From Darkness To Desert

Days 122 – 125

These days have been characterised by landscapes. First we rode the Quilatoa loop – a mostly dirt and sand ring road through indigenous villages and beautiful Andean countryside, culminating in the Quilatoa crater lake. Unfortunately the views were masked by mist and smoke which hung in the valleys under a layer of cloud the whole day, but we were still able to get a sense of it all.

We then went to Banos and rode out east – just tens of kilometres took us from highland down into jungle, and there were a number of beautiful waterfalls to visit on the way. Climbing up through caves to behind one of the falls was the highlight (and wet-light) of the journey, and the hot (and very cold) baths of Banos were a nice treat before we left the region.

From Banos we rode up to the base camp of Volcan Chimborazo at 4860m. The snowy top was shrouded in cloud but we had fantastic views across the sandy high plain and beyond. From here the spectacular views just kept going as we headed south, until we'd climbed right down to almost sea-level for the border crossing to Peru! On our way we stopped at Cuenca, which is Montecristi (Panama to you) hat central. We couldn't pass up the opportunity to meet octogenarian Alberta Pulla who has been refurbishing hats since he was six years old, and who found the perfect hat for Emily.

We were slightly relieved to leave Ecuador without incident in the end. Ecuador uses a lot of hydroelectricity, which is great, except that they haven't had enough rain this year and as a result there's an electricity shortage. Blackouts have been imposed to save electricity – we experienced full blackouts in some towns, but in Cuenca they rotated the electricity by quarter throughout the day and night. Not having street lighting is bad enough, but the lack of traffic lights is absolute carnage! We saw many a near accident but thankfully weren't involved in any...

Day 126

Within a few hours of crossing the border into Peru we met some locals at a petrol station who invited us to have lunch with them at their favourite restaurant nearby, so we hope this is a good sign of things to come! Peru was immediately different to Ecuador, though. As well as being visibly poorer with more shacks rather than buildings and a lot more rubbish around, it's also a lot dryer so far, including our first desert of South America – surprisingly cool but so windy Ric got a crick in his neck from his fancy helmet being blown around so much!