Blogs from Cuenca, South, Ecuador, South America - page 48

I shudder at reading Joe´s last entry about the people of Riobamba. We woke up yesterday morning to find that a nuclear winter had descended over the city. The sky was a murky brown and it looked like a heavy snow storm was engulfing the region. This turned out to be volcanic ash from the biggest Tungurahua volcano eruption of all time. Banos was completely evactuated the night we left and is now unreachable by road, 150000 ´people are now either displaced or without electricty. The Ecuadorian government has declared a state of emergency in the area. The streets of Riobabamba were ankle deep in dust which swirled everywhere , pervading our eyes and mouths. People had umbrellas up to protect themselves from the constant drizzle of volcanic fallout. All the shops were shut and no ... read more

This is a little late in coming, but last week we visited a tiny town about an hour outside Cuenca called Chordeleg. It´s mainly known for its silver jewelry (which is beautiful), which attracts tourists from abroad as well as from Ecuador (on weekends). The day we were there it was empty, I think we were the only non-locals there. There isn´t much to do if you´re not in the market to buy some jewelry, but if you end up there you can have a really cheap yummy meal at what appeared to be the only restaurant in town, right on the square. It´s not much in terms of ambiance, but the owner is extremely friendly and you can sit and enjoy the view of the beautifully landscaped central square. But, we wouldn´t recommend making the ... read more

Well, to start off with we got taken like a farm boy playing the shell game in the New York subway. We could not get a bus to Cajas from Cuenca´s main bus station, like all the guide books swear you can, so we ended up hiring a taxi to take us all the way there (45 mins) for 15 bucks. We chatted with the guy the whole way there and had a great ride up into the mountains. He brings us to this gate and says it is the entrance to the park all we have to do is walk through, and drives off. Snookered. He dropped us off at a chapel at least an hour walk uphill from the park and drove away with a tip to boot. Luckily we got a ride with ... read more

Foreword: this is Martina writing. Josh has to work for a couple of hours so this promises to be a long and detailed - and naturally, less funny - account of our last couple of days. But don´t worry, I promise you'll be graced with his hilarity on Monday when we´re back from camping. After writing y'all yesterday we headed up to the Instituto Geografico Militar, which is this really neat place on top of a hill in Quito where one can obtain amazing maps of Ecuador. We had to go there to get trail maps for two national parks we'll be camping in over the next week. They are huge, incredibly detailed maps, and only cost two bucks a piece. On our way out of the building to head to the airport an officer in ... read more

Hello Again I should say that I realize that these blogs are frequent and long which may not be ideal for those of you with jobs (teachers you have no excuse for not reading all of these...twice) but for those of you who know me, I have never managed to actually keep a journal while travelling, so this is it. That´s why there may be more info in here than you´re always interested in. Our Spanish lessons are going swimmingly! We´ve had two and have our last one today (3 lessons oughta be enough to learn a language) we learned (well, we were presented with) a TON of useful information yesterday so we need to devote today to sitting in cafes(we´ve managed to find a couple) and actually learning it. Shelagh has even managed to say ... read more