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Published: April 25th 2007
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Friday lunchtime, Hannah, Steve and I headed down to Riobamba on a "luxury" coach to meet up with some others who we met at orientation, but who were whisked off to the depths of the jungle, never to be seen again, practically!! Anyway, 4hours later we arrived in Riobamba, and it was so much better than expectations! Everyone had warned us it was "freezing" in Riobamba, and apart from the Devils Nose train journey there was nothing to do......However, we arrived slap bang in the middle of a carnival-festival type thingy and the town was buzzing. Funfairs in the main square, looking slightly more dodgy than blackpool however, but the atmosphere was great!!
We met the others at the hostel and had a catch up before heading out to the most amazing steak house ever, meeting some others the girls from Tena knew....so 10 of us sat down for the best steak in the world, ever, ever!! And the best bit, only $5.50!!The wine however wasn´t quite as cheap, but then it may have been the volume we consumed that made it expensive, rather than the actual cost per bottle! Ohh well!!
Anyway, from there we continued to
a club called Romeo, which played god-awful music, although apparantly I need to get accustomed to this "Reggaeton" music, dear god!! Drinks were free until 12.30, but Rum & Coke seemed to be the drink on offer, and despite my perseverence to drink for free, I just dont like coke!! Argh!! Anyway, somehow 2am came, and we decided to head off, only for some of the girls to get sidetracked by a street party in the hunt for food, and they didn´t get back til god knows what hour!!
Saturday we mooched around the town- Steve watched footie in the hostel, apparantly 6 girls and 1 guy can be too much! lol! There were processions and shops, although not much more!! Somehow the day flew, and it was time to meet the others for bullfighting, so at 4.30 there were 7 "gringos" running across town towards the stadium! What a sight! There were so few white people actually, but it made finding each other relatively easy!!
So we made it to the bullfighting, still not sure exactly what I make of it. It was a lot more humane than I expected, a lot of teasing and not much
actual hurt, but when one toredor, the woman, couldnt deliver the final blow, and tried about 5times it became a little distressing...All in all though we saw 6 fights, one bull lived because he was the "ultimate bull" apparantly, and he gave the best fighter in Ecuador a run for his money, thats for sure. Another bull managed to whisk someone up by the legs and he had to be carried off pretty pronto! You actually found yourself gunning for the bull!! It was lots and lots of fun, very exciting, and lots of screams from all the crowd, not just the "Gringo massive" (ie us!)
From there we went out for dinner at a pizza place, so very cheap and so very tasty, but as a result of the night before, and our early start in the morning, we didn´t manage to stay out late, just watched Road Trip back at the hostel.
Anyway, we woke at 6 to get to the train station for 7....although our queuing for tickets the previous morning had been to no avail and as we had reached the booth the tickets had sold out, soooo we had to catch a bus
to Alausi and take the shortened version of the train ride from there. So 2 hrs later we arrived in Alausi, and managed, eventually, to get ourselves tickets on a train ride!! However, it was annoying to discover that the rumours we had heard were actually true- a few weeks earlier, a couple of Chinese tourists had been sitting on the roof of the train, and had stood up to take a photo, only to get caught up in the wires above and get decapitated. Resultantly meaning that everyone now had to sit inside the train, how very rude of the Chinese!!!
Anyway, the train itself left at about 1pm and we dutifully sat inside, muchly angered!! The view was good, but it just wasnt the same as being on the roof!! Howeverrrrr, when we were out of sight of the town, the driver started jibbering away in Spanish, and it turned out they were charging $1 to sit on the roof until we came in sight of the town again...ohh yessssss!!! So much more fun!! And no, we didnt stand up unless the train was at a standstill!! (turns out the tourists were killed on the first part
of the journey to Alausi which we didnt do anyhow) Much more fun on the roof, and some very scary vertical drops!!
We arrived back into Alausi about 2hrs later, to see some folks we had met in the queue who had got tickets for the earlier train, and they hadnt got on the roof, so we felt very priviledged!! hehe!
Onto a bus back to Riobamba, and about 10,000 extra people piled onto the bus to stand in the aisle, and dear god did they smell! ARGHHHHH! It was painful! We were sat right at the front and I practically had a woman sitting on my knee, with kids grubby smelly mits on my shoulders, arghhh! We opened the window and sat in the freezing breeze to escape the smell....argh, it was horrible!! I really wished I had a thing of febreeze so I could educate the masses!!
Caught another bus in Riobamba and made it back for about 10pm, to collapse into bed. Woowoo!! Lessons on monday saw the class of kids escalate to 28, dear god! So went out for a drink n a chill out in the evening. However, I forgot to say
no ice (the water over here isnt safe to drink) and consequently I spent yesterday being sick and feeling like sh1t, so cried off teaching yesterday, but I am off again today in a few hours.
Think its time for a trip to the beach, so we´re heading out Thursday night on a nightbus, 10hrs on terrible roads apparantly, ohh I can´t wait!
Adios, xxx
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Gemma
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Hey Cathy - great work on the blog, I'm really enjoying reading all these crazy stories from S. America! Keep up the good work! xxx