Birthday Weekend in Baños de Agua Santa, Ecuador

It's my birthday!! ~ & I'm so happy to be spending it with Tim in Ecuador! It's truly a blessing and great privilege to be able to travel and explore new places.


We were recommended by our friends to check out this town, Baños de Agua Santa. It is known for the beautiful nature scenery and its natural hot springs. Definitely the highlight and reason for us coming here after hiking 2 full days. Our bodies were ready to relax and enjoy some hot springs.

We even had our first taste of cuy (guinea pig) here in Ecuador.


It wasn't what I expected. It tastes like chicken, but with lots of bones. I wasn't a fan...but glad we got to experience that.

For my birthday, Tim asked me what I wanted to do. At first, I wasn't too sure...all I knew was I wanted to be in one place and not traveling to another destination. But as soon as we got into town, we noticed that this was definitely a tourist town with tons of tours and activities you can do. Plus, renting bikes here is super cheap and easy to do! If you're an adrenaline junkie, Baños is for you!

Yesterday, we decided to rent bikes to explore the outskirts of town to a place called Río Verde. This is where we would be hiking to see the famous waterfall, Pailón Del Diablo.



 Visit to Pailón del Diablo Waterfall

 It was quite insane how many people there were here and with the tight space of getting to the top for the waterfall was definitely a safety hazard.

We are under the waterfall - So crazy!! 

After a long day of biking downhill around 10km to the town with the waterfall and hiking, we were exhausted and wanted to head back. We read online that you can hop on a truck that will bring you and your bikes back to the main town. So that's what we wanted to do. We waited for about an hour or so for other travelers who wanted to do the same, so that our fare would be cheaper. In the end there was another couple that joined us. However, there was so much traffic - I completely forgot to take a photo of how bad traffic was. But it was rainy and cold, so all I could think of was going back and cuddling in bed. 
In the end, the driver told us that it would be faster for us to bike back to town ourselves. Biking back would mean we would have to go uphill. As some of you may know, I am not the strongest bicyclist...nor do I enjoy it. But we knew that if we didn't bike back, we'd be stuck on this truck for hours! So...here goes another 10km back to town. It was one of the hardest bike rides I've ever done.
But I am so glad we were able to get back and it made me feel very accomplished. 

So back to what I wanted to do for my birthday...


This happened. Bridge jumping...100ft drop off the San Francisco Bridge in Baños, Ecuador.
I have been wanting to do this since my birthday last year, when I told myself that I would do something crazy on my birthday every year. (Last year was an exception and I was in Portland with friends.)

But this year, since I saw a bunch of signs that say bridge jumping...I wanted to do it. What an amazing, yet scary feeling. Would I do it again? Probably not. Should you experience it once in your life? Sure, definitely!
My view down the bridge...not too bad. 

Thanks to Marcos & Ali...I trusted them with my life. 😬

This past weekend has been great and I am so blessed to be here with Tim, doing what we love to do.

Until next time...

~ Lynna

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