After our brief stay in Baños we decided to head to Latacunga, from where we would base ourselves to do a tour of the Quilatoa Loop. The loop has been described as one of the most spectacular tours you can do in Ecuador. However, on reflection most tours just about anywhere make similar claims. Despite this it was a most incredible part of the country.
The loop itself is settled mostly by farming communities connected by several small villages. The landscape is diverse, and it is easy to see how many travellers can spend weeks completing the loop. You could spend an age exploring the deep, lush valleys and canyons, a particularly large inactive volcano, a cloud forrest, many quaint towns, and even a cheese factory. However, on our increasingly strict schedule, we only had two days to explore the area.
We booked two nights in a small village called Chugchillan (where there´s not much chugin but plenty if chillin... sorry that was incredibly lame), at hostel Cloud Forrest, and proceeded to make plans for the following day´s activities. With a bunch of other tourists we were able to hire a milk truck to drive us to the volcano, from where we would explore a section of the rim and then make a b-line back to our hostel, which would allow us to explore a few of the larger canyons and a valley, all up it was to take us about 5 hours.
The morning of the trip Sarah woke up feeling incredibly ill. You could tell she was torn, and I know exactly how she felt due to my Inca Trail experience, so I wasn´t incredibly surprised when she decided to push on regardless. I was most concerned that sitting in the back of a milk truck was going to push Sarah´s nausea over the edge into full a fledged fit of vommitting. I needn´t have been concerned however, as for some reason, the shaky dusty ride was enough to encourage an almost full recovery, and apart for the occassional coughing fit she fared well for the remainder of the day. I found the truck ride most enjoyable, standing high on the tray holding fimly on to the cab in front of me. The view was incredible, and at some moments mildly upsetting as the road narrowed and dropped away on one side to the greatest of depths.
We were also reminded that Carnival was fast approaching as at one point our truck was bombarded with water bombs thrown by the local kids, it would not be the last time that day we would be met with such an attack.
After an hour in the truck we arrived at the Quilatoa volcano. I hadn´t really heard anything about it, so I was suprised to see just how big it was, and even more surprised to find the crater filled with a magnificent blue lake. We climbed about a third of the rim before descending down the volcano, and before long we came across a small town. The girls decided we would have a luch break here despite the alarmingly high presence of sinister looking children armed with water bottels and water balloons. I had no particular desire to be drenched for the remainder of the day, so found myself a little apprhensive. As we were slowly surrounded I went so far as to get out my water bottle in such a way to make sure that it be known that there would be repurcussions for the child actually bold enough to dare get me wet. For a time it worked, whether deterrence was due to a fear of getting wet or the fact I was about five times bigger than most of them shall remain a mystery. However, after a time, the children´s numbers grew larger, and they did in fact grow bolder, and the occassional water bomb would whistle past us. At this time I realised things weren´t heading in a desirable direction, so I hastened the girls to finish their lunch, and we hit the road again only having to growl at them once to get enough distance between us to be safe from further attack.
The remainder of the walk was incredible, the descent in to the valley was spectacular, if slightly perilous. At times we truly thought we had gone the wrong way, due to the difficulty of the track, but soon found out that in fact we hadn´t. The final ascent up the other side of the valley was a particularly long and hard climb. Once I started I didn´t want to stop for fear of not being able to begin again, and thus left the girls behind to climb the valley at their own pace. Close to the top I had to pass through a small village, and began to feel goosebumps up the back of my neck as I came across evidence of a bloody water bomb battle whereby some poor tourist had clearly not come out on top. Bits of broken balloon were sprayed all over the place, and large damp patches that clearly showed where someone had been hit were far too frequent for my liking. It was a truly horrifying scene. Before long I became acutely aware of the presence of others. Charlie was in the trees, behind bushes, and peeking around corners. I was surrounded and sure of my fate, so I stopped in the middle of the track knowing not what else to do. The tension was thick in the air, you could feel the excitement of the little bastards rising as they knew their moment of glory drew closer. Although I didn´t want to get wet, it was the waiting for it to happen that I couldn´t stand, and thus the moment of calm before the storm seemed to last an eternity. Then it happened, one jumped out from behind his bush flinging his water bomb wildly, it missed badly, but set off a rapid release of other children´s bombs headed in my direction. I did a little uncoordinated dance dodging those that fell at my feet, and turned behind me in time to see a bomb flying straight for my face. I ducked in time, and looked ahead of me to see it scone another child square in his face. This gave me enough time to pass him without him getting a chance to offload one of his bombs, and was able to duck into a little nook in the cliff face on the side of the track to get momentarily out of range. I knew the children would not approach me directly as I had my large water bottle out again, and such daring would surely end in their drenching. I peeked out to check out the situation, but quickly ducked back in as 5 water balloons were hurled in my direction.
I realised quickly that there were surely no more than 12 of them, and some of them were holding water bottles, meaning only about 6 of them could possibly be holding two bombs, I thought I had at least 15 thrown at me, meaning that with no time to get refills there could surely at best be only 3 bombs left. Suddenly I begun to like my chances, I ducked out again and two more bombs came hurtling at me with no chance of hitting me, so that left only one. I decided to step out and face the last armed bandit, but found I had miscalculated, as three more bombs came at me again and luckily still missed. For country kids these guys had crap aim. I saw one last child holding a bomb, he couldn´t have been more than five, so I just stood there and let him hurl it. It missed by a mile, I smiled turned my back and walked slowly away in mockery, until I was out of sight whereby I hastened my pace to be sure not to be caught up with. I thought briefly about the girls, but figured they could cross that bridge when they came to it. However, upon questioning I found that they met no such ordeal. Humiliated, the kids were probably crying themselves to sleep. Suckers.
Anyway it was a great walk, and it would have been nice to explore the loop further, but with time as short as it was we had to head to Quito today, where we have arranged a great looking jungle tour for only $200 US everything included for 4 days. We head off tomorrow, and for that I am quite excited.
So until then,
watch out for little bastards with water balloons.
Regards,
Dylan
P.S. I´m not really that much of a stooge, it was all in good fun!
The loop itself is settled mostly by farming communities connected by several small villages. The landscape is diverse, and it is easy to see how many travellers can spend weeks completing the loop. You could spend an age exploring the deep, lush valleys and canyons, a particularly large inactive volcano, a cloud forrest, many quaint towns, and even a cheese factory. However, on our increasingly strict schedule, we only had two days to explore the area.
We booked two nights in a small village called Chugchillan (where there´s not much chugin but plenty if chillin... sorry that was incredibly lame), at hostel Cloud Forrest, and proceeded to make plans for the following day´s activities. With a bunch of other tourists we were able to hire a milk truck to drive us to the volcano, from where we would explore a section of the rim and then make a b-line back to our hostel, which would allow us to explore a few of the larger canyons and a valley, all up it was to take us about 5 hours.
The morning of the trip Sarah woke up feeling incredibly ill. You could tell she was torn, and I know exactly how she felt due to my Inca Trail experience, so I wasn´t incredibly surprised when she decided to push on regardless. I was most concerned that sitting in the back of a milk truck was going to push Sarah´s nausea over the edge into full a fledged fit of vommitting. I needn´t have been concerned however, as for some reason, the shaky dusty ride was enough to encourage an almost full recovery, and apart for the occassional coughing fit she fared well for the remainder of the day. I found the truck ride most enjoyable, standing high on the tray holding fimly on to the cab in front of me. The view was incredible, and at some moments mildly upsetting as the road narrowed and dropped away on one side to the greatest of depths.
We were also reminded that Carnival was fast approaching as at one point our truck was bombarded with water bombs thrown by the local kids, it would not be the last time that day we would be met with such an attack.
After an hour in the truck we arrived at the Quilatoa volcano. I hadn´t really heard anything about it, so I was suprised to see just how big it was, and even more surprised to find the crater filled with a magnificent blue lake. We climbed about a third of the rim before descending down the volcano, and before long we came across a small town. The girls decided we would have a luch break here despite the alarmingly high presence of sinister looking children armed with water bottels and water balloons. I had no particular desire to be drenched for the remainder of the day, so found myself a little apprhensive. As we were slowly surrounded I went so far as to get out my water bottle in such a way to make sure that it be known that there would be repurcussions for the child actually bold enough to dare get me wet. For a time it worked, whether deterrence was due to a fear of getting wet or the fact I was about five times bigger than most of them shall remain a mystery. However, after a time, the children´s numbers grew larger, and they did in fact grow bolder, and the occassional water bomb would whistle past us. At this time I realised things weren´t heading in a desirable direction, so I hastened the girls to finish their lunch, and we hit the road again only having to growl at them once to get enough distance between us to be safe from further attack.
The remainder of the walk was incredible, the descent in to the valley was spectacular, if slightly perilous. At times we truly thought we had gone the wrong way, due to the difficulty of the track, but soon found out that in fact we hadn´t. The final ascent up the other side of the valley was a particularly long and hard climb. Once I started I didn´t want to stop for fear of not being able to begin again, and thus left the girls behind to climb the valley at their own pace. Close to the top I had to pass through a small village, and began to feel goosebumps up the back of my neck as I came across evidence of a bloody water bomb battle whereby some poor tourist had clearly not come out on top. Bits of broken balloon were sprayed all over the place, and large damp patches that clearly showed where someone had been hit were far too frequent for my liking. It was a truly horrifying scene. Before long I became acutely aware of the presence of others. Charlie was in the trees, behind bushes, and peeking around corners. I was surrounded and sure of my fate, so I stopped in the middle of the track knowing not what else to do. The tension was thick in the air, you could feel the excitement of the little bastards rising as they knew their moment of glory drew closer. Although I didn´t want to get wet, it was the waiting for it to happen that I couldn´t stand, and thus the moment of calm before the storm seemed to last an eternity. Then it happened, one jumped out from behind his bush flinging his water bomb wildly, it missed badly, but set off a rapid release of other children´s bombs headed in my direction. I did a little uncoordinated dance dodging those that fell at my feet, and turned behind me in time to see a bomb flying straight for my face. I ducked in time, and looked ahead of me to see it scone another child square in his face. This gave me enough time to pass him without him getting a chance to offload one of his bombs, and was able to duck into a little nook in the cliff face on the side of the track to get momentarily out of range. I knew the children would not approach me directly as I had my large water bottle out again, and such daring would surely end in their drenching. I peeked out to check out the situation, but quickly ducked back in as 5 water balloons were hurled in my direction.
I realised quickly that there were surely no more than 12 of them, and some of them were holding water bottles, meaning only about 6 of them could possibly be holding two bombs, I thought I had at least 15 thrown at me, meaning that with no time to get refills there could surely at best be only 3 bombs left. Suddenly I begun to like my chances, I ducked out again and two more bombs came hurtling at me with no chance of hitting me, so that left only one. I decided to step out and face the last armed bandit, but found I had miscalculated, as three more bombs came at me again and luckily still missed. For country kids these guys had crap aim. I saw one last child holding a bomb, he couldn´t have been more than five, so I just stood there and let him hurl it. It missed by a mile, I smiled turned my back and walked slowly away in mockery, until I was out of sight whereby I hastened my pace to be sure not to be caught up with. I thought briefly about the girls, but figured they could cross that bridge when they came to it. However, upon questioning I found that they met no such ordeal. Humiliated, the kids were probably crying themselves to sleep. Suckers.
Anyway it was a great walk, and it would have been nice to explore the loop further, but with time as short as it was we had to head to Quito today, where we have arranged a great looking jungle tour for only $200 US everything included for 4 days. We head off tomorrow, and for that I am quite excited.
So until then,
watch out for little bastards with water balloons.
Regards,
Dylan
P.S. I´m not really that much of a stooge, it was all in good fun!
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