Lucie & Rhys´s Honeymoon Adventure: Week 27 - Misahualli, Quito, Pasto, Popayan, San Agustin (Ecuador, Colombia)

After heading back from our jungle lodge to Misahualli by motor canoe, we spent the day relaxing in our hostel. Although the bedroom was small there were plenty of hammocks strung around the tropical gardens, a mirador overlooking the river with a fire pit and a swimming pool to keep us entertained. We headed into the plaza for fish cooked in leaves for dinner and spent the night with the hostel dog sleeping curled under my bed because she’d taken quite a shine to us.

The next day we were up early for the direct bus to Quito, leaving a very sad hostel dog behind. The trip went quickly with the road skirting the edge of the Oriente, passing numerous waterfalls and patches of cloud forest before climbing into the Andean plateau surrounding Quito. Once in Quito we jumped in a taxi to a hostel located between the old and new towns. As we only had two nights left with mum before her flight home we decided to head out to a recommended restaurant in the new town for a goodbye dinner. Having only seen the old town on our last brief visit to Quito we were surprised at how completely different the new town was, street after street of bar, restaurant and hostel (we chose not to stay in new town as pretty much everyone we’ve spoken to who has been to Quito has been mugged there). It being the Thursday before Good Friday there were loads of people about but the Irish owned Asian restaurant we went to – Uncle Hos – was relatively quiet and we had a delicious meal before heading back to our hostel.

The following morning Rhys stayed in the hostel to use the computer and me and mum walked through a couple of the city parks to an artisanal market in the new town. Around midday we headed back to the hostel to collect Rhys to head out to the Basilica to watch the Good Friday parade, hundreds of people parading the streets dressed as penitents in purple cloaks that looked like something the Klu Klux Klan would wear. Some of the people dragged full size wooden crosses, others had barb wire wrapped around themselves or had cactuses strapped to their backs. It was a little eerie. After watching it for about half an hour we headed into the Basilica to climb the towers. The basilica is really gothic looking with gargoyles in the form of aardvarks, condors, frigates and jaguars. Some of the ladders to the viewing platforms were definitely not up to European safety standards and gave mum the heebie jeebies. On the way back down we stopped at a little café in one of the towers for coffee with a view over the city towards the El Panecillo hill where the parade was heading. We wandered back to the hostel and enjoyed our last night with mum eating dinner on the roof terrace overlooking the old town.

Our last day in Quito we intended to visit La Compana a magnificent gold gilded church built by the Jesuits followed by coffee on La Ronda, a street on the edge of old town known for it’s art galleries, restaurants, cafes and artisanal shops. It being Easter Saturday though everything was closed. After a while walking around Rhys headed back to the hostel. Me and mum popped into an art gallery and then back to La Ronda where one café had finally opened for us to stop for coffee and cake. Back at the hostel we sat on the roof terrace playing cards waiting for 3pm and mum’s taxi to arrive to take her to the airport. It was very sad to say goodbye but we had a great 2 weeks and you have to be proud of your mum when she backpacks with two twenty somethings and does everything they do without them needing to change their itinerary in the slightest (love you mum!). After mum had left me and Rhys headed into new town for a drink at an Irish bar (we were lulled in by the promise of a free shot that they didn’t honour, how un-Irish) before eating at an American dinner that was showing the movie the Hulk.

We were up early to leave Quito to head north to the Colombian border. After a taxi ride to a bus terminal in the north of the city we managed to get on a 6:50am bus to the border town of Tulcan 5 hours north. At Tulcan we jumped in another cab to Rumichaca, the border, where despite having read that the crossing could be long winded we were stamped out of Ecuador and into Colombia in super quick time. Once in Colombia we jumped in a collectivo to the bus terminal at Ipiales where we caught a bus to Pasto 2 hours further north. Once in Pasto we cabbed to a hostel that was perfectly fine for a stopover night in a non-touristy town and after dinner at Mister Chicken we sat in bed and watched the Hobbit.

The next day we were up early again and headed back to the bus station to attempt to buy a ticket to Popayan. Buying bus tickets in Colombia is a bit of a challenge, although they have bus terminals so they’re one step ahead of Peru, each terminal has about 20 ticket offices and none advertise their routes and most advertise towns but don’t actually run buses there or have one bus a day at stupid o’clock and in addition it would seem that it is expected that you haggle for bus prices. We were lucky with our bus to Pasto as it was a full size bus and was quite luxurious unlike the two buses we’ve caught since then. Getting a bus from Pasto to Popayan was difficult as we hadn’t worked out the deal with the super taxis and were asking around at all the bus offices with no luck despite being told at the hostel and by the Rough Guide that buses go all the time. In the end we were pointed towards the super taxis and finally worked out that the minibuses go pretty much whenever they’re full and you just have to ask around to find a ticket office going where you want to go. After boarding our mini-bus and throwing our bags on the back shelf to be spooned by sleeping passengers we picked up along the way we rocketed our way to Popayan. We checked in to a lovely hostel – ParkLife, located in a colonial house on the main plaza owned by travellers from Ireland, Romania and Spain. We headed out for juice and ended up with a bowl of unset jelly full of fruit and a spoonful of ice cream and headed back to the hostel to relax before dinner at an Italian in town.

The week ended with another bus trip in a mini-bus to San Agustin, or more accurately to a road junction 5km out of town from where a pick up truck took us the rest of the way. Having left our big bags at ParkLife the journey was relatively painless and even with the random stop for lunch and a delay because people struggled to sit in their allocated seats we still made it in 5 hours - highlight of the journey was a man with a cockerel on a rope sitting in front of us. Once in San Agustin we headed up the hill to the outskirts of town to a hostel we’d been recommended, La Casa de Francois. The hostel is a cluster of cute little bamboo and plaster buildings set in tropical gardens with lots of little nooks for chilling and a huge communal kitchen. After exploring town we cooked a homely spaghetti bolognese and played cards while drinking the cheapest bottle of rum we could find.