This past four day weekend, I went to Baños with some teachers and their families.  It was an extraordinary place.  No more than a few hours after we got there, there were already a lot of people in our group that were heading to the bridge to do swing jumping.  I was a spectator.  It looks like a lot of fun, but I wasn't able to do it yet.  I didn't even attempt it.  The next morning, almost all the group was going on the famous Baños towards Puyo bike ride.  It was great!  There were waterfalls all over the place.  There were cable cars to a few and trails to a few others.  I was only able to spend about a half day doing that because I had to be back for PARAGLIDING!  Never in my life would I have thought that I could even consider doing something like paragliding, but it was an amazing experience.  Our take off spot was a farm field with pigs and cows on the side of a mountain.  The day was pretty clear and there were great views of the main volcano of Baños and some views of Volcan Chimborazo.  I was definitely nervous going into it.  I went with Dave and Danielle and that helped calm the nerves a lot.  I was the first one up.  We waited for probably two hours for the ideal conditions.  The guide was constantly checking the wind speeds.  The winds were too strong for a while.  It was amazing being up there!  I had a permanent smile.  I was so happy that I had the opportunity to do something like that.  The next day we went canyoning.  We had a few jumps into pools below some waterfalls and repelled down some others.  The surrounding atmosphere was stunning in all the activities.  Everything was so green and lush.  I can't imagine what it will look like during the rainy season.  Baños even has more to offer than canyoning, biking, and paragliding.  I can't wait to go back to do some hiking, more biking, and some horseback riding.  I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving!  A few of us ate a Thanksgiving dinner at a hotel owned by an American couple.  It definitely wasn't the same as being at my grandparents house, but it was nice to have a Thanksgiving meal.

A great view of Chimborazo on the way up.  The top is the point furthest away from the center of the earth.

One of the many waterfalls on the bike ride from Baños towards Puyo.

What a view!  It was nice to see how green everything was.  In Guayaquil, we are in the dry season and things are not this lush . . . yet.

Cable car that went over the waterfall

This was the biggest waterfall that I had seen.

Ready for space travel!

Can we fly yet?  Our guide was awesome!  He wasn't willing to fly until the conditions were just right.  Here he is measuring the wind speed.

Up, up, and away!

Believe it or not, that's me way up there!  This was the point that I may have soiled myself (just kidding of course).







My view!!!



Here is the crew.  Golden Wolf and the Richerts . . . karate style!



Canyoning time!  You guessed it . . . karate style!

Suiting up and getting ready to go!



The crew!  Golden Wolf, Dave, and the Domingo clan.

Woohoo!

Me showing off my rappelling skills, or lack thereof.

Dave's turn to give it a go!

This was the view from the place we ate at.

The pools of water held trout of different sizes.

Mmmmm . . . trout.

The aftermath

The latest video is below.  It has some video clips of the paragliding and canyoning and more photos.  Check it out in HD for best quality.  


Most of the rest of the photos can be found at:
http://picasaweb.google.com/jmathisecuador