We got up early from room 123 (which strangely enough was on the second floor?) and hit the road. We were eager to hit the equator… as we left town we kept checking our GPS’s and watching the numbers count down. We saw at the hotel that there was this big tourist deal with a HUGE sundial right on the equator. As we rounded turns the GPS went up then down teasing us as we were getting closer and then further away from the equator. We had constant chatter on the intercom. We must be close. Then the curve would take us away… Where the hell is this tourist spot. Well, we finally passed 00.00000 and no tourist spot… So we decided to turn around and go back to make sure we got a photo of the GPS reading 0. We must of looked kinda funny inching along the road looking at the GPS 00.00040 then 00.0003 and bingo! We are sitting on the Equator!!! No sign, No tourist deal, nothing… After we took the pictures we headed out thinking for sure the tourist deal is going to be right around the corner… Well we never found it and just kept cruising towards Quito. 
We stopped at a gas station as we were talking about the fact that our map was kinda vague and we knew there had to be a bypass around quito. Quito is a city of about 2 million plus… Well the station attendant did not have a map and said we could get one in Quito! We laughed at the irony – in order to avoid the clogged up streets of Quito by using a bypass we needed to go into Quito to buy a map – so we decided to wing it. As we approach Quito the bypass was well marked and we cruised around the outside. Quito sits in a bowl surrounded by a ring of mountains – we rode along a ridge to the east and south of Quito and looked down on the city. It is clouded by pollution and seems to go on forever – big buildings in the center and lots and lots of small houses and buildings. The altitude was changing between 9500 and 10,000 feet as we rode along the ridge.
We then desended down this amazing moutain road on the way to the ocean. We stopped to check out this super cool waterfall. You can get an idea of the scale of it by looking at the truck in the picture to the left. The foliage was getting really rainforest like as we headed towards the coast. There was two ways to get to Manta, one was the main highway we were on, the other looked like a main road that went pasts some big lakes on the map. We decided the lakes would be cool to see so we took a left and headed down the other road. We could see the lakes on the GPS but we could not see the lakes when we looked for them. Nothing. Nada. Shortly there after the road deterated to asphalt with broken chunks missing. No worries, we pressed on. Shortly there after the road deterated to gaint pot holes and gravel sections. We began chatting about the time and how long it would take us to get to Manta. Would we make it by dark. Then the road deteriated to all gravel with section of mud. We thought, “we got this, at least its not raining” Shortly there after the rain came. And it rained… big time… tropical downpour. This made the road about the consistacy on baby shit after banana pudding. We were plowing our front end through the mud, however we could not slow too much as we were worried about being on the road after dark…
Well the road did improve after about 45 miles of baby crap and again we were carellessy cruising down the pavement at 70. We arrived in Manta shot to hell and muddy from the knees down. We gave up trying to find the hostel and checked into the first place that had a room. We found some beers and called it a night.
Tomorrow we head down the coast and find a place to chill for at least a day to catch up on some laundry and bike service.
Cheers
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