Today is a driving day. We head south from Otavalo, once again crossing the equator. For lunch we stop at the Papallacta hot springs. We go and jump into the hot pools for a relaxing soak - they have a number of pools that range from moderately hot to extremely hot. We have to go from one to the other in stages - we can barely take the really hot one. We have to take it in stages and very slowly. It was so hot our skin tingled. There is also an ice cold plunge bath, that we would alternate with the hot baths. It was very refreshing. We then had lunch off the truck - chicken sandwiches.
The rest of the afternoon was a long drive on dirt roads as we headed down from the mountains into the Northern Oriente - part of the Amazon jungle. The road is quite rough in spots and we are bounced around quite a bit. The road is a bit scary at times as we drove along the cliffs on the narrow winding road with no railings.
We arrive in Misahualli just before 7 PM, only to find out that our hotel had given away our rooms - very bad form. We find another hotel and check in there. After getting our stuff organised, we head out for dinner. The town is small and everything is concentrated around a small town square. There are only a handful of restaurants and we pick one. The owners are eating dinner as we walk in, but they quickly clear a space when they see the size of the group.
We have a very nice chicken dinner. After that we all go over to the house of the guy that is arranging our tour into the jungle. It is a strange place - we meet in a room that must be set up for disco nights with funny fluorescent painted designs on the walls. He tells us what we should expect for our 2 night trip into the jungle (water, mud and insects!!!) It is then back to the hotel and off to bed after we pack our stuff for the trip tomorrow.