy.

So, got back to the hostel and got chatting to a Dutch girl called Nikki and a couple Kriss and Will. I wanted to walk the Quilotoa Loop, but James had said for me not to do it on my own. Disappointingly Nikki had already done it by bus and Kriss and Will weren´t planning on doing it. What was lovely was that Nikki said to me, oh I wish you had been here a day or two ago we could have done it together. She is such a lovely person and the way she said it was so sweet.

Anyway the next day we got chatting again and she said she was having a lazy day cos she wanted to rest before she climbed Cotopaxi. I said there was no way on earth I would be doing that and she looked at me and said "but you have to try, if you dont make it, it really doesnt matter" and that was it.

From there everything sort of fell into place. She was planning to climb it the following day, but needed another person to go with her (if you go alone with a guide its more expensive), but I wasn´t acclimatised enough to go. So we agreed if no one else came along, she would come back to Quilotoa with me to walk part of the loop and then we could climb Cotopaxi together.

We spent the day watching movies and fantastically no one else came along to climb Cotopaxi with her, so we agreed we would leave early the next morning to go to lago Quilotoa. In the meantime American Dan :) and pilot Jasper checked in and the next morning we all got on the bus....

More later as have to sort out our guide for our jungle trip ;)