The photos from these parts of our trip are now on the blog and also be viewed by following these links:
Banos:
Cuenca:
Cajas National Park:
Tuesday 29 December 2009
Cotopaxi to Banos
After our night in the brothel in Machachi we cycled to Cotopaxi National Park, named after Volcan Cotopaxi, an active volcano sitting at 5897m. The route was along the Panamerican Highway – the main highway through South America. The Panamerican Highway was sadly smelly, hot, hilly, dirty and tiring! The majority of the traffic was buses and lorries. They must use some dirty fuel here, because all the exhausts were spewing out black fumes all over us. And it was Chris’s birthday...happy birthday!
We took one of the first opportunities to get off the main road, and followed a small track up towards Cotopaxi National Park. It was so nice to be away from the traffic! We ended up camping for two nights in the national park in a nice spot with a great view of Cotopaxi. It looked beautiful in the evening, shrouded mysteriously by golden clouds. While in the national park we went for a few walks, and at 3500m we could definitely feel the effects of the altitude! This perhaps wasn’t helped by the food we were eating...as our decision to camp had been entirely made on the spot we weren’t very prepared and all our meals for two days consisted of some combination of rice, mango and nuts. Cold and congealed mango flavoured rice for breakfast...gourmet!
By the time we decided to leave Cotopaxi it was clear that Chris’s leg was causing him a few problems. He has had a recurring groin injury for about 4 months now. We had hoped that a few days off in Quito would help to reduce the problem, by the uphill day on the Panamerican made sure that this wouldn’t be the case. So we decided to cycle back to the Panamerican and get a bus to Banos, a small city a few hours south. But first we had to find our way back to the road...this proved to be very difficult! The guy who we had paid for camping told us that the route to the camp spot was circular, so we decided to leave the way we hadn’t come. This was a bit of a mistake, the road was a dirt track (as it had been on the way up, but the way down turned out to be much worse). For about thirty minutes we fought our way down the worsening track, which led us through ditches, across fields, to dead ends and passed dogs determined to chase us and yap at our heels as we peddled frantically past. Eventually we saw a hopeful looking road. Chris went ahead to investigate, and as I was struggling up one of the hills I saw him coming back towards me. He reported, not very calmly, that at the end of that road there was a 'big f*****g gate that was f*****g locked!' Armed with rocks and big sticks, we faced the dogs again to ask at a nearby farm how to get back to the main road. The friendly farmer told us we should simply lift our laden bikes over the 12 foot gate. So...back again past the dogs, weapons at the ready (unused thankfully) and to the gate, which now was miraculously open! Eventually the road did lead back to the Panamerican, where we managed to flag down a bus. The bad luck wasn’t over yet though...
On the bus journey of woe, Chris’s expensive camera was stolen. Luckily, only the night before we had uploaded photos to the laptop, so at least not many photos were lost. But after a birthday cycling along the Panamerican, two days of eating rice and mango, an injured leg and a frustrating morning of dead ends and furious dogs this news obviously didn’t go down well. We stopped at a restaurant and ate more rice while we contemplated our options and worked out which dirty scoundrel had been the thief. After an hour or so of this we decided to continue on to Banos.
Banos turned out to be a lovely little town, and restored our good spirits. The town is situated right at the bottom of a valley with huge hills all around it. Just above the town is the active volcano Tungurarhua (meaning ‘throat of fire’), it is an impressive sight. Banos is so named because of the natural therapeutic mineral baths there. We visited them a number of times, hoping they would help Chris’s leg to heal. Even if they didn’t, it was fun and refreshing to alternate between the hot, warm and freezing pools. We found a great food market in Banos – the central market, where lunch was always less than $4 for both of us. Guinea pigs were a local delicacy, and although we didn’t try any as they were quite expensive, we saw them being cooked whole on big stakes over fires. They actually smelled quite nice! After a few days in Banos we felt refreshed from our traumatic few days and ready to face the rest of Ecuador. Next stop...Cuenca.
Road up to Cotopaxi National Park
We took one of the first opportunities to get off the main road, and followed a small track up towards Cotopaxi National Park. It was so nice to be away from the traffic! We ended up camping for two nights in the national park in a nice spot with a great view of Cotopaxi. It looked beautiful in the evening, shrouded mysteriously by golden clouds. While in the national park we went for a few walks, and at 3500m we could definitely feel the effects of the altitude! This perhaps wasn’t helped by the food we were eating...as our decision to camp had been entirely made on the spot we weren’t very prepared and all our meals for two days consisted of some combination of rice, mango and nuts. Cold and congealed mango flavoured rice for breakfast...gourmet!
Helen with Cotopaxi in the distance
View from our hike
On the bus journey of woe, Chris’s expensive camera was stolen. Luckily, only the night before we had uploaded photos to the laptop, so at least not many photos were lost. But after a birthday cycling along the Panamerican, two days of eating rice and mango, an injured leg and a frustrating morning of dead ends and furious dogs this news obviously didn’t go down well. We stopped at a restaurant and ate more rice while we contemplated our options and worked out which dirty scoundrel had been the thief. After an hour or so of this we decided to continue on to Banos.
Banos turned out to be a lovely little town, and restored our good spirits. The town is situated right at the bottom of a valley with huge hills all around it. Just above the town is the active volcano Tungurarhua (meaning ‘throat of fire’), it is an impressive sight. Banos is so named because of the natural therapeutic mineral baths there. We visited them a number of times, hoping they would help Chris’s leg to heal. Even if they didn’t, it was fun and refreshing to alternate between the hot, warm and freezing pools. We found a great food market in Banos – the central market, where lunch was always less than $4 for both of us. Guinea pigs were a local delicacy, and although we didn’t try any as they were quite expensive, we saw them being cooked whole on big stakes over fires. They actually smelled quite nice! After a few days in Banos we felt refreshed from our traumatic few days and ready to face the rest of Ecuador. Next stop...Cuenca.
Sunday 27 December 2009
Photos From Ecuador
Since arriving in Ecuador we haven't done much cycling due to my stupid leg so after leaving Quito, we spent a day in Machachi walking around the market, then a few days near Volcan Cotopaxi before heading to Banos. The photos from these parts of our trip are now on the blog and also be viewed by following these links:
Quito:
Machachi:
Cotopaxi:
Enjoy!
Quito:
Machachi:
Cotopaxi:
Enjoy!
Thursday 17 December 2009
Helen Arrives
I arrived safely in Quito after my 50 hour journey from Auckland to be met at the airport by Chris. I was relieved that my bike and luggage also made it, I had had 3 flights to catch and wasn’t that confident that they would arrive with me.
We stayed in Quito for 6 nights. The city is split into ‘old’ and ‘new’ areas; the new area is pretty touristy and more expensive, whereas the old area is much less touristy, cheaper and has plenty of beautiful old buildings, as well as steep, windy cobbled streets and plazas to explore. We spent most of our time wandering the streets, people watching and trying to learn Spanish. Very few people in South America speak English – even at Santiago airport I was surprised that people at the desks etc didn’t speak English. So, we are trying to teach ourselves the basics. We haven’t done too badly, and I usually feel quite confident after we’ve done some learning until I try to speak to someone and they reply too quickly for me to follow, and then all I can do is stare blankly and say ‘no entiendo’ and start to mime, while they try to explain in even faster Spanish. I think we will gain much more from the trip if we can converse with people, so we will keep learning and are planning on having some Spanish lessons somewhere along the way.
Despite our poor Spanish, the people in Quito were really friendly and always willing to help us out. I was surprised to see a lot of people (especially women) in traditional dress, it is a very colourful outfit consisting of long socks, a skirt and poncho, and completed with a small trilby hat with an extravagant peacock feather pinned to it. Often women had small children strapped to their backs with long strips of material – I only saw one pushchair while we were in Quito! There were very few beggars on the streets, which was another surprise for me. I had expected to see quite a lot. There were, however, plenty of shoe shiners. People who live in Quito must have the shiniest shoes in the world, on every street and in every plaza there were shoe shiners! People of all ages had their shoes shined; I think the youngest person I saw was a boy who looked about 2, and the oldest about 80! We were sitting in a plaza one day and were approached by two shoe shining boys. Although we were wearing flip flops, they offered to shine our shoes! They were very determined and even when we declined they got their polish and tried to shine the sides of our shoes. We eventually managed to send them away.
After an enjoyable time in Quito it was time to build our bikes, pack and leave. I was almost certain that I’d be unable to fit all my stuff into the two small panniers and one rucksack that I will be travelling with for the next few months (a challenge and a difficulty for any girl). Chris kindly said he’d take some of it for me, but between us we still seemed to have too much to carry! An amusing (in hindsight) few hours followed where we asked each other questions such as: “Do you think I’ll need this saw/ perfume/fishing rod/3 books/adjustable spanner/llama wool jacket?” The reply was usually “Do you think you’ll need it? Have you used it?” To which Chris usually responded “Well... I haven’t used it since Canada. But, you know, might come in handy somewhere.” We ended up being fairly ruthless and leaving the hostel staff with a nice pile of rejected items. The rest we managed to squash in or strap on somewhere.
It was time to leave! We decided to cycle from our hostel to the main bus station, and get a bus to our next destination - a town called Machachi, which is about 25 miles south of Quito. By doing this we hoped to avoid much of the traffic in and around Quito, and on the 4-lane highway out of the city. BUT...we still had to negotiate the busy streets of Quito. I felt quite apprehensive, mainly because I have no front panniers (bags) on my bike, so all the weight is at the back. Lifting it is almost impossible, and I had frightening images of myself doing wheelies while going up steep hills, and then falling over backwards while Chris cycled ahead obliviously. Luckily that wasn’t the case, and once I had got used to the crazy steering on my bike I was fine. We unknowingly picked a brilliant day to leave Quito (I wish I could say we planned it). Twice a month, all the streets in the city centre are closed to vehicles, and there is a cycling event. We picked one of these days! Even better – most cyclists were travelling the opposite way to us, so we had half to road almost to ourselves. There was a real mixture of people taking part in the cycling event, and some very unlikely characters too. The most memorable person was a guy who instead of having panniers on the back of his bike, had two huge speakers and a sound system! Very inventive I thought.
We managed to get a bus successfully, and paid only $1.50 for both of us and our bikes! We arrived in Machachi to find there was a huge food market going on, where we tried a lot of new food, most of it delicious. We also met a very giggly, chatty old couple (we didn’t understand anything they were saying) who we laughed with. After they had walked off the woman scampered back and stuffed $5 in Chris’s hand! He tried quite forcibly to give it back, but she was having none of it and just laughed as she trotted away. Everyone else was laughing too, and we felt quite bemused, but very grateful for her small and incomprehensible act of kindness. After the visit to the market we headed back to our hotel which we realised as the night wore on was actually a brothel, but for $7 who's complaining! The next morning we headed south towards Cotapaxi National Park.
We stayed in Quito for 6 nights. The city is split into ‘old’ and ‘new’ areas; the new area is pretty touristy and more expensive, whereas the old area is much less touristy, cheaper and has plenty of beautiful old buildings, as well as steep, windy cobbled streets and plazas to explore. We spent most of our time wandering the streets, people watching and trying to learn Spanish. Very few people in South America speak English – even at Santiago airport I was surprised that people at the desks etc didn’t speak English. So, we are trying to teach ourselves the basics. We haven’t done too badly, and I usually feel quite confident after we’ve done some learning until I try to speak to someone and they reply too quickly for me to follow, and then all I can do is stare blankly and say ‘no entiendo’ and start to mime, while they try to explain in even faster Spanish. I think we will gain much more from the trip if we can converse with people, so we will keep learning and are planning on having some Spanish lessons somewhere along the way.
Despite our poor Spanish, the people in Quito were really friendly and always willing to help us out. I was surprised to see a lot of people (especially women) in traditional dress, it is a very colourful outfit consisting of long socks, a skirt and poncho, and completed with a small trilby hat with an extravagant peacock feather pinned to it. Often women had small children strapped to their backs with long strips of material – I only saw one pushchair while we were in Quito! There were very few beggars on the streets, which was another surprise for me. I had expected to see quite a lot. There were, however, plenty of shoe shiners. People who live in Quito must have the shiniest shoes in the world, on every street and in every plaza there were shoe shiners! People of all ages had their shoes shined; I think the youngest person I saw was a boy who looked about 2, and the oldest about 80! We were sitting in a plaza one day and were approached by two shoe shining boys. Although we were wearing flip flops, they offered to shine our shoes! They were very determined and even when we declined they got their polish and tried to shine the sides of our shoes. We eventually managed to send them away.
After an enjoyable time in Quito it was time to build our bikes, pack and leave. I was almost certain that I’d be unable to fit all my stuff into the two small panniers and one rucksack that I will be travelling with for the next few months (a challenge and a difficulty for any girl). Chris kindly said he’d take some of it for me, but between us we still seemed to have too much to carry! An amusing (in hindsight) few hours followed where we asked each other questions such as: “Do you think I’ll need this saw/ perfume/fishing rod/3 books/adjustable spanner/llama wool jacket?” The reply was usually “Do you think you’ll need it? Have you used it?” To which Chris usually responded “Well... I haven’t used it since Canada. But, you know, might come in handy somewhere.” We ended up being fairly ruthless and leaving the hostel staff with a nice pile of rejected items. The rest we managed to squash in or strap on somewhere.
It was time to leave! We decided to cycle from our hostel to the main bus station, and get a bus to our next destination - a town called Machachi, which is about 25 miles south of Quito. By doing this we hoped to avoid much of the traffic in and around Quito, and on the 4-lane highway out of the city. BUT...we still had to negotiate the busy streets of Quito. I felt quite apprehensive, mainly because I have no front panniers (bags) on my bike, so all the weight is at the back. Lifting it is almost impossible, and I had frightening images of myself doing wheelies while going up steep hills, and then falling over backwards while Chris cycled ahead obliviously. Luckily that wasn’t the case, and once I had got used to the crazy steering on my bike I was fine. We unknowingly picked a brilliant day to leave Quito (I wish I could say we planned it). Twice a month, all the streets in the city centre are closed to vehicles, and there is a cycling event. We picked one of these days! Even better – most cyclists were travelling the opposite way to us, so we had half to road almost to ourselves. There was a real mixture of people taking part in the cycling event, and some very unlikely characters too. The most memorable person was a guy who instead of having panniers on the back of his bike, had two huge speakers and a sound system! Very inventive I thought.
We managed to get a bus successfully, and paid only $1.50 for both of us and our bikes! We arrived in Machachi to find there was a huge food market going on, where we tried a lot of new food, most of it delicious. We also met a very giggly, chatty old couple (we didn’t understand anything they were saying) who we laughed with. After they had walked off the woman scampered back and stuffed $5 in Chris’s hand! He tried quite forcibly to give it back, but she was having none of it and just laughed as she trotted away. Everyone else was laughing too, and we felt quite bemused, but very grateful for her small and incomprehensible act of kindness. After the visit to the market we headed back to our hotel which we realised as the night wore on was actually a brothel, but for $7 who's complaining! The next morning we headed south towards Cotapaxi National Park.
Saturday 12 December 2009
More Mexico Photos
These are my photos from Baja, Mexico. Click to see in Picasa. I'll hopefully add some captions soon. Enjoy!
Thursday 10 December 2009
Photos from the USA
I'm now in Quito and have joined up with Helen for the South American Section of the trip! Helen has a netbook so I have managed to get a lot more photos on Picasa. These are the best from the USA, should have photo's from Mexico up soon, Enjoy! Click on the galleries to view from Picasa.
Border to San Fran
San Fran to Mexico
Border to San Fran
San Fran to Mexico
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