The Great Ordeals

Day 167

Last 16 days, I think I've come to terms with coming home, but really, half a year away from home, who knows how it will go.

So, where am I? Ah, last Thursday. Valentine's Day. Was my shopping day, having no romantic engagements to attend to. I decided, after having been through 2 panama hats, that I was going to invest in a good one, that actually fit. So, I visit the hat shop of Alberto Pullo. Now Alberto, is probably the most famous and oldest, at the ripe age of 80, hatter in Cuenca. I walk into his shop, and he comes out and greets the strange foreigner in his shop. He has definitely been here a long time, his hands He has apparently, in his age, lost his voice, and is now largely dependent on hand signals to communicate, when I ask if he is Alberto he gives me a big hug like we're old friends. All over the walls are hats of various people who have brought them in for refurbishment. He takes me upstairs, where there are piles and piles of new hats for sale, some cheaper, the most costing $100 (which could fetch $800 in North America) and of varying qualities of weave, the superfines being so densely woven no light passes through them. I tell him about how my hat will need to be big, I have a large head, a reality I've been dealing with since I was 12. He gives me the first hat, it's actually too big. He gives me the next size done, perfect. He gets me to sign my name in a book that has names of people from around the world who've bought his hats. I thank him and walk out of his store with my new hat. It should be noted that the term "panama" is actually a misnomer, in Spanish they're called "sombereros de paja toquilla" or Montecristi's, named after the town where the reeds to used to make the hats comes from. Coming back to my hotel, Barney is walking down the street selling heart-shaped balloons. I buy more batteries and film as well. That evening, I'm feeling buoyant, and eat pizza. The place I choose was fairly empty, just one couple making out in the corner, and there's a football game on TV. Good times, this time I didn't spill beer everywhere, and just plain happy to be where I am.

Friday. I left Cuenca, aiming for the town of Guaranda, 8 hours northwest. I was doomed however, not to reach there that day. As we rolled toward Riobamba, we made it some hour and half short when the bus broke down. This was compounded by the fact that now that we were stopped there, in the middle of nowhere, the luggage bay doors wouldn't open, causing distress to most of the passengers. I'm quite happy, however, as my bag was riding on my lap for this trip, and I watch with amusement while they work on the bus. Hours pass however, and it was getting late, so I got out and waited for the next bus. I also gleaned introduction to a pair of Belgians, the other foreigners on the bus. They've only been here for a few weeks, not used to the normal engine failure of Ecuadorian buses. Just before the next bus drives by, they manage to crack the luggage bays, and everyone gets on to the new bus, wet, and tired, and me, still amused. We arrive late in Riobamba, no way I'm getting to Guaranda. This second bus was terminating at Quito, so it dropped us off at a random intersection in Riobamba, an hour, walking distance, from the town center. The Belgians, Antonio and Louis (don't ask me for their Belgian spellings) and I get on a city bus and manage to get to the town center, and find this beautiful hostal down a quiet side street for the night. Having made it through our bus journey, we go out and eat Mexican and talk about cultural differences, a generally normal topic for me these days. The next morning, I end up, due to a misunderstanding with the hostal owner, who drove us all to the Baños bus terminal, where the Belgians were going, walking all the way across the city center to get a bus to Guaranda. The ride up, despite being told it was beautiful, was rainy and cloudy, so I didn't see anything brilliant on that one. Arriving in Guaranda, I ask the guy at the terminal for directions and set off for the hostal. Setup there, I thought I was the only one there, I go look for lunch. I'm so busy looking for a restaurant, I nearly get run over by a pickup coming down one of the steep streets. In a rather un-Ecuadorian way, the driver yells at me; a pair of boys on the street corner laugh. This particular event solifies a rather poor first impression of Guaranda. It becomes evident that not much happens here, even though it is market day. I wander through the market. One woman comments how silly I look with my new hat, not sure why, I thought it looks fine, thank you very much. As well, there's a fair/circus thing on the edge of town, big ferris wheel and merry-go-rounds. Not much else. Feeling rather out of place in this town. I go back to the hostal, to find that there are, actually 2 other foreigners in this town. Valerie and Kristin, American. They're staying here for a month, helping the local doctor (they're both final year med students, doing practical stuff). They agree, there isn't much in this town. They do know a good cafe though, and I spend the afternoon drinking hot chocolate, and talking about medicine and generally taking fascination with their expertise. We also have dinner at a restaurant where quite a sizable birthday is in progress (excellent garlic prawns too). We leave, I wish the birthday man best wishes as we head out the door. So, maybe Guaranda isn't as bad as I thought.

Sunday. Guaranda, to blemish it further, really does shut down on Sundays. NOTHING is open. With the town lacking any kind of attraction, I walk up to a monument of an indian chief overlooking the town. There was a woman trying to herd cows down the road, with little success, as the cows seemed to be very stubborn. I decided, looking down on the town, that being there wasn't what I should be doing, and walked back down, bought some chocolate from the local woman's cooperative (delicious, but she had a hard time making change for me) packed up and caught a bus to Ambato. Ambato, as I learned quickly, is a murderous place to change buses. The bus drops me off at a random intersection, and I have to get a cab to the terminal. Wanting to go to Patate, east of Ambato, I find that because it's inside the same province as Ambato, I have to get to another terminal, pissed off at Ambato transit, I buy a hot dog from the stall out in front of the terminal and get another cab to the other terminal. The bus ride to Patate was brilliant, long green valleys lined with small village stretching before the Andes, with Tungaruhua, still belching smoke, in the distance. I arrive in Patate, and am immediately pointed in every which direction for a place to stay. I walk around the same blocks several times before finding a guy that knew a guy that had keys to a few rooms in an unused nite club where I could stay. Relieved at finally finding a place to sleep, I have kebabs from a lady selling them on the street corner, some of my favourite food around here. It's been a good day.

Monday, having enjoyed my night in Patate, I have breakfast at a place where the woman seemed extremely anxious that I got what I wanted. Unfortunately, I then had to go back to Ambato to get anywhere else. Back in Ambato, another random intersection. This time, in a sad twist of fate, I caught a bus, that said it was going to the terminal. Somehow, I missed whatever terminal this was, and ended up at the end of the bus' route, near the highway leading north. The conductor keeps asking me where I'm staying, clearly not understanding that I'm lost. I walk out to the highway, and after finding a good spot, flag a bus north, aiming for Latacunga. However, I must have fallen asleep when we passed the town, and the conductor couldn't remember where I wanted to go, and I wound up in Quito. I had lunch and got another bus back to the south. This conductor was much sharper, and made sure I got off. I then got another bus to the little town of Zumbahua, one more time. I arrived long after dark, and was hounded by people asking if I wanted to go to Quilotoa, which I'd planned to go to the next day. I went back the hotel I stayed at last time, found that there was no one manning the front desk, and made the ultimately frustrating choice of asking at the store next door. The guy there, evidently thinking me the ignorant gringo, lied between his teeth, telling me everywhere in Zumbahua was full, but, conveniently enough, he could take me in his truck to Quilotoa, for more double the going rate. I decided that swearing at him wouldn't help things. I walked up the street to the next hotel, finding that only one of it's many rooms was occupied, and settled down against the cold of Zumbahua. What a nightmare of a day, but the worst was yet to come...

Tuesday. The sun is shining, I get a truck out to Quilotoa. Laguna Quilotoa, an akaline lake of water caught in this crater of a collapsed volcano, is truly stunning (check photo gallery in a couple of weeks). Take photos, my driver points me to the path that will take me around the crater on the way to Chugchilan, my desired destination that day. So off I go, it's up and down, I pass a group of foreigners on a day trip, with a little girl following them asking for candy. Now, the trouble begins. My first mistake, that I only realized in hindsight, was that I dropped out of the crater rim too early. I follow this path on a maze of pathes heading down into the valley where there are farmsteads everywhere and the hills are the classic patchwork. I'm ecstatic, because I'm out in the middle of nowhere, wandering toward a destination I can see at the far end of the valley. It doesn't take me long to realize I'm not on the right track, but I'm happily getting lost, blazing my own way and what have you, so I carry on. I meet these 2 little boys, Luis and Javiar, who try to persuade me I need a guide, that it will be easier. At that point though, I'm not interested in easier, I'm having too much fun at this. I haul on down the hillside, the boys follow, in a rather creepy fashion, the way shoeshine boys or pickpockets might act. I loose them, and get down to the river at the bottom of the valley, having got stinging nettled and quite dirty on the way down. Knowing that the main road is up the hill, I begin up the other side of the valley. I see Luis watching me on the other side. He knew where I was going. I eventually made it up the road, and started happily walking down it. Unbeknownst to me, this was not actually the road I wanted, which had forked away further back. It starts to drizzle slightly. Not a problem, on with the coat keep at it. This is when things began to deteriorate. First, the dogs. It seemed like every dog from every farm in the area was running up and snarling at me, and after being bitten by the little dog in Las Tunas, this made me very stressed very quickly, getting paranoid about a pack of dogs hurting. I run into a young girl who enlightens me to the fact I'm not on the right road, and puts me down a path in the right direction. God knows where I would've ended up if I'd kept going. I'm really stressed now, having been walking with pack for a couple of hours now and been through too many encounters with the dogs. The path led down into the next valley. I meet a man sitting on a rock at the side of the path, resting. I join him, and he points me further on the right path. I meet some more dogs, these however, are tied up, and are much less grief-inducing. I walk on by the beautiful countryside, largely ignorant of it's beauty, being tired and stressed. I come down this new path some more, and come across a group of little children in bright red school uniforms, who wave at me as I come down the hill, but run away from the strange foreigner when I get down them. At a distance, they point toward the road, the right road. Finally, I'm on the road to Chugchilan. Now the rain starts. It isn't bad at first, but as I'm going up this road, it gets steadily worse, no more dogs though. I break a lot, trying to find somewhere out of the rain, without luck. Now, having been walking for 5 hours, which was actually the estimated hiking time, I'm tired, and very very wet. Up switchbacks, constantly looking back, listening, hoping for the bus I know that is due to come up there anytime now. Nothing. I suddenly arrive at a fork in the road, and have no idea which way to go. Look for the bus again, still nothing. I look up in that moment, and see, nailed halfway up a tree, a sign for a hostal in Chugchilan, pointing me to the right. I'm so relieved and am renergized, climb some more, and there, before me, is a sign "Bienvenidos a Chugchilan" Welcome to Chugchilan. There's a little boy there asking if I need guide, I ignore him, and sit under a roof eave and catch my breath.

I'm exhausted, extraordinarily wet, but I made it, in the estimated time, despite not following the correct path. I walk down to the Hostal Cloud Forest, whose signs guided me, and get a room and begin the process of drying off. I find that I'm not the only one to have made the journey from Quilotoa to Chugchilan. There is a guy from Idaho, and an Austrian, who had made the hike, on the correct path, no less, (I never learned there names, not sure they knew each others either) and joined them drying out our clothes around the wood stove in the common room. The Austrian has been living in Colombia, studying architecture, and is doing some travelling. The Idaho man is on vacation climbing mountians, and works for the forest service, so I find a common subject of climate and the pine beetle. Dinner was nice and hot, and vegetarian, no less. I go to sleep, quite happy to have made it through what I now consider to be one of my greatest challenges on this trip.

Yesterday morning. I legs are numb with stiffness, but they give me a big breakfast and I, with the other 2, catch the daily milk truck, to Sigchos, where we would connect with buses going back to Latacunga. The question for this truck ride, how many people can you fit in the back of an Ecuadorian pickup truck. The Answer: 25, not accounting for the large barrel of milk and the backpacks of 3 foreigners. Needless to say, it was cramped, to put it mildly, there was one man that hung off the tailgate for almost the entire journey. However, we made it to Sigchos, where the sun was shining, we lie on the plaza, drying some more, the Idaho man drinks a beer, that we find out is actually the last beer in the entire village, not being able to find any more in half a dozen different stores and restaurants. We get the bus, that's supposed to take us to Latacunga, but we find, with the rains from the day before, that there are numerous earth falls, and we come to one that has covered the entire road, taking several trees down the hillside with it. However, the other buses that are trying to get to Sigchos are on the other side, and we transfer without hassle. Finally, after riding a couple of hours back sitting next to a little kid that seemed to have whooping cough, we arrive back in Latacunga. I've had quite enough of this part of Ecuador, and take the next bus to Quito.

So now I'm back, closing that chapter of this trip. I'll be based in Quito for the next 2 weeks, not including the Galapagos trip. I arrived back, and engaged in a long argument with a taxi driver of the fare to a hotel in the Old Town. Despite assuring me that he knew where it was, he hadn't a flipping clue where I was talking about. I asked for the Hotel San Fransisco de Quito, on Sucre. The bloody taxi driver takes me to Plaza San Fransisco, to a hotel on the corner there, apparently absorbing only 2 words of my directions. He also has no change, so I get a 50 cent reduction to my fare, having failed to take me where I want to go. I find the San Fran, but it's full, surprising for a Wednesday night, and find a different hotel.

So we come to today. I decided, being open to everything once, to use a guide, the same guide I'd met on Plaza Grande months before, out of sheer running into him, to go see a couple of churches in the Old Town. The churches are lovely, but the guy was only moderately helpful, and I felt like he was rushing me through them, and in the end found him quite useless. I paid him and as it has been raining heavily all day, I came here to finish this update.