I flew from Manaus to Quito after our jungle adventure. On a stop over in panama city I had to say goodbye to Hilary. after traveling with her for 6 months it was pretty crazy to think of separating, so after a teary departure I was off to Quito. To make the transition of being alone a little easier I planned to meet up with Hilary and Adam, who we had met on the amazon river. I am so happy I made the decision to meet them! They let me fit into their travel plans, and we ended up having the best week. 
On out fisrt day In A small town an hour from Quito called otavolo we explored through markets, and ate one of our favourite snacks. It is called a papas reinas. It is a deep fried ball of rice, meat, a whole egg, and potato. 
The next day a really nice man from our hostel said he would take us to the mitad del mundo. (the middle of the world aka the equator.) there are two places to be on the equator line. One is the actual gps navigated line and one was calculated by the French which is only 500 meters off. On the gps line there is a museum, which was super informative about the indigenous people and there are tests you can do to experiment how on the equator things are different, for example how the water flows. On the line the water goes straight down instead of counter or clockwise. He then took us to the old town of Quito. The reason he was taking us around was because he said he loved showing people his city. I totally get why. I was not expected such an amazing old city. The churches were beautiful! Filled with gold and instead of gargles they were animals from the galapogos on the basilica. 
The three of us then decided to head to the south of Ecuador. Hilary and Adam had to make it to cusco, Peru by a certain time to do the inca trail. We hopped on buses that costed a dollar per hour and made our way to alusyi to catch the famous switch back train. This train is known as the steepest train in the world and has three switchbacks in order to make it down the mountain. Beautiful secenery and interesting stories about the construction of the train. Goast stories included because it is called the devil throat, and the devil is said to have cursed the building of the train. 
We were recommended in Quito about going all the way to south to a town called machala. There is a port there that apparently has the same huge sea turtles as the galapogas. We didn't get to see them but we did head to the beach which is a vacation spot for a lot of ecuadorians. We spent st. Patricks day drinking beer on the beach and eating civiche. On the boat ride over we met a man who was traveling with his wife but they were doing Thier own thing for a few days, this is why he was on his own. We invited him to have some beers with us, because he was a fellow Canadian and he seemed like a nice guy. As we hung out more we found out the reason he wasn't  with his wife was because she was in the hospital unable to walk for a month. On march 8th (international woman's day) they were walking in a national park on the coast and were attacked by three men. He was told he had 30 minutes to get three thousand dollars or his wife would be killed. While he was running down the mountain, the men got a little bored and start harassing the wife. She noticed a machete and slashed the one man. They then started pounding her head and she jump 50 meters off the mountain. She broke her pelvis and legs, and thus in the hospital unable to walk. 
Our faces and our mouths were wide open in total shock, his is not why we expected! So interesting to have met this man and heard his story. 
Later that night we went out for more beer, when we went into the first bar we were immediately noticed, we got one beer and sat down, beer was thrown on us within seconds. This is the first time in south America I have felt as a gringo unwanted. Made for the most unexpected and interesting st. Patty's day.

Manaus

When we got off the boat in Manaus, we were greeted by a man who said he had a great price for us for a place to stay. So Hilary, Hilary, Adam and i decided to get a room together at this hostel. He wanted to talk to us right away about jungle trip options, Hilary and Adam only had a day there before they flew to Bogotá, they did a day trip. Hilary and i agreed to a 4 night 5 day trip. We were then given a walking tour of manaus. Manaus was not what i expected at all! It is a very large city On the Río Negro where it meets up with the Amazon river. Manaus used to be the Richtest city in Brasil. The people who lived there used to send their laundry to europe because 1. They has the money and 2. Because they didn't want to Wash their clothes in the Amazon water. 
Our jungle tour started with a long boat ride to see the meeting of the Amazon River and the río negro. The río negro is Black because of the acidity in the water. The difference in the water allows for their to be a defined line in the water between Brown and Black. We arrived at our jungle lodge and right away put into a small Green Amazon canoe. We were taken pirana fishing. At night we were taken in the same boat to go camen "hunting" not killing but looking. Our guide got into the water and roamed around until he found one. This should have been hint number one for me of the unethical things about our amazon trip, i was uncomfortable the whole time that this poor animal was being passed round and cameras were being flashed in its eyes. By day three all we wanted to do was leave because we realized that this was not worth what we had paid for. It was so disapointing being Hilary's last thing she would do in south america. To top  the cake we saw a sloth in a tree (which was awesome) but then the guide Climbed the tree, tied a rope to the sloth and dangled it so we could eventually hold it. Hilary and i were outraged, we yelled at our guide. But unfortually the other people in our boat loved it. We begged for them to let us go home, but language was a barrier. 
Not all of the trip was a right off. We had an amazing camping experience in the jungle in hammocks. It was crazy because we could barley sleep because the bugs surrounding us were so loud. We also did a really informative jungle hike, we saw a tranchula the size of my hand.
Overall it was diacourging because the amazon is such a amazing place and it makes me sad to see it being taken advantage of by tour agencies. Please do more research into the company if you choose this is something you want to do.