Dramatic travel on Saturday, July 27, 2013
WARNING: The following blog post is quite wordy. Please read at your own visual peril.
We have a had a few days that rank among our most exhausting days
of travel. They happen in between all those smiling pictures we post amidst Spanish colonial architecture or with stunning mountains. Saturday, July 27, 2013 was up there near the top. We
departed from Ibarra, Ecuador on a bus at 7am for a 3.5 hour bus ride
to Tulcan, Ecuador which sits on the border with Colombia.
After
arriving in Tulcan, and using the much needed bathroom, Will and I
headed toward the line of taxis. I shrugged, guessing we'd missed
our chance to change US dollars (because Ecuador uses the US dollar)
into Colombian pesos at anything like a decent exchange rate. But,
then, right before our eyes materialized a guy offering to change our
money. This is exactly the kind of guy we usually try to avoid,
making no eye contact and saying “no, gracias” repeatedly. But
in this situation, we had downloaded the most recent exchange rate
onto our phones that morning, and we were pretty sure that the money
changers on the actual border would be offering an even worse rate.
So, he entered a rate into his calculator, I noted the 1800 was
missing the 80 in place of the double zeros, and I asked Will if it
seemed reasonable. As ever, quick with the numbers in his head he
nodded yes, we changed our $40 US dollars and continued to the taxi.
(Keep in mind that it just took you probably twice as long to read my
description as it actually took in real life.) And the taxi was
already asking us “A la frontera?” before I said anything, so we
stashed our bags in the trunk and jumped in. Then I worriedly asked
the ubiquitous taxi question of “Cuanto cuesta?” And was
delighted to have the driver reply with a price under what I had
expected.
So, off we sped, at a fearful speed, swerving around other
cars, etc. to get the 4km to the border. And since we had little use
for any US cash, of course Will gave the driver a tip (which we have
dispensed with doing, in most cases, since we figure 8 out of 10 times we
are paying a tourist rate for the rides we take). And then, before
we could even get our packs out of the trunk, there was an nice
honest looking young woman talking to us about Colombia and where we
needed to go. After asking her, “Un vez mas, por favor. Mas
despacio.” (Which is one of my most common requests.) She then
slowly explained that she could offer a service of taking us directly
to Colombian immigration and then on to connections with whatever bus
we needed for whatever city we wanted to continue to in Colombia, all
this for approximately $17 per person. I pointed out that we needed
to handle leaving Ecuadorian immigration first and that we would
think about it.
On the walk into the Ecuadorian offices I told Will
what she had said that he hadn't caught, though he had the gist of
most of it, and we looked over our shoulders at the bridge into
Colombia and the tons of people crossing with kids, etc. and the
building visible on the other side of the bridge. And we figured we
could safely and easily walk there on our own legs just fine. So, we
got our exiting stamp from the Ecuadorian officials, and we got our
stern stares from the Ecuadorian national police in fatigues on the
way out and we walked into Colombia. And other than being swarmed by
offers of “Cambio, cambio, dolares, pesos, cambio” which we
thankfully didn't need, we walked into Colombia and got our entry
stamps just fine. They like to ask what your profession is... this
is hard enough to explain to friends in the US, it is near impossible
in Spanish, we say things about being building mangers and this is
usually fine. Upon exiting we found a taxi, with a driver who seemed
to have his son along for work that day, and the inquisitive little
boy bounced into the front seat. This time when I asked that
worrisome taxi question I got an answer quite a bit higher than I was
expecting so, I questioned it and he repeated the same price. So, we
accepted it, because we were already on our way. As we neared our
destination the driver informed me that he would only accept payment
in Colombian pesos (obnoxious since he worked side by side with all
those cambio guys at the border) but I told him we understood and it
wasn't a problem. He also drove a bit wild, especially since I
anxiously watched his son bounce around on the front seat, but fortunately not out of the window.
We
arrived at the bus station. And then we found a company with a bus
leaving at 11am. This worked out perfectly, since by our
calculations we needed to be on a bus leaving by 11am in order to get
to Popayan before dark. We found coffee and a bench and waited for
the bus. We put our bags in the bus cargo and much to our relief
received claim tickets for them. While in Ecuador this never
happened. The bus systems there seem to work on more of a
cooperative system that allows the rates to be low and anyone to get
around the country for approximately $1 per hour of travel. This
means just about everyone can afford to ride the bus. In theory, I
think this is superb. In reality, it means the buses smell a bit
more from the folks who don't have the luxury to bathe every day and
it means that you worry a bit every time the bus stops and the
luggage compartment opens that someone might be making off with your
bags. So, we weren't all that sad to return to buses that cost a bit
more, but also included luggage claim tickets, and as we were soon to
find out, a functioning bathroom! In Ecuador, if there was a
bathroom on the bus, it was always locked. And the only option for
using the restroom was to ask the driver to stop and to hope for a
few bushes to hide behind along the roadside. This system is shit,
if you ask me, so to speak. Anyway, so back to our first bus in Colombia... after
marveling at our claim tickets, we boarded the bus and Will said,
“gotta love that new bus smell” I laughed and he said, “I've
always wanted to say that.” And after Ecuadorian buses, I knew what
he meant. The bus was clean and smelled clean too!
You may have wondered earlier at my mention that we needed to
leave Ipiales by 11am in order to reach Popayan by dark... this
happens to be because our lovely Lonely Planet on a Shoestring travel
guide (which we call our Travel Bible) noted that bandits have been
known to waylay buses on this route between Pasto and Popayan at
night, even in a police vanguard. How lovely. So, since we had
decided to cross by bus and not fly (continuing to worry about carbon
emissions and also wanting to see as much of the country as
possible), we needed to negotiate this time restraint. And since
hereabouts near the equator the sun has a pesky way of going down at
the same time somewhere between 6 and 6:30p every night, this bus
needed to stay on time. The ride was gorgeous. Somewhere after our
very civilized lunch break in Pasto (where I chose to order something called a hamburgesa that contained an unidentifiable meat and was by far the worst hamburger I have ever eaten) when we got back on the road and
were treated to a real movie (by this I mean one that does not star
the Rock or other B grade Hollywood stars), with which Will was
thrilled, even with dubbing and Spanish subtitles (the movie was Midnight Express, directed, he tells me, by Alan Parker), we started
to realize that our excitement about one of the bus' features might
have been premature.
The air conditioning would come on only after
we could hardly breathe and then only stay on until we felt barely
human again. And the cycle would continue. We realized that we had
traveled from northern Ecuador that morning, where we needed our
fleece sweaters in the morning, all the way into a tropical climate
where all the folks on the roadside selling mandarins and bananas
from their front porches were dressed in tank-tops, shorts, and
flip-flops. But even accounting for that, the bus was damn hot. And
the cycle from hot to cool made me feel like I was going crazy (and
very much look forward to menopause... oh the things to look forward
to!) We drove through mountains and valleys and little towns and
watched the faces and the flora change. We saw waterfalls and
roadwork and had the pleasure of being detained by the national police
twice. Neither time could we see that they wanted to do anything
more than simply make the bus wait. In fact, that is what our
conductor told passengers who asked, what happened, he answered,
“Esperamos.” We wait. (This, as a side note, happens to be
Will's favorite verb in Spanish: esperar means both to wait and also
to hope. And Will likes to stare off into space and ponder how often
these two actions are really one and the same thing.) The police
didn't open the luggage compartment under the bus to take even the
most cursory glance. They simply pulled the bus over, made calls on
their cell phones and we waited.
The second time, we all got off the
bus, in hope of cold beverages nearby from one of the roadside
tiendas. But, there didn't seem to be electricity that far out
because none of the three places had anything cold. They did have a
freshly butchered cow hanging up and the restaurant next door smoking
a ton of beef. We could see the stall a few meters behind the
butcher where the head and legs remained. And the turkey vultures
hung out in the trees nearby, hoping for their turn. The local dogs
thought they might have a better chance and inched closer and closer
until some youths came and removed the remains to somewhere behind
the house. Eventually, with the snap of fingers we got back on the
bus and left. I had some worrisome day-nightmares about how we'd
been delayed and were going to get robbed on the road just before we
got to Popayan.
However, other than dealing with the cycling A/C and
tropical heat, we didn't have any other adventures on our bus trip.
We arrived in Popayan around 8:30p. We saw on our map that our
hostel was the closest one to the bus terminal and that it was
walking distance. And then somehow (probably because we were
delirious with fatigue) we double-checked, didn't see any safety
warnings about Popayan, and decided to walk the 2km to our hostel.
We love trudging down the streets like turtles with our big packs on.
Just when we thought we might have the address wrong, there was a
big welcoming sign on the corner saying “Hostel Trail” and we
buzzed the ringer and were welcomed into the nicest $30 a night room
we've yet had. We had a corner annex to our room with a beautiful
view of the largest church in town. So, now being about 9pm, we
looked at each other and agreed that even though we hadn't eaten since 1pm
that we simply wanted to fall onto the bed and go to sleep for the
night. Well, perhaps with the exception of a little “checking in”
on the internet (which to our pure joy was a good strong connection)
and a quick shower. Oh, and the rest of the peanuts and raisins we
had in our packs. And with that, despite a fellow hostel mate in the
lounge below drinking cheap Colombian beers and talking loudly (I
feel compelled to point out that he was German. For some reason
during our travels so far, many Germans seem to be loud, especially
on buses and in hostels where you'd want them to shut-up), we went
right to sleep.
-Cher
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