Cuenca and Loja

We arrived in Cuenca in the pouring rain and checked into our hostel. After a bad nights sleep due to the bright Christmas lights outside our window, making it basically daylight, and the noisy traffic on the road, we decided to spend some of the next day seeing the city and then get a 4pm bus to our next place, Loja. Apparently Cuenca is a very popular place for expats, and although it was fairly nice to walk around the streets, there wasn't too much in the town to keep us occupied and we ended up chilling in a park for a while before picking up our bags and heading for the bus terminal. 

Pup in pyjamas in a coffin shop

Ask for a coffee with milk, get hot milk and a jar of instant coffee

We had originally planned to get through these cities quickly in order to make it to the coast of Peru for new years eve, and had planned only 1 day in Loja, enough time to see the city and a free walking tour. There was also a viewpoint on top of a tower of the city gate which we walked to, and botanical gardens which we took a public bus to, only to find out when we arrived that it was closed between Christmas and New year. 

The city gate

Castle-y

View of Loja from the top

We got to the meeting point for the free walking tour, at the tourist information centre, with no sign of anyone else waiting or a guide. We asked at the information desk and were assured that it was happening, and sure enough about 15 minutes later a guide appeared. Looks like we were the only ones on the walking tour then. Can't really give an anonymous tip with that ratio.

Some kind of tree jumper

The guide took us around the streets and the plazas, showing us the place where cloister nuns still live- once they enter they can't leave the building, pretty much completely separated from the outside world except for a hatch where people can come to get traditional medicines that the nuns grow in their garden. There was also a music school which was originally the first high school in Loja, with a statue of the man who founded the school in the middle. Except that when the statue was being made it was mixed up with another statue of a guy from Chile and sent to the wrong place, the one that stands there is a random guy from Chile, nobody knows what the actual guy looks like. He also took us into one of the churches which had the biggest nativity scene in Ecuador and definitely put any other ones we had ever seen to shame- it was effectively a nativity village, complete with animal sound effects, moving figurines and even running water and lighting changing from night to day.

Loja is known for its music, and our guide informed us that even the bin lorry is musical and that the tune is a recording of the mayor whistling. 

A fair amount of time spent making this nativity

Night time in Bethlehem!

The guide also explained that every Thursday in the main plaza there is a free display from local musicians and dancers for anyone to attend, which luckily was that evening. Also it was a shame we were not staying for new years, people burn dummies with masks of famous people or characters to represent burning the past and making way for a new year and men dress in drag on the streets and ask people for beer money. 

Tiny musicians in oversized ponchos

We thought about it, it did sound interesting and we were both exhausted from almost 2 months on the road and jonno recovering from a stomach bug. Maybe we should stop for a few days, see the new years celebrations in Ecuador and then move on to Peru. 

If we were staying a few days we wanted somewhere that we could actually rest, and we managed to find an apartment in Loja for about $35 a night. It was about 2km from the hotel we were staying in, so we checked out and decided it was walkable. We knew it was going to be up a bit of a hill but didn't realise until we started that it was about 200 steps up which was pretty tiring with all our bags. When we arrived at the apartment, sweaty and sore, we were pleasantly surprised. A modern apartment with great views of the city, with a full kitchen and sofas and even an office corner with a computer. The perfect place to recouperate. And this is exactly what we did- apart from a couple of trips into town for food shopping, we spent a few days just enjoying not having to do much (apart from a lot of blogging to catch up on!) 

Blog headquarters

On new year's eve, we decided that we would head into town at about 9pm to see what was going on. We expected things to be happening around the main plaza if anywhere. As we walked though the streets, we saw a lot of dummies lined up and some taped to the front of cars. There was also bit queues of traffic building up on the streets, as the roads were being blocked off by men in wigs and minidresses, who were stopping every car and humping them, sometimes even climbing on the bonnet on all fours, until they were handed some money and then they let the car pass. Weirdly enough this hadn't put people off driving through the streets, and if anything there were more cars, almost as if people wanted to have their vehicle violated, even bringing their small children along for the ride. 

Selling the masks for the dummies in the marketplace

Bundled into the back of vans

And taped to the front of cars

Men in wigs and dresses accosting cars

Apart from these strange displays, nothing else was open and the main plaza was pretty much deserted. Maybe this is all there was. After walking around for about an hour and not finding much else except for a caterpillar train driving around erratically and a small fairground set up with stalls selling more dummies and masks, we were about to give up and wander back to the apartment. Just in case we were missing anything obvious, Jonno decided to ask a passer by if there was a party happening anywhere, to which the guy pointed towards an area a kilometre away at the city gate. We walked there and found there was a concert going on, so we decided to watch the concert with some kind of latino boy band playing, by this point there was only an hour until midnight. As we were flagging and it was waaay past my bedtime, we sat against one of the walls of the city gate to watch the concert and other people dancing, and a couple of minutes before midnight thought we should probably stand up and join in with the crowd. It was lucky that we did, as at midnight the tower above us exploded with fireworks, and a shower of sparks came down the walls, landing where we had just been sitting. We took a few steps further back, slightly concerned we were still far too close to the fireworks, ducking behind a stage to avoid the debris falling from the sky. After the fireworks had finished, we walked back through the streets towards the apartment, although now we had to dodge fireworks being set off in the street and fires in the middle of the road where the dummies had been set alight. Before midnight the streets had been filled with music and people, and on the walk back the music had stopped and streets were either deserted or had people somberly watching the fires or clearing up piles of ash from the streets- it felt like some kind of apocalyptic warzone. There were also children leaping over the flames, definitely no health and safety here! 

The moment the clock rolls over to midnight and the crazy fireworks ensuing!

Burning dummies

One more day to chill in our lovely apartment and then it was time to leave, even though we could have happily stayed there for another week. 

View of Loja from the apartment

A very early start to get to the bus terminal, and Jonno still being half asleep found a coffee vendor and got a very sweet black coffee to try and maintain consciousness. He had gotten halfway through it when we were approached by a grubby old man who smelt very strongly of alcohol, asking for money. When we said no, the man instead took the coffee from Jonno's hands and walked off with it, laughing with glee. Seriously, the crime in south America....

Poor dog just missed the bus..

Salinas y Montañita

We read mixed reviews about Salinas. This was a place was supposedly a cheap, but therefore also very popular beach destination. We read that the weather is best between November and February, and as such, arriving then would be very crowded and busy, with people trying to sell you things left right and centre. We’d be arriving right inbetween this time period. The area was also supposedly somewhat upper market, with a yacht club and huge towering real estate overlooking the bay. We’d see how we liked it, but reviews were certainly polarized.

The bus from Guayaquil took us to a place called Santa Marta, where we hopped on another bus to Salinas. First impressions of the place were a little a different to what we had been expecting. The place with almost entirely deserted, with roads being built, pavements dug up and buildings being erected. We’re not quite sure where people were getting the impression of an extremely busy and posh place, because we certainly weren’t experiencing that. Not that we were complaining!

Luxurious!

Our hostel was quite nice, with a bar area overlooking the bay and all the amenities we could need in kitchens and air conditioning. Posh after all! We took the first day just to hit the supermarkets to stock up our little area of kitchen, and take a look up and down the beach and bay area. Not a bad place to chill for a while.

The following morning, we were awoken to drums, xylophones (they are a legitimate instrument here, not just something to fill up X in an alphabet song) and all manner of wind instruments filling up the streets. We took to the bar area where we had a great view over a procession working its way down the beach front, which included a guy being dragged along in a little cart behind a van, I’m not sure why but it was ridiculous to watch. The next float behind was setting off fireworks out of a beer bottle he was moving along the pavement. Safety isn’t a prime concern where there is entertainment value to be had.

There are two main points of interest in the area – La Chocolatera, the furthest most point in the peninsula with views of the sea all around, and La Loberia, another beach area with sea lions off the coast. We decided to walk to La Chocolatera first, as the map showed it as about a 4.5km distance, around an hours flat walk, easy peasy.

That was until we got about half way and found out that the area was also a huge military base. Whilst this wasn’t a real problem, it did mean all the direct roads were inaccessible, and we instead had to take several detours, adding another half an hour or so to the distance. Not only that, but the sun was a lot stronger than we had envisaged, so by the time we arrived there, we were grateful for the sight of a restaurant serving fruit juices. The views were okay – nothing remarkable that we hadn’t seen in other places, but I can imagine that it would be incredible if not usually near the sea as the waves were fairly intense.

From there, a path following the coast had been put up to walk directly to La Loberia. We arrived after about 30 minutes, and at first presumed that the sea lions hadn’t got the memo and couldn’t be seen. But then, we went onto the wooden deck at could see a rock in the distance full of them, so we weren’t entirely cheated out of that. The walk back from here should have been shorter, but again the military base was in all the wrong places, so we had to walk back the way we came just to follow the same roads. All in all, it was a very inconvenient location for a military base.

Ready to pick the flesh from our bones, or missing a friend for a Jungle Book re-enactment

Don't jump!

The next morning brought along another procession. We still don’t really know what these were in aid of, other than this one looked to be mostly children performing then followed by groups of adults who looked like they didn’t really want to be there, we presume parents. More free shows though! Not much left to do here, we took the bus back to Santa Marta and headed towards the next beach town and where we would spend Christmas Day, Montañita.

Montañita has a reputation as a surfing town, very touristy, especially with non-Ecuadorian nationals, with plenty of restaurants, bars (or at least popup street bars) and a party atmosphere. Knowing this, we decided to stay in a place a little out of town, as even in the places not regarded as party towns the music and noise can easily go on until silly o’clock in the morning. We found a place advertised as our own cabin, with terrace, kitchen and private bathroom. Sounded good.

When we turned up however, it had been a little oversold. The room was indeed a cabin, made of the finest wood and leaves, and it was huge (we had three double beds to choose from) with a private bathroom, but no kitchen to be seen. It seemed there was a central facility with a kitchen, however we got the vibe from the guy running the place that the kitchen was more of a ‘we will cook you something if you pay for it’ kinda deal. Onsite restaurant would have probably been more accurate. Either way, we’d booked it and it wasn’t awful. That said, we did have all manner of bugs, spiders and unidentified poos littered around most days, which was sub-ideal.

A great dane? Here?

A Great Dane with the same colourings as Ruby too? Where are we!?

Beach pups chilling

Already missing my daily breakfasts... 

Friendly fella

We didn’t do a huge deal whilst we were here, taking the time to try and recover a little as my illness still hadn’t passed. The only thing we did want to do however was the nearby ‘Isla de la Plata’, a small island about an hour off the coast of nearby Puerto Lopez, about an hours bus ride from where we were. We had been debating whether, whilst in the area, we would visit the Galapagos islands. However, being the time of year it is and us being cheap, we just couldn’t justify the costs, and instead opted for this place, far cheaper and with a similar ecosystem. We decided to do the trip on Christmas Eve, freeing up Christmas Day to relax, have a drink and speak to family back home. Yes, even a devoutly Catholic country such as this barely slowed down for Christmas Day, let alone the outright stoppage you get in most countries, and we did have the opportunity to go then.

By about 10am we were at the docks of Puerto Lopez, getting ready to board our boat, a roughly 20 seater with two engines on the back. The boat started off smoothly, whilst our guide was introducing himself in English and explaining what we’d be doing and seeing whilst there. This was fine. Once he had finished and checked if we had any questions however, he knocked on the ceiling and the engines opened up. At this point it felt a little bit like riding a rodeo, as we continually kept hitting huge waves and smashing back down. I can confirm that this isn’t something my stomach needed at the time.

Around 45 minutes in, the boats engines suddenly cut out and we slowed down to nothing. Confused for a moment, we soon realized why, as the guide pointed out to the side of the boat where we saw a pod of dolphins swimming alongside the boat. Diana audibly squealed ‘SHIT!’ with excitement. They were jumping out the water literally within touching distance. An American girl behind us whined that she wanted to swim with them. That wouldn’t be the last time she did something annoying, but we all just watched as they swam past the boat, bobbing in and out. We later found out we were particularly lucky here, as they usually only see dolphins once or twice a month. Merry Christmas to us!

Just before pulling into the island, we stopped at an area where apparently turtles sometimes were. The guide started throwing bits of fruit into the water and we all watched, wondering what might happen. Then a turtle happened, about the size of a flattened sheep. That was pretty cool. Over to the other side, big blue fish were swimming around (each about the size of one of those silly little handbag dogs). All very interesting!

Medium sized sheep I'd say

Runty chihuahuas

We arrived as the island and after a short wait for everyone to go to the bathroom and gather themselves, we headed uphill and were told there were two paths. One would be a shorter, flatter walk, where we’d likely see one species of bird up close, with a few others flying above, and views of the ocean. The other walk was a longer walk, where we’d see two up close and the rest above. Most people voted for the short walks, so the guides split off into English and Spanish groups, and we set off.

Almost immediately, we found our first roosting Blue Footed Boobies. Weird looking birds that have up to two offspring at a time, and mark their nest by shitting in a circle around it. Absolutely normal behaviour. What you won’t get from a photo alone is their weird vibrating necks, apparently an attempt to cool down like a panting dog. Bear in mind they were sat out in the middle of the paths in direct sunlight rather than under the shady bushes, I’m not sure these were the smartest animals of the bunch. The guide explained how to tell the difference between the males and the females, where the males were smaller and had smaller pupils in their eyes. The babies also apparently grew at what I would consider an alarming rate, where he said the absolute smallest ones were a few days old, and the ones almost the size of their parents were about 2 weeks old. Their feet start off white, and slowly turn blue as they reach maturity apparently.

Mind where you're putting your silly blue feet!

The path was full of them, with literally three or four nests of them every corner we took. On occasion they would make noises at us as we walked passed, clearly indicating we were too close (as said, they could have built nests off the path, but noooooo…). Anyway, interesting at first, but honestly once you’ve seen one booby you’ve seen them all.

The views were good, as we stood at a top of a cliff looking down you could see small schools of fish swimming around, the water was extremely clear. Overhead, blue footed boobies, masked boobies and frigate birds flew around, apparently albatrosses too, but I’m no birdyologist.

We walked back down and headed back to the boat for lunch and the last part of the tour, snorkeling amongst the different fish. I did take some video here, but I’m not sure if it relays just how close the fish got, on occasion I’d look behind me and one would be sneaking up and looking at me funny, they weren’t in the least bit timid. Eventually we returned to shore, a far less interesting trip back (although definitely more violent, I thought I might break my neck on the bumps at one point).

Christmas Day was a fairly quiet one, pancakes for breakfast (fruit and muesli for Diana), a frappucino on the beach and a few phone calls whilst chilling, then by evening a couple of cocktails and a walk down the beach. Wonderful! And my stomach felt better. Until the next day after the cocktails when it felt instantly worse than it ever had before. Wonderful!

Anyway, no time to feel sorry for myself, onwards to our next destinations – Cuenca and Loja, in preparation for our next border crossing!