So we had a 6 hour bus journey from Banos to Quito - we arrived after yet another Kamikaze ride through the mountains as Quito is still at altitute of 2800m aggggggg I am sick of it - I hate the rain and the cold and the dull headache I seem to get.  

We jumped in a taxi from the bus station to our hostel it looked really nice online but when we got there it was clear the pics were taken some time ago and the place wasnt all that nice - the room was ok so that wasnt too bad. We really should be in dorms to save money but mentally I dont think we can handle it - getting a good night sleep is important and dorm sharing sucks - at this point in our trip we just cant face it even though they are a bit cheaper.

Anyway we were here for one thing and that was to book our jungle trip - we arrived on a Sunday which meant everything was closed, we looked for a place to get food - it was rotten and we got absolutely soaked to the bone in a downpour getting back to the hostel - just what we needed !!!

Noting was happening in the hostel so we did some more research on jungle- stuff - I know its also here that you can book a last minute tour to the Galapagos Island - only one of THE most amazing places in the world but our budget was already knackered so we knew this wasnt an option - still I was annoyed.

Lets book that tour.....oh you mean THAT tour hehehehe
The next morning we headed out to the first travel shop, their jungle tours didnt leave the next day, we were now pushed for time to get to Columbia and back to Lima we didnt have days to wait for a tour to start we wanted to get it over with asap.

We headed to "Happy Gringo" a reputable tour company when I noticed over the road was Galapagos Travel, I said to Marc, "lets just see how expensive it is" - we sat down and said to the girl "whats the ABSOLUTE cheapest last min deal you have leaving tomorrow" - she made a few phone calls and spoke in Spanish while we looked at all the amazing animal pics on the wall of cool things in the Galapagos - we were torturing ourself.

Well we spent the next 5 hours in there working out money justifying this trip to ourself, she came back with a really good deal but if we were gonna go there we wanted to scuba dive but this was very expensive - we sat there debating this for ages till we justified it enough to say BOOK IT !!!!!!

GALAPAGOUS HERE WE COME !!!!
So we got a 3 nights 4 day live aboard on this boat 
http://www.galapagosislands.com/mid-range-cruises/galaven-i/galaven_i-pictures.html 

We had a flight for the next day at 0730am and we were going to stay an extra night on the island so that we could do 2 scuba dives. Both of us were going to wet ourselves with excitement we never though it could be affordable even though it meant we were now having to dip into our savings money which we had kept behind to have money to go home to. We figured you only live once and we hadn't been this excited about anything in ages it was just what we needed to lift our 9 month "low"

We booked our dive with her too through Scuba Iguana, our dive sites were North Seymour and Mosquera - I wanted to see sharks SOOOO bad.


THE COST PER PERSON
Flight from Quito - Galapagos return - £270
Cruise price incl transfer & all food/soft drinks - £320 
Entry to the National Park (compulsary) - £63 each
Cost of 2 scuba dives - £140
Double room with wifi at Los Amigos Hostel in Santa Cruz, Galapagos - £16

TOTAL COST PER PERSON - just under £800 with the conversation rate  

We had already put aside £220 each for a jungle tour in our travel budget so we figured £580 from our personal savings was justifiable, it was the Galapagos afterall- the dives were really expensive but hey we defo needed a holiday from our holiday and to say we were excited was an understatement - we NEVER thought it was gonna be affordable - peeing my pants was putting it mildly, Marc even more it meant not having to go to the jungle haha.  
 
We booked this through this company below - this page shows their promotions and boat options - if you arrive in Quito and have flexability its ideal - even if you book 2 weeks before it leaves the other girls on the boat got the same price as us. We only had our 2 bank cards to take out cash but she reduced the paypal fee to 1% insead of 3% for us to pay for the rest of it so she was really nice her name was Danielle.

http://www.galapagosislands.com/galapagos-travel-deals.html 
 
 
There are no pics from Quito we were only there a night and I didnt dare risk getting my camera nicked cause it was meant to be a bad area and I needed that to use snorkling as it goes underwater.


Aggggggggggg next blog will be from the Galapagos - still cant believe it AGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG