BUSSING TO BAÑOS; CLIMBING TO CROSS; SPRINGING TO BATHE
Baños, Ecuador, Sunday, June 18, 2006

If you have ever spent a wet and cool summer-vacation week sitting on the edge of your bed-&-breakfast accommodation in the Austrian Alps, you can sort of get the feeling of being in Baños, Ecuador, at the end of the rainy season. It’s not actually that it rains the whole day here in this attractive spa town in central Ecuador. But, here, three hours by bus from and 1,000 metres lower than Quito, here, nestled in a deep mountain valley with water pouring down the steep cliffs, here in a modest town full of hostals and thermal baths, it seems to be raining a lot.

On Friday we waved down a taxi outside New Bask backpacker hostal in La Mariscal and drive south to the main bus terminal, a rather grim and “under-built” edifice. The terminal is both regulated and unregulated. The taxi fare was a set $3, but when we arrived outside the terminal the driver asked, though we were not exactly clear what he was driving at, if we wanted to get out where the busses were exiting the terminal or be driven to the building itself. For the latter the fare was an extra dollar, which he had to pay to get his vehicle inside. Apparently, we were to learn later, you can actually stand outside the terminal and flag down almost any long-distance bus. We must have stopped a dozen times before we were actually out of sprawling Quito itself. And the first stop was actually just outside the gates. Taxis and, I suppose, foot passengers have to pay to get into the terminal and passengers have to pay again just to get onto the platform.

The long, thin terminal building is lined right and left on the outside with bus slots and inside with wickets announcing (in alphabetical order) destinations like Riobamba, Gualaquil, Cuenca, Otavalo and, we were happy to see, Baños. In fact there are several wickets for each major town, each wicket representing a different bus line. In a rather confused gaggle and clutching our baggage tightly as we warned to do by everyone who knew we were going to be travelling by bus against thieves and pickpockets, we head for the ticket seller who is vociferously hawking his tickets to Baños through his plastic grating. We have learned to ask for “uno adulto, dos niños y uno mejores” (one adult, two children and one senior) whenever we have to buy tickets for anything: sometimes they baulk at the idea that Antonia and William are still children (after all they are already a lot taller than most Ecuadorian adultos), but they readily accept that Kathleen is an adult and that I am a “post-adult”, tercera edad “third-era” (Ecuadorian euphemism for “old farts”), mejores or senior. I have decided not to take this personally since the seniors’ discount is usually bigger than the children’s.

With more warnings about hanging on tightly to our belongings and about not putting them up on the overhead racks, we wait on the platform for Bus #20 on Platform #21 (go figure). We ask around and get no end of help from bus drivers, conductors and even other passengers. Everybody warns us in Spanish, broken English and/or sign language to hang onto our things. Eventually we climb aboard our somewhat aged blue bus with the big “Baños” sign in the window. A TV is on at the front of the bus showing the World Cup game between Holland and Serbia-Montenegro. (How do you know you have arrived in Latin America? No matter where you are there is always a TV on and you always get served Nescafe.) Our baggage has been stowed in the luggage compartment below us by some young man with slicked-back hair and wearing an Ecuador futbol tricot. In other words, he is combed and dressed at present like every other Ecuadorian male of his age and fifty percent of the Ecuadorian women. One of the drivers told me that, if we take the baggage inside, we are responsible for it, but, if we stow it in the luggage racks below, the bus line is responsible. I am not sure this gives me all the comfort I should desire, but we gave it to the young man to stow below. The manner of stowing has made me especially nervous since I observed that the compartment has no lock on it. So I sit, as recommended in guidebooks, near a window that will allow me to watch what happens to the baggage compartment whenever we stop.

When it finally leaves the terminal, there are only about a half-dozen other passengers. We spread out. The young man in the yellow, blue and red tricot stays with the bus by walking alongside. As we exit in the long string of other busses through the gates of the terminal grounds there is what appears to be the first unofficial stop. The young man is calling out “Baños! Baños! Baños! Baños!” rapid-fire to the assembled people who are standing on the curb, the scruffy grass verge or sitting on their bolsas ( “bags”, literally in some cases). Within a couple of minutes the bus is nearly full. I have forgotten than all Ecuadorian busses, local or long-distance, carry conductors.

The trip to Baños takes about three hours and descends steadily through a continuous mountain valley. Central Ecuador runs north-south down this Avenida de Volqanos. This is one of the most active volcano areas in the world, a testimonial to the pressures of the Pacific tectonic plate which, centimetre by centimetre over eons, presses against and under the South American continent and pushes up the land mass to create the Andes. There is lots of cloud about so we cannot see any of the active volcanoes like Cotapaxi clearly, though, at one point, we did see a bit of snow-covered mountainside. The view across the high and fertile valleys and up to the meadows rising quite high up the slopes is stupendous. All very “grand” and, unlike, say, the Rockies, covered with signs of agriculture and therefore of human habitation. The Rockies are heavily wooden or of bare rock and are basically unpopulated.

The bus keeps stopping at intersections or roundabouts to pick up new passengers and, by the time we have cleared Quito’s suburbs, the bus is full. We jockey for position with busses from other lines for the people waiting at the stops until we are full. After that we keep going, jockeying for position against the 18-wheeler freighters.

Nearly the whole trip is through grazing land and truck gardens. The former are populated with Holstein cows, the latter covered with plastic greenhouses. I ask later if flower growing is important to Baños and am told by someone that that takes place closer to Quito. I am not sure why. I learned from my Quito acquaintance, Mario Klein, who runs a rose-growing and exporting business, that roses can readily be grown there as long as they are protected from the wind (therefore the plastic coverings). Grapes, on the other hand, need a winter resting period, so wine-growing is left mainly to Chile.

At Ambato, the fourth or fifth largest city in Ecuador and a half an hour short of Baños, most of the passengers disembark. We continue descending on the now two-lane highway until we eventually drop rapidly into a river valley, cross an arched bridge and arrive in Baños. All our baggage is still there and Mr. Ecuadorian Futbol-Fan hands them out to us. I guess he was keeping an eye on it the whole time.

Our guidebook (2001) tells us that Hostal Café Hood on the main square charges $1 per person per night, the cheapest in town. We find it, a gaily- painted storefront. But he charges $5 a night and has no rooms with a bath for us. We trudge off to Hostal Santa Cruz for which we had several recommendations from backpackers in Quito. In fact it is just we want. Easygoing atmosphere, two quiet and nicely painted though spartanly-furnished adjoining rooms with a nicely-tiled common shower cum WC.

We drop our things and head out for almuerzos, a cheap set lunch. This is a real tourist town and there are plenty of eateries of every price. We looked into a French restaurant to find that main courses were only about $5 a plate (e.g. steak dinners). This was more than we could afford and we continued till we found a chicken roasting place. Toni’s soup had a chicken foot for flavouring; the rest of us got neck pieces. The main plate, as usual, has lots of rice and a nice piece of beef or a chicken leg. (Why Ecuadorian beef is tender and Mexican beef as tough as shoe leather remains an unanswered question.)

I have checked if the hostal has a filter-coffee machine in its little kitchen for guests (it does). We therefore visit the well-stocked supermarket on the main square opposite the mercado (closed for the day) and buy ground coffee, a can of evaporated milk and cookies, essential provisions for us. We skip bread since there are bakeries all around the hotel where we can get fresh buns the next day.

At the supermarket we also run into George and Jan from our neighbouring boat back in Bahia de Caráquez. They give us a few tips on what to see and how and we stop to gab.

We are in bed in good time, the mattress at least as hard as back in New Bask but no TV room below us to keep us awake all night.

Climbing to cross

On Saturday I get up around 0800 and go over to the main hotel building to get the coffee on and dart around the corner to buy warm and delicious fresh blaetterteig rolls. While waiting for the others eventually to arrive, I talk to the many Canadian university students who are on an outing organised by a student organisation in Ontario. They have been living with families in Ecuador, some with suburban families and some with rural and/or in indigenous families. They have some funny things to tell about their volunteer activities. Aingarin, for example, of Sri Lankan heritage and a natural sciences/pre-med student at Queens University, Kingston, tells about the typhous/tetanous/polio inoculation campaign he helped with amongst rural indigenous peoples. The medical teams travelled directly to the places where the women and children were working, told them it was government policy, had them bare their bottoms and gave them the jabs right there on the spot. The men have to pay for the shots but women and children get them free. I joked that, in ten years, he will have become incorporated into indigenous mythology as the bearded stranger with the needle that passed through the land sticking women in the bum and likely the reason why all the children thereafter have an oriental cast to their features.

We also meet Lorenzo, an ex-cruiser from California who has been retired here for the last year and one half. We make contact with Tara, a student at Windsor University, who wants to hike up to La Cruz, the large lit-up cross halfway up the side of the volcano above the town. She does not want to do it alone so we volunteer to go too. It is a pretty steep climb of about an hour on a stony and muddy path across and up the side of the mountain to about cloud level. It is probably about 300 metres over the town and all along the way we have great views. Occasionally the sun shines through, but most of the time it is cloudy or even a bit rainy.

Along the way we meet children and men who come bounding down the mountain trail headed for the town. We also meet Carlos Sanchez, who lives in town but also has a mountain hut near the volcano. He observes and makes regular reports to “volquanistos” i.e. volcano scientists in the U.S.A. and acts as a guide sometimes for tourists. He speaks rapidly in Spanish but so clearly articulated that it is easy to hear each word, although not always so easy to know the meanings. It makes us want to improve our Spanish.

We also, small world, meet Scott, a Calgarian, who is moving down to a sailboat (S/V Selah, Edmonton) belonging to friends from Alberta that we met before we left for Quito. They are all sailing to Peru and Chile and farther south perhaps.

At la Cruz it is windy and wet. We are sweated and thirsty and head for one of the two little cafes up there. There we order lemony herbal tea, which the lady makes from leaves she picks from the plants at the edge of the café, and “canelasso”. This latter is water, a cane-sugar-based schnapps, and cinnamon sticks served hot in a big cup. It’s a real pick-me-up after a climb. We also meet three English hikers. One of the young men was raised in Chile and he says his accent sticks out a mile here in Ecuador. He also explains that canela means cinnamon as spice (uno canelo is a cinnamon tree). If we add an “itto” or “itta” to a word it becomes a diminutive, e.g. Chiquita, little, little-one. If we add “asso” or “assa” it turns the idea into something really big. So a canelasso is a big drink of something big.

As with most itinerants we exchange names and stories and adventures before starting down the trail. We might have climbed some more to reach Runtun village. But I reckon I shall have had enough by the time I reach the bottom and take a pass. Downhill “climbing”, I find, is really hard on the knees, thigh and calf muscles. We aim to go to the thermal baths in the evening but I know I am going to be stiff anyway. Sure enough, my right knee feels very wonky by the time we get down.

Nothing daunted, we look for a place to get something to eat and end up eating quite good roast beef “sanduches” or a hamburguesa in the town for about a dollar or slightly more each. We really have to squeeze down our costs now or we shall be impecunious again. It costs us $20 a day to stay someplace for the four of us. We no longer do set breakfasts but make our own coffee and buy buns at the local bakery shop and fruit at the market or supermercado. Organised tours such as horseback riding and river rafting, which all the students seem to be able to afford to do without much problem, is beyond us. One hopes that Kathleen’s clients will pay soon and that I shall get a translation or two to do. Fortunately, translating (if you can get it) pays better better than proofreading. But they pay at about the same speed as the tectonic plates create the Andes.

We may have to go down to the boat simply for cost reasons. Alternatively, we can volunteer someplace where it is free in exchange for work. Today, Sunday, we are taking it easy. William has a head cold (as it seems do several of the local staff). He gets extra vitamins and last night we went to the hot baths.

Springing to bathe

Baños is famous for its natural thermal baths. It is one of the reasons that it has been a pilgrimage centre even under the Incas. The hot water springs from the volcanic mountains at the town’s back door. We head for the most famous of them, La Virgen de Agua, shortly before 1600. We are thwarted however by the fact that they are about to close for two hours while they drain the pool and refill it. At 1800 we are back with our towels and bathing suits.

A bridal-veil falls drops the three-hundred metres from la Cruz to just next to the baths. It is dark and the baths are lit up with floodlights. We see steam rising from them as we approach in the now heavy rain.

Inside, the place is packed with Ecuadorians of all ages and young backpackers. Not the ice-cold pool, of course. The really-hot bath (it is round, approximately fifteen feet across, about three feet deep and of a sulphurous colour), however, is so full that you can only stand or squat down. It reminds me of a painting by Hironymus Bosch (spelling?) of sufferers in hell standing in boiling water. It is nice and hot though and, along with the aspirin I took for my bum knee, it makes me feel quite mellow.

The place is really overrun, however, and, given that, not so much fun. There are no lounging chairs or seats or resting rooms where you can cool down and relax. Kids are darting around and the pools are over-crowded. After forty-five minutes of hot water I decide to get out. Standing at the edge of the pool I feel a little dizzy.

I recall to the kids about the time when I was nine or ten when we drove across the (North American) continent to Banff, Alberta, so my father could attend a GM dealers’ convention. That was 1951 and I recall the trip vividly. Banff has natural hot springs too and my Dad took my brothers and me there for an outing. I distinctly remember signs telling observers not to throw snowballs into the pool. Do I recall that there was a ladies-only pool with a sign saying, “Gentlemen are asked not to overlook the Ladies Pool”? Maybe it was someplace else. We had a great time anyway and stayed in for a couple of hours. In the dressing room later, my Dad nearly passed out and had to sit down and place his head between his legs, to the amazement of his little boys, who thought Dad was invincible. We had none of us read the sign saying we should limit our stay in the 115º F. water to maximum twenty minutes. Mum had to drive us down the mountain road in the Buick and Dad fell into bed to sleep when we got to the motel. I was ready to head back to the hostal and a glass of wine a game of canasta.

This morning (Sunday) everyone is slow to get going. I get up to make coffee and buy buns and enjoy talking to the students over in the lobby of the hostal and to Lorenzo, who is also recovering from a cold. Eventually I return to the room to write up my blog. Maybe we shall get our act together and do something later today.