Today we said our farewells to Madre Tierra. We met John, Carol's
husband, an actor who was in Hill Street Blues, Dynasty and Knotts
Landing amongst other things. Leaving was a lengthy process. Every
time we got close to reception to pay up it seemed like something
happened - saying farewell to the Brits getting married tomorrow,
then the Belgian family etc etc.
At breakfast we had been joined by an American
girl traveling on her own. Her boyfriend in still in Huaraz in Perú
climbing and she is here for a while until she meets him in Quito.
She was not good company. She almost seemed spaced out and not
really there. She is a big fan of GW Bush (he has great domestic
policies apparently). She works for Congress which we did not feel
boded well for the US government machine, and could not stop herself
from name dropping all the places she had been to for work. We got
talking about Carol and how she had been involved in space and Star
Wars. He reaction was really negative - "I've come across loads of
activists like her at work. There seems to be a link with full moon
because there are definitely more of them that come out then" she
drawled in a whingey high pitched voice. It would have been
interesting to see how she reacted to Carol over the next few days.
Finally we made it away and headed back to the main road to get the
bus. A caterpillar had crawled onto my day pack and we spent a few
minutes taking photos. As the camera was put away the bus turned up
and we were on our way back to Loja. Again it was a little mini van
and people crammed in at every stop. At Loja we timed it just right.
We had time to buy our tickets to Cuenca and the bus left ten
minutes later.
Again the bus was full of locals (there was one other "western"
traveler) and it was packed. Crammed into the corridor was an
elderly couple with two small children, I assumed their
grandchildren. The youngest was sitting on the floor so I asked if
she wanted to sit on my lap. She fidgeted and looked at me with very
suspicious eyes until finally she decided to stand after all. People
were standing for most of the way. Cuenca is higher altitude than
Loja and Vilcabamba and we climbed and climbed and climbed.
Most of the people on this bus seemed to be farmers from the
outlying villages. Sunday must be market day as people were getting
on with bags full of food, mainly fresh fruit and vegetables. Here
too were signs that people do not have much spare cash. Clothes
looked well and truly worn but one man had a small dash of colour, a
red button sewn onto the back pocket of his beige trousers. It
seemed to have no purpose at all in relation to the pocket so it
must have been for decoration!
As we drove through different villages there were slight changes in
the local traditional dress. One constant is that pretty much all
women have long, black hair tied in a pony tail or plaits. This was
the case in most of Perú as well and a couple of times my short hair
led to me being called Senor. The journey to Cuenca was
smooth enough but, unusually, there was no Steven Seagal or Jean
Claude van Damme to keep us company. The TV stayed off all the way,
a very welcome change.
At Cuenca we got a taxi from the bus station to our hotel, The
Tomebamba. We were surprised to see four stars above the door as it
did not look that smart. We were even more surprised when we saw the
room - very small and basic. The guy from the hotel sensed we did
not like it before we said anything. He apologised that this was the
only one they had, the hotel is full of conference people, and gave
us a get out if we wanted it. We retrieved our cash as we had had to
pay in advance for the first night, something we have had to do a
couple of times (some hotels are obviously not very trusting of
their guests!) and looked at our options. Carol from Madre Tierre
had recommended another hotel, the Posada del Angel ("although the
breakfast is not much" she said), which was just a bit further up
the same street. As we were hoisting our packs the chap from
Tomebamba was, unprompted by us, on the phone to Posada del Angel
and he confirmed that they did have a room.
A few blocks up we found Posada del Angel. You have to ring a bell
to get in. The hotel opens into an inner courtyard with a glass
roof. Rooms are mainly on the next level up, which is surrounded by
a wooden balcony. Further back there is a second covered courtyard
with more rooms and tables for breakfast. The hotel is busy and they
only have two rooms free, a small but cosy double or a larger twin
room up three flights of narrow rickety stairs. We opted for the
double with a promise that we could change the following day for a
larger room.
We headed out to see a bot of Cuenca. As it is Sunday all the shops
are closed. The city is very quiet with not many people walking
about. At the main square we stopped for a late lunch and then
headed back to the hotel to unpack and catch up on diaries. We then
realised why this place is probably not in Lonely Planet - it is
used by tour groups. First to arrive were a very loud group of
Americans and Brits. I think the whole hotel must have heard their
decision to eat first and shower later. As we headed round the
corner for our free internet time the second group arrived - about
ten Dutch girls in their early twenties. They were probably even
noisier than the first lot!
The young chap at reception had been very friendly and recommended
places we could go to eat (they even have copies of the menus here
so you can look before you go). We decided to check out a Lonely
Planet option first and if that was no good to go for his
recommendation, the Eucalyptus, that he assured us was open even
though it is Sunday. Both were closed! Earlier in the day we had
talked about another "pizza in front of the telly" type of evening
and that is what we opted for. The New York Pizza company was on the
way back to the hotel so we stopped off and got a take away.
At the hotel they tried, in a very friendly way, to get us to eat in
the breakfast bit but Stef politely said we were eating in our room.
They supplied us with plates and cutlery, the latter much needed as
the pizza slices were too big to manage with fingers only. I cannot
remember what we watched on telly so it could not have been that
good!
