Advertisement
Published: November 8th 2007
Edit Blog Post
Vilcabamba
My Lovely Horse I arrived in Vilcabamba on the 31st October. Journey details:
Origen/Destination... Piura (Perú) - Loja (Ecuador) / Loja - Vilcabamba
Mode of transport... Coach
Company... Transportes Loja & Vilcabambaturis
Cost.... 28 Soles & $1 USD
Duration... 8 Hours & 1 Hour
Remarks... The first bus was fine and the border crossing into Ecuador was easy enough. The second bus was a bit of a death trap... and it freaks me out a little when bus drivers here drive on the wrong side of the road in an attempt to avoid the pot holes. On a straight road ok, but it makes me chuckle as they do it round blind corners and over blind hills.
So I decided to head to Vilcabamba in place of Loja just because I'd heard that Loja wasn't up to much and also that Vilcabamba is great for cheap massages. No contest really. The valley that Vilcabamba sits in is known as the ´valley of longevity' supposedly because the people there live to be 100 or so. It's quite a small town and in all honestly there isn't a whole lot to do there. I was told that people go to Vilcabamba only to relax
Vilcabamba
My ass was killing me at this point. Nice landscape though and take a break from the strenuous activity of being on holiday all the time. Whilst the thought of doing nothing for a few days bothered me to begin with, I soon got used to it.
Vilcabamba was such a chilled out, tranquil place. There were mountains on all sides of the town so no matter where I looked there was always a pretty good view. From Vilcabamba it's possible to enter the Parque Nacional Podocarpus although I heard this is more easily done from Loja. I stayed at a place called El Jardín Escondido (The Hidden Garden). This wasn't my first choice place, but I couldn't contact them so I went here instead. It was one of the more expensive places in town (a hefty $9 per night)... but what I got for that made it totally worth it. The breakfast was awesome, and if doing nothing got too much, I could chill out in the pool, hammocks or jacuzzi.
Anywayz... the surroundings are great for trekking on foot and on horse. Having already done a fair bit of trekking I decided I'd let something else do all the work for a change. So on the second
Vilcabamba
Did somebody say "Work"? day I went on a horse trek out of the town and up into the valley. It cost me $30 USD. Had there been more people it would have been only $25. However, as it was, it was just me and my guide: Carlos. We climbed the valley on one side (I constantly felt sorry for my horse having to carry me up a steep hill), before descending into the jungle at the bottom. Here we walked for a while and saw some waterfalls. The normal procedure would have been to stop and bathe under them, but sadly as it's still the dry season they were more like gentle trickles than actual proper waterfalls. Still, the walk was fun and it was back on the horses and up the other side of the valley. I can understand how some people have problems with vertigo since the horse was forever just a few centimetres from the valley edge. I decided to just put my faith in the horse and tried no to think about what would happen if it slipped! We returned to the town via a different route than the one by which we left allowing for a different view
Vilcabamba
The pool and garden at El Jardín Escondido of the landscape.
I would say that on the whole the trek was great. It was a shame that Carlos turned out to be a bit quiet.... it seemed once again that I'd drawn the short straw when it comes to getting a guide that actually guides. Still, I did manage to get a good bit of spanish practice in during the day. It was my first time on a horse... and I had NO idea how painful it was gonna be. After about 6 hours on a saddle my ass and legs were killing me. I guess the trick is to do it so often that your ass becomes moulded into the shape of a saddle. Unfortunately mine wasn't, and towards the end it was a struggle not to just dissmount and walk the rest of the way!
So... what better way to cure a sore ass than with a $15 masage and a wee while in the jacuzzi. But of course. The masage was booked through the hostal... $15 USD for 1.5 hours... far too difficult to resist I thought. It was a great hour and a half... far better than those hour and a half
Vilcabamba
The main Plaza in Vilcabamba English classes I used to give! At times it was damn painful... but in the end totally worth it. A little while after the massage it was into the Jacuzzi and after that my muscles were feeling relatively normal once more. The following day I left Vilcabamba and got a slightly less dodgy bus than the one I had arrived on back to Loja.
So now it's off to Cuenca... which luckily has nothing to do with summer camps.
Suerte
New photos:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/14643121@N05/
Advertisement
Tot: 0.082s; Tpl: 0.024s; cc: 12; qc: 28; dbt: 0.0319s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1mb