Sunday morning I got up early, before seven and put on my Mexican poncho to fend off the 40 degree damp morning air and walked Rusty to the rim of Quilotoa Lake, a crater filled with water.
It was a gray flat morning miraculously free of fog so Rusty and I could see the water barely rippled and the steep cliffs all round dropping vertically into the water. You couldn’t sail or easily swim there even if you wanted to and all you could do was sit and think.
I figured I alone among seven billion people was sitting there staring at this lake, that had once been a hole in the surface of the earth where magma came out, molten impossibly hot for humans to bear but it had all died down and been filled with passive water locking whatever was below us back underground.
The reverie ended and I walked back down through the freezing air to GANNET2 parked at 12,250 feet and we took to the road back the way we had come. And there was more water from the skies and 42 degree air and the road was lined again with abandoned soggy dogs waiting for cars to pass out scraps. We did of course and I hated Ecuador and everyone in it. I missed Colombia where dog abuse is a crime and Colombians cherish their animals.
The road was still filthy made worse by the rain, the dogs desperate and the humans beaten down by poverty and lack of opportunity. I spiraled into depression.
We were going to Chimborazo the largest mountain in the world, bigger than Mount Everest. It isn’t even that high, just 20,550 feet but because it’s almost on the equator the earth is thicker here than under the Himalayas so Chimborazo’s peak is further from the center of the earth than the top of Mount Everest is, even though that mountain is nearly nine thousand feet higher. Now you can win a bar bet with that piece of information.
I had this idea in my head that the campground Layne had contacted would have a parking lot for us, a restaurant said to be very good by friends and we could rest in the shadow of the great mountain. It did not turn out like that at all. There it was in the early afternoon:
Google Maps screwed us up nicely to start with by figuring a winding dirt road would be faster than following the main Panamerican Highway. We caught the error soon enough when the blue line ran through a soccer match in a small dusty village where already we felt out of place. Layne went into a store to buy toilet paper but they had none. That’s how poor these people are: they can’t afford loo paper. We got back on the main road which looked decrepit and run down.
The main road to Chimborazo was a disaster. This incredible mountain, this magnet for hikers and climbers is surrounded bred by filth, ugly decrepit villages, abandoned dogs, and a road that is so awful cars slalom to avoid potholes and patches and mud slides.
I mean take a look. The road is crap and I’m driving my home up it to a purported dinner and quite night in the shadow of this famous mountain.
I just hunkered down wishing I were anywhere else.
The poverty and lack of amenity just made me curl up inside. Here we were in our $90,000 hone in wheels with r dry comfort and a dog whose every need is catered to and outside on a 45 degree overcast afternoon humans and animals live a medieval scrounging life for survival. The whole thing was surreal. I felt like Elon Musk in a homeless camp.
Sleeping not dead. Some perked up when they saw us. Others just Layne in a ball. They broke my heart and my hatred for Ecuador just grew.
There were abandoned empty buildings all around the area where our camp spot was supposed to be. There were no signs and the apocalyptic nature of the place had us in despair. iOverlander put our place right here but there was no sign of life. A dog had followed us back and forth as we struggled to find our spot and he sat there staring at me as I tried to figure out our next move on Google. He got a big bag of food which held his attention as we drove away.
We found another dump with an apparent security guard in site. We asked if we could camp overnight. He looked doubtful. You could, he said but it’ll cost ten dollars. Okay we said. Each he added the light of greed in his eyes. We drove away. “He creeped me out,” Layne said. We drive bs on down past the dogs toward the village of San Juan. It was 4:30 with perhaps 90 minutes of daylight left. Chimborazo had gone already, lost in the clouds.
We drove despondently back down the valley trying not to make eye contact with the dogs and trying desperately to avoid the killer pot holes while trying also to keep out of the way of the rapid fire locals who drive as though on a billiard table.
We got a phone signal back and Layne sent a WhatsApp message to which there came a prompt reply. We had a campground for the night with hot shower, internet and a safe place to sleep for $10. Amazing, especially as we had been contemplating wild camping in this lonely cold dog infested place.
There was a festival underway in San Juan so we stopped on the street, as you do and bought dinner. Layne had been looking forward to a no cooking night.
The lady pro used there was no cuy (“guinea pig”) on her coals.
It was a short drive out of the village and the usual devastation of collapse and decay.
It looked to me like pictures from a place recently shot up and abandoned. It was not a joyous crew that turned into the campground driveway.
This is rural impoverished indigenous abandoned Ecuador.
The high plains castle this place styles itself. And it was a refuge from the world outside.
We were greeted by Caroline and Jan and their two kids, a Belgian family in a van traveling south like us. We’ve met them before and like them a lot so it was a joyous reunion as we were both feeling lonely. The campground has a lovely common area we could share and we were alone as the owner and his family were away.
Suddenly the cold miserable world outside with its miserable dogs and despair was pushed back a bit. We talked by the fire, shared dinner and wine and a day of profound sadness gained a bright ending.
They drove up to the Chimborazo parking lot and hiked up to the climbing refuges around 17,000 feet. It was in the fog so they saw nothing on their climb except local amateur hikers out of a Sunday vomiting copiously along the trail as altitude sickness claimed its victims.
We all of us had had a crappy day in our own ways, so we could not have had a better encounter than meeting these guys Sunday evening. What a relief it was them, friendly familiar faces.
If every day were like this travel by van in South America would be unbearable.
I annoyed Rusty, the dog once abandoned in the Everglades, by hugging him extra hard before bed. I wish I could save them all.
And Monday morning looked so good we decided to stay a day.
