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Published: October 28th 2008
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Puerto Lopez
The beautiful fishing town of Puerto Lopez We landed in Guayquil in Ecuador, which is the largest city of the country and had the biggest population, it still felt quite small though in comparison to other major cities we've been too. It was situated on the river Guayas where there is a great Malecon (waterfront walkway) with parks, cinemas, restaurant and cafes. At one end of it there was an area called Las Penas a colonial area that had been renovated and painted in bright colours and was a tourist trap with cafes, restaurants and viewpoints. We picked a really sunny afternoon to visit and spent it sitting looking over the river drinking beer, just our sort of afternoon. However walking off the Malecon and main street was a bit like walking in to the bronx and had a bit of an edge to it. There was also is a great little park called Park Bolivar which is full of massive land iguanas, they were everywhere, hundreds of them in the trees and sat on the benches, some of them even liked to be stroked.
We then headed to the coast to follow the Ruta del Sol (Route of the Sun) on the pacific ocean. The first
little town was called Montanita, it was like a little Ibiza 20 years ago. People just go here to surf and party and we managed to hit it right by arriving on the weekend. We were there for two days, the first day we got hammered (on about 15 quid) and the second day we were in bed all day recovering, god knows how we are to going to cope drinking when we get home!!! It was a really relaxing place, a bit rough around the edges and geared for tourists with local South Americans selling handicrafts on the street and small makeshift bars along the road making cocktails very strong and selling them very cheap. It was a typical Ecuadorian beach holiday resort and at weekends they all flock in to enjoy themselves.
When we recovered we headed further north to Puerto Lopez and the Island of Silver (Isla del Plata), they say the island is the 'poor mans Galapagos' as it has similar wildlife to the Galapagos but just on a smaller scale and its (a lot) cheaper to get to. The Island itself was very nice but no substitute for the real thing!!! We actually came
Hump Back Whales
Off the coast of Isla Del Plata here though to see the humpback whales that come to breed off the island for about 3 to 4 months of the year, it was awesome, we followed a mum and her cub for about 45 minutes as they swam around.
From here we took a 12 hour bus over to Quito the capital city, we were very dubious about coming here as nearly everyone we had met had been either robbed, mugged or pick pocketed! The city has a new and old town and most of the travellers stay in the new as there are a lot more restaurants and bars etc but is also where most of the crime happens. We decided to stay in the old town and it turned out to be a lovely place, really clean and pretty safe but that could of been due to the immense police presence on the streets. The old town has renovated colonial buildings and is very picturesque, it has a lot of beautiful churches and convents around. We visited a few and then went to the Basilica del Voto Nacional (church) where we climbed up rickety steel stairs and over wooden planks to the church spires, there
had definitely been no health and safety checks done here!! The view over Quito though was amazing.
Obviously as we are on the equator in Ecuador and a the trip here wouldn't of been complete without going to the centre of the earth (Mitad Del Mundo). It was about 1 hour from Quito and had obviously been turned into a big tourist attraction with cool experiments with eggs and water, loads of restaurants and shops. It was fun hopping from the southern hemisphere to the northern hemisphere over the equatorial line and there was also a huge monument to mark the spot. Next to Mitad del Mundo was a tiny museum who were supposedly revealing the true middle of the earth some 240 meters away at the top of a hill and marked by inca ruins. The current location had been measured by the French years ago and due to apparatus errors they apparently got it wrong and since the invention of satellites and GPS the 'true' centre of the earth has been re-discovered. Who do you believe!!!!
Then we headed south to the town of Banos, which is based at the bottom of Tungurahua Volcano and is
still live, it's last big eruption was in 2006. Its setting couldn't of been nicer and more relaxing, a lush green valley with beautiful waterfalls and villages all the way through it. We hired push bikes out and visited most of them, the most impressive being Pailion Del Diablo, the devils waterfall. Banos is another favorite with Ecuadorian weekenders and there was loads of Quads and motorbikes which you could hire for the day along with bungee jumps and endless tours you could do. We even went on a night tour advertising that we could watch the volcano errupt.......this tour was obviously falsely advertised, otherwise you wouldn't be reading this now!!!!
Sixty kilometres from Banos is the gateway to the Oriente (Amazon Basin) at a town called Puyo. Having loved all our experiences into the jungle we decided to go for another few days and stay with a guy called Gonzalo and his family in there village of Iwia a 2 hour drive from Puyo into secondary jungle. We did a few treks into the jungle where Gonzalo let us try some medicinal plants for coughs and colds, which they still use for the family today. We even witnessed
his dad and mum trying to expel an evil spirit from his brother using hot coals and chanting in Quechua, he had a fever and they believed he had picked up a bad spirit.
The second day Gonzalo took us fishing which Dan was well up for, although it was a little different to what he was used to. First we had to trek into the jungle and find a specific tree with poisonous roots, which we then tied together into bundles. We crushed the bundles with rocks so the white milky poison was released out of them. Gonzalo tied the bundles to the end of bamboo rods and then dived down in the river and placed them in holes in rocks. Within minutes fish started to floating to the top, they weren't dead, the poison just makes them feel drowsy and kind of stuns them for a few seconds, which (should) give you time to catch them with your hands. It was like a comedy sketch trying to catch them, we kept dropping them back in the water, although the local kids had no problem. After about 30 minutes we had caught a big bag full.......great fun......some of
Quito
San Francisco Church the strangest fish we have seen!!!
Whilst we were getting the poison roots, Gonzalos heard his brother shout from somewhere in the jungle and when we found him, he was in a hole about 7 foot deep hunting for armadillo. After helping them dig the hole, his brother suddenly stopped as he heard the armadillo move. Gonzalos fired into life and quickly made some wooden stakes to spear the animal. A few (gruesome) minutes later the armadillo had been staked, smashed on the head and then slung over his nephews shoulder (you'll have to see the video to believe it). It wasn't exactly eco-friendly or humane but this armadillo was going to feed a family of 18 plus. As you can imagine me and Jen weren't exactly looking forward to lunch........armadillo soup and poisoned rock fish anyone?
Our final destination was the bustling town of Riobamba. Here we took the world famous train journey down the Nariz del Diablo (Devils Nose) to Simbambe. The journey was very picturesque as the train weaved through mountainous countryside and villages. It was all going well until the train decided to de-rail, including the carriage we were in.......well sat on top off!!!
Luckily we were only going slow and nobody was hurt but it was definitely the end of our train ride......who said this travelling lark was boring!!! Right we are going back to Quito know to catch a flight to the caribbean coast of Columbia. Hasta Luego.
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