Avenue of the Volcanoes

Since we have an Ecuadorian car to babysit, we have been thinking about what to do with it during our time in the US for quite some time now. Traveling on buses with bags full of valuable items isn’t really a great idea: some thieves here have made an art out of cutting into bags that you place between your feet and relieving you of your expensive items. Larger bags that get stored in the cargo areas at the bottom of the bus sometimes decide that they want to get off before you do. With these things in mind, we decided to drive ourselves up the Panamericana from Cuenca to Quito.

I started the day by nearly taking the front end off while backing out of Jose’s parking spot, but the silver lining to that is that now we should have enough damage to the car to meet the $100 minimum required for our insurance policy to cover the repairs. After making sure that the car wasn’t going to fall apart and the gate wasn´t damaged, we headed for the highway. The drive through the Andes is really quite pretty. You get to see out over many different valleys along the way. They call this section of the road “The Avenue of the Volcanoes,” and they are justified in doing so. Unfortunately, there were too many clouds for us to see all but the biggest volcano (this is usually the case unless if you’re in the area around 6 AM). We got a view of the massive base of Chimborazo, which at 6200 meters or so and close to the Equator is the farthest point from the center of the Earth.

We then took Jose´s advice and stopped at the market in Ambato to have llapingachos for lunch. Ambato is more of a city than a town, so it took us over an hour to get in and out of the city center. Since you can’t just park your car when it has stuff in it in this country, there was no good place in town to stop and eat our food. Fittingly, we stopped at a gas station so we could get out of the car and share our Thanksgiving lunch. We’re pretty sure the attendant cheated us out of $3 and didn’t actually put any gas in our car, but neither one of us felt like arguing over $3 . . . in Spanish.

Chelsea then remembered that the upcoming town of Salcedo is famous for its multicolored ice creams on a stick. I passed the first sign advertising them and asked Chelsea where she wanted me to stop. She replied, “Anywhere. Every store in town sells them.” She was right. We probably passed over a hundred ice cream signs. With so many options, it’s hard to know which one to choose. For our purposes, I made a good choice. The lady at the store hopped up when we pulled over and gave us roadside service. We drove away with ice cream sticks in hand, and they were delicious!

From Salcedo, we continued on towards La Union Del Toachi. We passed through Aloag, then switched roads instead of heading north to Quito. Here, the highway continues west toward the coast—fortunately it wasn´t our plan to go that far. However, it is amazing to travel downhill in the Andes. The vegetation changes significantly and waterfalls flowing down from the mountains are common. Along this part of the drive, we saw car washes advertised with semi- naked ladies for truckers to wash their cars, we saw a guy´s bare backside as he stood next to his car to respond to the call of nature, we saw a large devil´s face carved into the side of a mountain, and finally we came to Toachi.

When we arrived in Toachi, we had to carry our things across a large footbridge and up to the house. Neither one of us are particularly good at traveling light, so it took a few trips. However, we were very excited to meet an old friend, Elicio, when we finally arrived at the house. He is involved in an amphibian conservation project in this part of the country, and is currently building a frog house. He invited us to sit down with them to dinner, we spent the evening catching up, and got to see a monkey that came to the “monkey feeded” near the dining table. We enjoyed the much warmer climate of Toachi, slept in the following morning, then were on the road again to Quito.

We had planned on leaving the car in Toachi, but were uncertain about the best way to get our things (and ourselves) to Quito. Elicio suggested we drive the car to Quito, then he could bring it to Toachi the next week. So we re-loaded the car and hit the road. Quito is a big city and local maps leave something to be desired, but Brad braved the challenge and succeeded! We easily found our way to Giovanni´s house, and he greeted us both with a big smile and warm hugs. His house feels more like home than anyplace else in Ecuador, and I´m pretty sure it is the Marianist spirit which permeates the house. He offered us a temporary parking spot at his house, inside the gate. We also got to catch up with our friends Mayra and Silvia, the girls who live here. They were both shy, but managed to practice their English with us and we practiced a little Spanish while Italian was also being spoken at the table.

As always, Giovanni stopped what he was doing to prove himself Marianist, and got us a snack when we arrived. Jams are his specialty, and he had 2 new ones for us to try: one of some bizarre tropical fruit and the other of the fruit of the chocolate plant. You have to be brave to try the food here, but bravery is usually rewarded. The jams were delicious, and I´m afraid Brad liked them enough to wear out his welcome!

Tomorrow, we have a big shopping trip planned. We are going to the famous Otavalo Market, and hope to find a bank once we get in town! It will be a day of Christmas shopping in the busy market, then we hope to spend the night in a hotel Brad´s medical group stayed in last February. Sunday is a day of travel restrictions, so we may be stuck there. They will be conducting their census (which they do in person since the mail system is so poor), and no one is allowed to leave their house or apartment or hotel from 7am- 5pm. It should be an adventure!