Viva las Américas!: The Middle of the World!

As much as I love visiting cities, it was very hard to adjust back to busy city surroundings after having spent a great few days in Otavalo, listening to nothing but my own thoughts (scary!). After arriving in Quito, as impressive and pretty as much of it is, I could already tell I'd be happy to leave again.

The bus journey to Quito from Otavalo was a mere 2 hours, which, when compared to our other epic bus journeys of previous weeks was almost like hopping on a Dublin Bus for the short spin into town. The "hassle" started after we arrived at the new terminal in Quito; situated at the northern end of the city and which has been built in the years since our edition of the Lonely Planet was issued. So with no great help from the guide book and some very unhelpful signing in the bus station, we waited around for some sign of a bus for "el centro". But, thanks again to Latin inefficiency ( i thought the Irish attitude to time keeping was bad.....) none showed within 30 mins, so we got fed up and just paid the $8 taxi fee into town. This was AFTER being offered a taxi ride for $10, only for him to attempt to put us into the back of his pick up truck. Now, normally I wouldn't stick my nose up at this mode of transport around here, if it was just for a short hop down the road, but for a decent journey into a major city, I would rather not be risking life and limb by sitting on a bag of spuds and holding on to my backpack and paying $10 for the privilege.
So, legitimate taxi ride later, and some more patchy conversation with the taxi driver, we arrived at our hostel, Chicago Hostel (nothing remotely Chicago-ish about it), only to be checked in by an old man who mumbled Spanish, let alone spoke it. We had booked the room for $8 each per night, only to be told by mumbly Spanish man that $8 rooms were "occupado" and all they had left was the swankier $10 rooms. What with the double booking scenario, the need to pay upfront for the total cost of our room and the general noise outside was enough to put me into a bit of a sulk, but I soon came back to my senses when we discovered the room was pretty feckin' decent and we were refunded the difference of our room due to the booking fiasco. oh and the shower. The shower was AMAZING. Decent supplies of hot water and power, and not the scary electical pump showers that have a tendency to electrocute you slightly...

So the next day was spent just rambling about Quito's Old Town and admiring the sights. We opted for staying in the Old Town as we heard it was much safer, less muggings, and less like a Latino Ibiza strip than the Mariscal area of the New Town. There was lots to see, lovely plazas, nice old buildings and loads of churches; I do love my churches. We walked to the Basilica near our hostel where you could climb up the gothic tower and into the bell tower for views of the city. We did this by managing to dodge paying the fee while the fee collector had his back turned, mmmmwwwaahahahhhhaaha. But usually it's $2 to do so. You have to cross over the top of the arches of the cathedral inside over a wooden bridge and then up some very rickety looking stairs to bring you out the top. If you have a head for heights, which I don't, you can climb even further up, but that to me looked like a bit of a death wish, so I was content enough staying where I was, taking in 360degree views of Quito and the mountains all around.
At 11am, we made our way to the Plaza Grande where we heard the Changing of the Guards at the Presidential Palace would take place. The guards weren't as poker-faced and rigid as the guards at Buckingham Palace, but they were just has stupidly dressed and out-dated looking. Charming though. The whole routine was interesting to watch, brass bands aplenty and various groups of school children belting out the National Anthem in full voice (the Irish have a lot to learn....) and I was very surprised to see that the Ecuadorean president, President Correa and some foreign dignitaries were also there, overlooking the spectacle from the balcony, and waving to everyone, making the usual grins at the women of the crowd and the kids of course, the public love a man who's good with kids. Shouts of "Viva Ecuador!" rang out around the square and it was very rousing to observe people being so passionate about their country. Salutes were made by the guards to those who had died in service. And apparently this all happens every Monday! Afterwards, there seemed to be some kind of protest against the president. In my patchy Spanish, all I could make out was that they were unhappy about workers' rights or something. The vice president (at least I think it was) then came out onto the streets to listen to peoples' complaints, and brought some of them into the Palace to hear them out. I was amazed; I'd love to see that happen in Ireland....

After some flitting around from church to church in the old town, we decided to head out to Mitad del Mundo, the monument marking the equator line that passes through the outskirts of Quito. First of all, we had to battle shitty city maps and unhelpful advice from locals to locate the metrobus station from where to get the bus to Ofelia. Once in Ofelia station we then had to hop on a local bus to Mitad del Mundo, where we were keeping an eye on another Gringo couple to see when they'd get off; there's only one reason foreigners would be on a bus this far out of the city! This trip, taking about an hour and a half cost us only 40cents. Once inside the Mitad del Mundo park, we took the obligatory photos of oneselves straddling the equator line etc, we made our way back outside and walked Northwards to what's supposed to be the ACTUAL equator line at Inti-Nan; it seems when Mitad del Mundo was calculated back in the 17th century, they had been inaccurate by about 200m, which was later discovered with the invention of GPS. Which is the true line I'm not so sure, they could both just be money-making rackets but we visited them nonetheless! Inti-Nan is set up as a mock Inca village where they describe some Ecuadorean history to you and then show you the various experiments to demonstrate the magnetic effect of the two hemispheres when compared to the neutral gravitational pull of the equator line, like balancing an egg on a nail and observing how water down a plug hole pulls in different directions either side of the equator and then falls straight down when the sink is placed directly on the equator line. Good fun, and interesting, even if you're a bit of a skeptic and it'll set you back $4 for your troubles.

The highlight of the Quito stay for me though was the trip up the Teleferiqo and the subsequent climb (or at least the attempt) of Rucu Pinchincha, a mountain standing at 4784m. The teleferiqo cable car brings you up to a height of 4100m, so the remaining ascent and descent was supposed to take 5 hours. The trek started off reasonable ok, despite the struggle for air at 4100m. My poor little heart was about to burst several times, so we stopped quite frequently to catch our breath and continue again. The walk has some occasional uphill bits which look easy enough, but take several stops and starts to get to the top. There are some flat bits as well to let you get the strength back in your legs until you're confronted with the challenge of the peak. The peak seems to be an almost vertical ascent of about 300m. You're required to follow a very hair-raising narrow path along the outside edge of the peak which appears to bring you around the back and more gentle slope to the top. We had been warned however about the clouds and the mist which can come in very quickly and make the ascent dangerous. So, we had gotten to about 100m away from the peak when we found ourselves enveloped in whispy white clouds. As determined as we were to reach the top, we knew it could be a very very bad idea, as it could be so easy to get lost either on the way up or the way down and we had passed some very scary vertical drops that I wouldn't want to have been faced with in near blindness. So, we conceded defeat and turned back and began the 5km trek back to the Teleferiqo station where we got the cable car all the way back down to Quito, at an altitude in itself of 2800m. I'm so used to being starved of oxygen now, maybe I should take up smoking......

Where we stayed: Chicago Hostel http://www.chicagohostelecuador.hostel.com/
How much?: $20 per room per night (double with private bathroom)