It seems like forever ago that I started towards South America via a broken down Marta system and a hurried cab ride to the Atlanta airport with my college roommate and trusty travel amigo Ian. After a few days acclimatizing in Quito and digesting the guide books we cracked open on the flight, we headed off via rickety bus on windy roads through the cloud forest to the jungle. We had an awesome two days of whitewater rafting through amazing waterfalls, canyons, and dense jungle. We went about 70 km down some of the biggest tributaries of the Amazon. We looked for but did not find any monkeys (apparently since they are eaten by Indians they have learned to avoid people), saw a bunch of birds, and had a brief hike that I quit for good after our guide scared us with a fake anaconda. We also had an unexpected but awesome swim after the 10 foot tall wafleria (waffle iron) rapids capsized our raft.
After the jungle we headed for the relaxing scene of Banos, a town in the mountains known for its hot springs (which were quite nice). A local described it as a good town to 'chill and grab a pizza in'. So we did. But...our R&R was interrupted around 5pm on day two by a massive volcanic explosion! Some quick history, Banos was evacuated for 6 months in 1999. But after there was no actual volcanic eruption, just a lot of lava and smoke, residents were let back in. So when we first heard about our eruption, we immediately booked a night tour up to see the fun more closely. Just as we started to go, however, the local police stopped us and started arguing about taking tourists to an erupting volcano. The news got wind of the conflict, and soon there was a camera crew filming us being stopped. Finally the local police let us go, but within seconds, we were stopped by the national guard. Eventually our guides talked our way up to the lookout. Quite exciting to see the lava but the sky soon become quite cloudy with smoke and ash and after an hour we headed back down. Even when the police shut down our bar (and rather than make us leave, the bar locked us in) we were still not too worried. But around 1:30, there was a huge explosion which rattled the entire bar. All the bartenders and the few remaining locals said adios! and immediately head out. Walking to our hostel, we passed countless cars full of belongings and families headed for safety. But there was really nothing for us to do at 2am. So we decided to go to sleep and catch the first bus out. Around 5:30 we woke up. Neither of us had heard anything through the night, so we briefly thought we were overreacting and decide to snooze. Around 5:31 a massive explosion shook the hostel. So we were out the door and at the bus station by 5:45. We talked to some neighbors who apparently could not sleep because of the eruptions every few minutes. Apparently we just slept through it. The only problem with our escape was that there were no buses. As it turned out, the police blocked off all roads leading to town, so buses could not get through. Around 8:00 we gave up and started to hitchhike to safety. We took a pickup truck to the police checkpoint - like 5 miles - for 50 cents. We then found a chicken truck on the other side who took us to the next village for a dollar. We then caught a small bus to the next major town and a real bus that could take us away from Banos's biggest eruption in 15 years.
After getting our fill of volcanoes, our journey to the coast took us on 2 trucks and 5 buses (the last sharing seats with some argumentative ducks and chickens). As we deftly handled the numerous transportation challenges presented by the volcano specifically and the Ecuadorian transit system in general, it became apparent that we had 'hit our stride' in Ecuador.
We finally settled in a very chill, awesome town called Canoa. We had a 17km beach set among cliffs and jungle to share with about 30 other people. After 4 days without shoes or shirts, countless meals of encocado pescado (local seafood specialty), days spent surfing and hammocking, and nights at 75 cent happy hour and in our $5 cabina in the sand (complete with bucket of water to wash your feet before bed), we had a hard time pulling ourselves away from Canoa´s “tranquilo” lifestyle.
We spent a few more days hopping among coastal beach towns (and spent a day whalewatching and wandering among the blue-footed boobies on the poor man's galapagos) before Ian decided that he had fallen in love with enough teenage latin women for one trip and had to go home. I headed to Quito (my count of unrequited latin love continues to escalate uncontrollably) for a couple weeks on my own.
I took 7 days of pretty intense spanish classes from a great Quichua woman who spoke spanish but no english, an interesting way to learn a language from scratch. I improved from knowing nothing to high beginner proficiency, but my confidence and language skill was tested when we took a field trip to a fruit market and I accidentally tried to order a juice known locally as 'nature's viagra'. Other than a few mishaps like that, which I will optimistically classify as minor, I have gotten along pretty smoothly.
A few highlights from Quito:
-Meeting an Ecuadorian guy who had lived in Norcross, GA for a year, about 10 minutes from my parents house. Also interestingly, he worked as a taxi driver for illegal immigrants. Apparently the risk of being caught with improper paperwork while flying or taking trains is too great, so he charged people as much as a thousand dollars to ride in his taxi to Arkansas, Texas, Florida, or wherever they needed to go.
-Taking the cable car way up over the city and hiking for half a day among the 4600m mountains with a guy from Alpharetta
-Hiking for a surprisingly intense 5 hours (having forgotten to buy water before arriving at the lake) up and down and around the crater of a gorgeous volcanic lake 100 km north of Quito.
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