Excellent Ecuador part 2

14/11/16- 15/11/16

The cloud forest hostel was a quirky hostel in the town of Chugchilian nestled high into the Ecuadorian highlands. The floors were on different levels in a maze of higgledy-piggledy levels. We were high around 3200m and I was certainly feeling it, walking up a flight of stairs rendered me so out of breath it was ridiculous, I feel sick, have a headache, having really crazy messed up dreams and the most unwanted side effect I cannot stop needing to urinate which when you need to increase fluid intake is less than ideal. The other thing I noticed was how cold I was, the temperature dropped to 12 degrees from a warm 31 degrees. Luckily the beds had multiple thick blankets and wood burners in the game rooms.

Lake Quinolta is just under 4000m it is a crater lake in the most western volcano in the Ecuadorian Andes. From the top of the viewpoint there is a path down to the lake itself. The walk is not difficult but the altitude makes walking back up difficult. I hung around at the top and didn’t want to take the risk of going down. To be fair the views were best from the top anyway. The small town at the top had the usual tourist shops and restaurants but I found some young puppies that just needed to be cuddled so whilst waiting for the group to get back up I had some puppy time.

The town of Chugchilian is a small town with not much to do, wondering along the streets a small market was attracting locals to come and buy produce. A lone volleyball court seemed to be the hub of social activities with a group of spectators gathered around a tense game. The locals appeared to be very good at the sport but then again if this is your main entertainment it’s hardly surprising. Dogs were pacing the streets looking for morsels of food and cats hiding under rocks, I wanted to collect them all and bring them home for the life dogs and cats should be living.

Back on the road again we had a long drive ahead towards the city of Cuenca. What amazes me on our drive days is the massive difference in the scenery from place to place. Snow capped volcanoes looming in their wake, to rolling green haciendas was the order of the day. It’s very easy to fall asleep on the truck but it’s a shame to miss such beautiful scenes. Quenca is Ecuador’s third largest city and a university town. The architecture is stunning reminiscence of colonial Spain with ornate balconies and impressive cathedrals. The Panama hat originates in the city so no trip would be complete without visiting one of the many hat factories. This is a city I was keen to explore, with an early morning wake up I headed out with a few fellow truck buddies to do a walking tour, bus tour, shopping, a walk to the top of the cathedral, Ice cream, the best fish and chips, museum to see the shrunken heads (a highlight), and general potter. We managed to fit in a lot to our only full day in the city. Obviously no trip would be complete without a purchase of some jewellery and art.

I grabbed an early night as we had another long drive in the morning to enter Peru, the next country on my epic trio across South America.