Advertisement
Published: February 6th 2007
Edit Blog Post
Our ¨train¨conductor
He is really into the whole train thing, of course I think he is hanging out of the train looking for rocks or landslides, not really for a photo op. After waiting two more days in Riobamba, our time had come to ride the famous train south to the Devil´s Nose. We sprung awake at 5 am on Friday morning, wolfed down breakfast and made way to the station for the 6 am train. We arrived to throngs of anticipating gringos all there for the same reason--to cruise down through a chunk Ecuador via train while riding on its roof. And of course, the train was late. When the horn sounded and the light appeared, the amped crowd balled up, jockeying for position to get the best seat on top of the train. I don´t think anywhere else in the world believes in lines. The arrival of the ¨train¨ was a bit anticlimactic to say the least and completly hilarious to say the most. Their ¨train¨ -the one portrayed in the posters, and guide books, and even the t-shirts they sell at the train station, was in fact not a train at all, but rather, a Bus. A normal run-down autobus common of all latin america with the exception that its wheels where swapped out for train wheels, a large metal rack was welded to the roof for passengers of course,
hmmmm, mercedes trains
Didn´t know mercedes made trains! and a new horn was added. The horn was loud enough to make one wonder if they were trying to hide their little illusion behind a proud curtain of noise. Well none the less, people rushed the, umm, bus so they could climb up and get good seats on the roof. Mind you, this roof rack was about half the size of the bus and they were packing about twice the amount of people on it as could fit inside. And it was all metal, but you could of course, rent a cusion from them for another $1. Nearing capacity and tensions rising (we witnessed a great shouting match between a young man and the old lady who wouldn´t scootch over for him) We opted to jump over and wait for the second ¨train¨ which was now arriving. That brings up another point...the two buses wern´t even conected, so in no sense was this going to be a Train ride. With the same situation mounting at this second train, we opted out of the caos and climbed inside to grab two comfy seats- the thrill was gone anyway and the thought packing in like chickens at an egg farm was
Our bus oh, wait i mean train
We did have some great views! no longer appealing. Sometimes bad situations have a way of presenting themselves in a whole new light and end up worthwhile none the less.
The engineer fired up the engine, let out a honk honk-hon-hon-honk honk----honk-honk and we began to roll toward the exit of the train yard. That´s when the attendant, who was hanging out back door started shouting, ¨La Puerta! La Puerta!¨ No Response from the driver not the guy maning the gate. You could look forward, sizing up the situation, and guage that the gate was not quite open far enough. ¨La Puerta! La Puerta! LA PUUUEERRTA!¨ and then he jumped inside the saftey of the train as the gate skimmed down the side of the train and conected with the ladder system accsessing the roof rack and passengers above. A loud metal on metal crash noise ensued as the ladder system was ripped clean off of the train. The driver slammed on the breaks and we stopped pretty quickly (good thing we weren´t an actuall train). It took about a half an hour of them screaming at eachother, a piece of string and some bailing wire for them to reattach the ladder... and it would
Matt earning his keep
Even though he did pay his $11, if we were going to go anywhere, the shoveling must continue! probably stay that way from this day forward...oh but read on.
The train ride to Alousi (where layed the famous Devil´s Nose section) was beautiful and reletively uneventfull aside from the occasional cow or heard of sheep on the tracks. It was a little annoying that we pretty much parralleled the road the whole time from which a bus could be taken in a quarter of the time.
The town of Alousi seems to have all but forgotten about the all but extinct railway, having built it´s main street down over the tracks so it could be used as a road, parking lot, food court, etc. One truck was parked all too close to our speeding locamotive and in an instant, lost his driver side mirror to our oh so prominant ladder. To make things funnier, we didn´t even slow down after the loud smash, nor did the cop who was sitting right there even flinch.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.042s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 7; qc: 24; dbt: 0.0199s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1mb
Jody
non-member comment
The little train that could....
Fabulous entry, guys! Great writing and photos both- I feel like I'm right there with you from this entry! :) I would also be suspect that all of this train/bus delay was a part of a grander scheme to give tourists a show! ha. Glad you made it to Alousi and lived to write about your journey!