So, in case you're like Audrey and I and thought it was just kind of a funny coincidence that Ecuador sounds a little like, 'equator,' it's not true...it's not just a funny coincidence. Ecuador means...'Equator.' AND the equator, of course, happens to run right through Ecuador, right outside of Quito, AND happens to be pretty easily accessible by scooter if you can find a place to rent some:)
So, one day Audrey and I went and rented two scooters from two men who had ridden motorcycles down from New York, had planned to make it to Buenos Aires and live there for awhile but got to Quito and didn't want to leave!
They give you a GPS for the scooters and it's a whole GPS guided tour thing, including a stop at the equator and several other places. You drive all through the mountains and a cloud forest, and stop in a town for a chocolate and coffee tour on a coffee and chocolate plantation and then to a really cool, pretty famous market in Otovalo, then stop at a few more outlooks and the 'middle of the world' on the way back.
Apparently most people make it a two day thing, staying overnight in the town with the coffee and chocolate tour, but we hadn't planned on that, didn't bring anything with us for that, and they assured us, oh yea...you can probably just do it in a day...no problem. Go for it. Well....it was an amazing day! At least the first part of it. We enjoyed riding our scooters all through the gorgeous mountains on crazy dirt and gravel roads...it was gorgeous. Because of the slightly less ideal roads, though, it was taking quite awhile to get to our big destination, the little town of Mindo, where we needed to get there by 4pm for the chocolate and coffee tour...but we made it! We got there about 20 minutes late...but they still let us join the tour which was awesome. The guy gave us a really cool history of chocolate, cocoa beans, the current cocoa growing situation including the politics of it, and then showed us the whole process of it! It was all very interesting to see and learn about...and, of course, at the end got to have a little tasting session.
We started with 100% chocolate and then you added sugar a little at a time to see how sweet your preference was. It was a pretty incredible place...the guy was SO interesting...he is from Ecuador, but lived in the US for awhile, speaks perfect English, and he says the people in his town call him 'the gringo' -(the white man). He showed us his garden where he was growing all KINDS of stuff...aloe, natural sweeteners, and even some things he was just experimenting with. He was quite a creative guy...he even made most of the machinery himself that he uses to process the cocoa beans. Incredible.
Well, when the tour ended, we looked outside and one- it was getting dark, and two- it was POURING rain. Hmm. Well a few things were going through our mind at this point...one- we had heard way too many stories about how dangerous Quito is..especially at night/when it's dark, and two...we should really know by now that if we rent a means of transportation where we are exposed to the elements...most likely one of those elements is going to be rain. Also...Audrey and I are both very...determined (stubborn). Period. So..we were determined to bypass all the rest of the stuff we were supposed to see on the way back to the city and just drive on through the rain...in the dark..back to Quito...to make it to our hostel where we hadn't checked out so we knew we would be charged for that night Not smart not smart not smart..keep reading, Mom!
So we were both completely out of gas (that one gallon tank gets you further than you think! But after a whole day of driving them...they had finally run out of gas. We asked someone if there was a gas station nearby, and after asking about four different people, going to where they pointed and described (in this tiny town that consisted of about 5 blocks, literally) we finally found what they were talking about! This man's house where he has a huge barrel of...blue colored...gasoline? As we were filling up with this blue colored...stuff, he was asking us what we were doing..where we were going...and WHY?!? He kept telling us we shouldn't go. Ok, thank you sir...but we just have to. (We're determined! And just silly sometimes). So, soaking wet we got back on our scooters, paid him the $1.50 for the gas, (gas is SUPER cheap in Ecuador!! It's crazy. No more than $2/gallon), and drove on out of the town. We got to the top of the hill that takes you from the little town to the big main road, and just stopped for a second to readjust and have a break from the rain in our faces. A local lady was standing there waiting on a bus, so we talked to her for a minute as she asked us what we were doing and why and also told us we just shouldn't. We were starting to get a little less determined, and considered other options..finally coming to the conclusion that either we make it back on a bus or some other large vehicle that could fit our scooters as well with this super nice and knowledgable local lady, or we drive back to the town and stay the night there. After lots of attempts to flag down buses and trucks that looked like they could take our scooters, and quickly realizing scooters are much bigger and heavier than they look...we went back to the little town, Mindo. We were annoyed and felt shot down..but we knew it was the best thing to do then! We found an Internet cafe, managed to call our hostel who was a little like a family and SUPER worried about us. Haha, the south African guy in his accent, 'are you girls OK?!?! We were worried about you!' (side note: several years ago he was driving his motorcycle and got in a head on collision with an 18 wheeler and was in a coma and completely unrecognizable for quite awhile and his dad thought he was dead and he was immobile and in a body cast for 6 months....). We assured them we were fine, but were staying the night in Mindo and would see them in the morning! We made friends with the internet guy who had a friend who owned a hostel and let us stay there for $5...since we didn't have much money with us...ate some Doritos for dinner..and called it a night. Phew! The next morning we got up early, drove back on the main road, stopped at the Mitad del Mundo- middle of the world! (the equatorial line), enjoyed a few other sights, and booked it back to turn our scooters back in by their due time!
Quite an adventure...totally worth it...but we haven't rented any motorized vehicles recently...we're not going to push our luck with them for now:) Next up...one of my absolute favorite stories and few days of this entire trip. I'm not sure if telling the story will capture the amazingness of the situation and quite what it was like...but I'm gonna give it a try and I hope it works:) Miss you all and just have to say...Audrey and I will be getting home in about a month and 2 days!!! CRAZY! I've told a couple of people recently that I think right now we are right in the perfect balance of looking forward to being home but also enjoying each moment of these days where we are. Right after those amazing people left, I was pretty home sick and told Audrey, 'it's a good thing we had already booked our really expensive plane tickets home..because I might have been on a plane home otherwise.' I was pretty homesick! But we're back on the move and once again soaking up these days:) But we STILL miss you....and are looking forward to being at home..with the people we love and have grown to appreciate more than ever...in familiar places.
Apparently most people make it a two day thing, staying overnight in the town with the coffee and chocolate tour, but we hadn't planned on that, didn't bring anything with us for that, and they assured us, oh yea...you can probably just do it in a day...no problem. Go for it. Well....it was an amazing day! At least the first part of it. We enjoyed riding our scooters all through the gorgeous mountains on crazy dirt and gravel roads...it was gorgeous. Because of the slightly less ideal roads, though, it was taking quite awhile to get to our big destination, the little town of Mindo, where we needed to get there by 4pm for the chocolate and coffee tour...but we made it! We got there about 20 minutes late...but they still let us join the tour which was awesome. The guy gave us a really cool history of chocolate, cocoa beans, the current cocoa growing situation including the politics of it, and then showed us the whole process of it! It was all very interesting to see and learn about...and, of course, at the end got to have a little tasting session.
Well, when the tour ended, we looked outside and one- it was getting dark, and two- it was POURING rain. Hmm. Well a few things were going through our mind at this point...one- we had heard way too many stories about how dangerous Quito is..especially at night/when it's dark, and two...we should really know by now that if we rent a means of transportation where we are exposed to the elements...most likely one of those elements is going to be rain. Also...Audrey and I are both very...determined (stubborn). Period. So..we were determined to bypass all the rest of the stuff we were supposed to see on the way back to the city and just drive on through the rain...in the dark..back to Quito...to make it to our hostel where we hadn't checked out so we knew we would be charged for that night Not smart not smart not smart..keep reading, Mom!
So we were both completely out of gas (that one gallon tank gets you further than you think! But after a whole day of driving them...they had finally run out of gas. We asked someone if there was a gas station nearby, and after asking about four different people, going to where they pointed and described (in this tiny town that consisted of about 5 blocks, literally) we finally found what they were talking about! This man's house where he has a huge barrel of...blue colored...gasoline? As we were filling up with this blue colored...stuff, he was asking us what we were doing..where we were going...and WHY?!? He kept telling us we shouldn't go. Ok, thank you sir...but we just have to. (We're determined! And just silly sometimes). So, soaking wet we got back on our scooters, paid him the $1.50 for the gas, (gas is SUPER cheap in Ecuador!! It's crazy. No more than $2/gallon), and drove on out of the town. We got to the top of the hill that takes you from the little town to the big main road, and just stopped for a second to readjust and have a break from the rain in our faces. A local lady was standing there waiting on a bus, so we talked to her for a minute as she asked us what we were doing and why and also told us we just shouldn't. We were starting to get a little less determined, and considered other options..finally coming to the conclusion that either we make it back on a bus or some other large vehicle that could fit our scooters as well with this super nice and knowledgable local lady, or we drive back to the town and stay the night there. After lots of attempts to flag down buses and trucks that looked like they could take our scooters, and quickly realizing scooters are much bigger and heavier than they look...we went back to the little town, Mindo. We were annoyed and felt shot down..but we knew it was the best thing to do then! We found an Internet cafe, managed to call our hostel who was a little like a family and SUPER worried about us. Haha, the south African guy in his accent, 'are you girls OK?!?! We were worried about you!' (side note: several years ago he was driving his motorcycle and got in a head on collision with an 18 wheeler and was in a coma and completely unrecognizable for quite awhile and his dad thought he was dead and he was immobile and in a body cast for 6 months....). We assured them we were fine, but were staying the night in Mindo and would see them in the morning! We made friends with the internet guy who had a friend who owned a hostel and let us stay there for $5...since we didn't have much money with us...ate some Doritos for dinner..and called it a night. Phew! The next morning we got up early, drove back on the main road, stopped at the Mitad del Mundo- middle of the world! (the equatorial line), enjoyed a few other sights, and booked it back to turn our scooters back in by their due time!
Quite an adventure...totally worth it...but we haven't rented any motorized vehicles recently...we're not going to push our luck with them for now:) Next up...one of my absolute favorite stories and few days of this entire trip. I'm not sure if telling the story will capture the amazingness of the situation and quite what it was like...but I'm gonna give it a try and I hope it works:) Miss you all and just have to say...Audrey and I will be getting home in about a month and 2 days!!! CRAZY! I've told a couple of people recently that I think right now we are right in the perfect balance of looking forward to being home but also enjoying each moment of these days where we are. Right after those amazing people left, I was pretty home sick and told Audrey, 'it's a good thing we had already booked our really expensive plane tickets home..because I might have been on a plane home otherwise.' I was pretty homesick! But we're back on the move and once again soaking up these days:) But we STILL miss you....and are looking forward to being at home..with the people we love and have grown to appreciate more than ever...in familiar places.
Ahhhh, I LOVE your posts and the GREAT pictures. I love SEEING where you are and what your next adventure is. LOVED the equator pics AND the views of Quito ~ bubbles, cathedral, people etc. WHAT memories you will have of these months ~ incredible, wonderful memories. Visions of the world......keep on adventuring Hannah and having FUN! I do believe you might need a vacation to recover from this BIG adventure! Love you!
ReplyDeleteHannah - great commentary and amazing pics! Need to get the next adventure posted. Miss our little adventures together.
ReplyDeleteRegards/
Bea