Advertisement
Published: December 29th 2005
Edit Blog Post
Mama Hilda's
Ours was the room in the far building with the peaked roof. Nice. We'd climbed a volcano. So what next? The Quilotoa loop...
From Latacunga there's a fairly well trodden path around a series of villages known as the Quilotoa loop. Quilotoa itself is a stunning emerald green lake in the caldera of an extinct volcano at around 3800m above sea level. It takes between 2-3 days to do the loop, and buoyed by relative sucess at Cotopaxi we decided to give it a look. The first leg of the journey was a straightforward taxi journey to Saquisili (you see why we were having trouble with the pronounciation?!) along with Rein & Char, two of the folks that we had climbed Cotopaxi with.
Saquisili is the site of a colourful Indian market every Thursday, which was why we started the loop there. Although we had already seen the market at Otavalo, this was nice as it had an air of authenticity about it despite having a tourist nicknack section. I for one regretted having eaten breakfast in Latacunga before setting off when I saw loads of local folk eating slow-roasted pork, potato tortillas and maize for brekkie! Incidentally if you ever visit Ecuador that has to be one of my recommendations; it's
Bits of pigs
Might gross you out, but they do some very tasty things with pigs here... known as hornado and is served with all of that along with a super spicy sauce called ají (pronounced: a-hee). Very tasty. Anyway we had a look around, I bought my mum a scarfe (awwww what a good son) and then headed for the bus terminal for our onward journey to Chugchilán, the next village on the loop, and some 3 hours away despite only being 65km down the road.
The bus terminal. Of course, that would be where all the buses are parked. Wrong! The village has no less than 4 places to catch busses from, and of course we found the right one on our fourth attempt. Oh well. We got on the bus and soon realised why the journey was to take 3 hours - the road was a dirt track! After some hours, and a whole load of stunning mountain scenery, we were dropped off at Chugchilán. We'd taken the decision to stay at a different hostal than most, Mama Hilda's rather than the more popular Black Sheep Inn. Happily we weren't dissappointed. Mama Hilda was a great hostess, and since we were the only people in the place, we got top service. We also
had our own wood cabin with beautiful views of the valley below, so we were very happy campers.
The next day we decided to walk the 22km to the volcanic lake, it being a pretty route and all. We were advised of an alternative route that cut the distance in half, across the valley rather than around. Oh well, in for a penny...... So off we set. The first bit was dusty and steep downhill - but that's fine, right? Well yes it is, until you get to the other side of the valley. We met a friendly little local boy called Pedro who I proceeded to confuse with my Spanglish, and with him we started the walk up the other side. And what a side. Both Em and I panted and puffed our way, stopping every five minutes to catch our breath and cool down - at that altitude, strenuous excersise really takes it out of you. I have no idea how far down and back up we went, but suffice to say I reckon the 22km would have been much easier if longer.
Pedro was a friendly little chap, if somewhat bewildered by these strange foreigners.
Us on the way to the lake at Quilotoa
Millets want this one for their catalogue... Contrary to my original understanding, it turned out that he wasn't from the lake area at all, and after a couple of hours he arrived at his house. By that time he'd already walked
BOTH to
AND from Chugchilán to get free food aid for his family (it turned out that they were really poor, hence the aid) and carry it back. The kid was only 10 years old and carrying a sack that I would have struggled with. I gave him a bit of cash and we parted company, with (vague) instructions on how to get to the lake.
The walk to the lake was pretty but
HAAAARD. Bear in mind that we started at about 2800m, descended who knows how far, and then had to ascend to the crater rim at 3800m. That's probably 1500m of ascent, all the more difficult in thin mountain air!!
After stopping for lunch (tin of tuna and packet of biscuits - surprisingly tasty!) we plodded on in what we assumed was the right direction, stopping to ask directions wherever we encountered people. We finally found ourselves near the top of a very steep, very tall hill - hoping that
We made it!!!
It was a hard slog, but it was all worthwhile when we saw the lake. this was indeed the rim of the lake. Neither of us had much more go left in us, and there was a grumpy sounding storm gathering overhead. You can imagine our elation when we were finally greeted with the beautiful sight of the lake ahead of us. Amazing. When you've worked that hard for something, it seems worth so much more.....
As it turned out we had to trek half way round the crater to get to the hostal. We haven't been that glad to see a hostal for ages - and this wasn't the sort of hostal you get excited about under normal circumstances! Basic isn't the word. It was a bit like staying with a family, which was kinda cool as the proprietors were an indigenous family including a number (and I really can't be more specific!) of kids, ridiculously cute at that. We took some photos of the sunset, eat dinner and crashed out at about 8pm.
The next day was a travelling day, getting back to Latacunga via another market village called Zumbahua, although we didn't hang about there. The most notable thing about the journey was the camionetta (read: pick up truck) that
Me putting a stone on the pile
It's a peace thing apparently... we travelled in to the market. I joked that you could probably get 15 people in the back - in fact these guys managed just under 20. Impressive, although I don't suspect the suspension would agree if it had the capacity to. We got straight on a bus and were soon on our way back to Latacunga, and after being reunited with our (massive) backpacks, on our way south to the town of Baños...
Advertisement
Tot: 0.056s; Tpl: 0.01s; cc: 13; qc: 28; dbt: 0.0201s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb