The Thermal Pools of Banos Cuenca

Another week gone by and a busy one it was. It's nice to be in a regular routine in our new home. This week we toke off on Friday to Banos (Cuenca). This is a thermal hot spring about 10 minutes out of town. There are 4 different resorts that we found out there. The nicest appear to be the one we choose which was called Piedra De Agua. It was $10 each and $5 for the kids. For that you have access to the Turco (steam bath), Hot pool, and freezing cold pool. There is also a $20 upgrade to get into the Spa. The Spa gives you access to a personal assistant who walks you through the Turco, the Red and Blue mud bath. He then takes you below ground where you sit in the hot tub for 10 minutes and then a freezing cold tub for 2 minutes, and finally you have the steam box. A nice experience and I bet it's even better if you don't have any kids with you.

The picture above is the mud bath area of the spa. To the left this is the hot pool with basic access. There is also a eating area as well as massages available. Definitely worth the visit if in the area. And for us worth several visits as it is a 10 minute bus ride. We walk 5 minutes up the road grab the #12 bus and 10 minutes later we are there.

We didn't do much exploring this week. But we did have an opportunity to meet many of our neighbors. And what's quite interesting is that most of them speak English, in fact in our building of the 7 families it appears 6 speak English.

The question does remain is life here feasible? We found several things out. If looking to maximize your stay here you can take a 1 year Spanish class at a University for between $1000-1500 including books. This will allow you to apply for the student VISA. That being said we understand laws to change quickly here But technically you could come in on a tourist Visa, Apply for a 6 month Visa, after which you could take a University course and then apply for a 1 year student Visa. Giving you a total of near 2 years in the country.

Looking for work during this time? You have options. One I found the other day is called oDesk. At oDesk you sign up for free, post a resume and search for jobs that are done online. It can be anything from writing reports or proposals to being an admin assistant or even posting products online. Everything is done and logged online. There are hourly jobs as well as contracts. Another option is Open English, this is an English teaching online opportunity. You sign up and get paid to teach online. There are quite a few friends down here doing this option. Another teaching opportunity is Tutor  ABC. The difference with the two is that Tutor ABC is teaching to Chinese where as Open English targets South America.

So can life down here work? Yes, how free you want to be depends on how much you want to spend, and how simple you want to live.