No Train For You!

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Up at the crack of dark (5am), we pack our bags and head to the train station to procure our tickets to ride the famed Devil's Nose train. A marvel of railway engineering, this train route is one of the most, if not thee most harrowing stretch of train track in the world. You can see a video of it here. Clinging to sheer cliffs it's a wonder the locomotive hasn't plunged into the river gorge below. And train goers are allowed to ride atop the train for optimum viewing. When we arrive at the train station we're informed by indifferent security guards that the train has been sold out and there are no more tickets available. I want to punch something. I didn't drag my butt out of bed at 5 in the morning for nothing. No train for you! We curse our Lonely Planet book for this egregious error of omission and stand somewhat dumbfounded while we contemplate our next move. Stay the day in Riobamba, or giddy-on to our final destination of Cuenca. We decide on the latter and make our way to the bus terminal for the more than 6 hour ride south (and thank god it's our last bus ride of the trip).

Ecuador being famous for it's landslided washed out roads we arrive 7.5 hours later in Cuenca. Like old town Quito, Cuenca is a historic colonial gem, even more so than its capital cousin. A quick taxi ride later we arrive at our B&B, Casa Ordonez, which would be our little oasis for the next 3 nights. The B&B is run by Alberto Ordonez, his wife and mother. The huge house in the center of downtown Cuenca has been in the Ordonez family for over 100 years and history abounds in every hallway. As it turns out Alberto is retired US Navy and was stationed in Norfolk, VA where I grew up. Small world huh?

After a quick respite in our cozy room we head out to explore Cuenca. The only thing to detract from the stunning colonial architecture is the car clogged narrow cobblestone streets. The exhaust fumes from these vehicles is nauseating, apparently catalytic converters are optional in this country.

The rest of the afternoon and night is spent strolling the streets getting ourselves acclimated to our new city. To cap the night we settle into an upstairs table of a hip looking restaurant bar overlooking a live band and even livelier dancers. There's a massive group of French tourists sitting front row that look supremely bored. How pleasant for the band to be playing to such miserable looking people. Our bottle of Chilean wine is going down nice and when we finish the last drops we call it a night.

This is the home stretch of the vaca so we've got a whole lot of nothing planned but relaxation and it is welcomed.

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