Wax palms, whatever they are, live nearby where we have been
camping so it would be rude not to go check them out. We are told they are kind
of a big deal. There are lots of hikes you can do through these palms in the
valley, or you can just take the lazy option and drive past loads on a mountain
road instead. Turns out they are huge and lanky growing at a cool altitude
above 11,000ft. 
A mediocre camp spot by a mediocre lake served its purpose
that night, and an awkward realisation in the morning that fresh underwear was
currently out of stock was quickly remedied by Mr. Pre Soak and Mrs. Spin
Cycle.
Apparently there was nothing of interest during the next
day’s driving because we don’t have any photos. But we DID take a bad photo at
the hot pools by which we slept. A huge pool fed by boiling hot water was the
epitome of relaxing until we were joined by a large family up from a local
town. Initially disgruntled our peace had been disturbed by Latin American
dance music on a cheap Bluetooth speaker, we were pleased to find out this
feeling hadn’t manifested onto our faces as they made us tea from the hot
spring water and a plant nearby, and gave us shots of a local rum. Humans are,
for the most part, lovely. 
Colombia is huge, so we made another crack at getting across
a large swathe of it heading south towards the border. The route was quiet and
well paved along a valley with very little around. Elder native ladies were
very frequently found beside the road, putting a hand out for money as every
car drove past, something we imagine would be hard to make a career out of.
Some had a few tricks, like making the effort to get up awkwardly and taking a
couple of steps closer to the road to win you over.
More hard done by souls, Venezuelans that were also heading
towards Ecuador were perched on almost every truck heading south.
In order to appeal to the younger audience, we decided we
should try to take Instagram worthy photos in the hopes of being retweeted or
whatever. It isn’t as easy as the kids make it look, coming up with this
fanciful hippy “life changing” inspirational bullshit.
We had to adjust the mirror first so that you wouldn’t see Jenjen
picking her nose. It really is an art #nofinger
iOverlander, our travel god app, continues to provide us
with daily gems and our final destination this day was no different. A rural
hotel/restaurant that frequently hosts campers in their car park if you buy
their daily dinner. For the measly cost of 6 Canadian, or 4 Squid, we got a
three course dinner with fresh trout, local cheese and a miscellaneous berry
juice drink.
A bonus was our neighbours for the night, a lovely Colombian
couple out enjoying the countryside in their very own campervan, a conversion
very closely resembling our own. They gave us biscuits, wine and even a small
12V fan after we expressed our jealousy that they were better equipped for the
coast than we were. It was a really lovely night, but what we didn’t know was
that things were about to go incredibly wrong before the sun rose. 
Steve goes to hop out the van, but staring down at the grass
in disbelief, shock, horror, disgust, sadness, disappointment and anger finds
flop missing. Flip was still there, but flop was gone! Flop had had a tough
life, almost worn through and paper thin he had been mauled by a dog in Mexico
which was lovingly repaired by Steve, before being torn again whist wading
through a fast river in Honduras before being repaired again. What’s the big
deal we hear you thinking? Well, Steve is US 13, UK 12 and apparently nobody
south of America has feet this big because despite countless efforts to locate
a flip and a flop to replace the tatty scraps Steve was tramping around in
nothing had ever been found.
Investigations began with a through sweep of the entire area
and some very stern questions to the bear sized dog who was a potential suspect
to this heinous crime using Flip as bait. It also became apparent, thanks to
the discovery of a small scrap of black plastic that our rubbish had also been
stolen from the back of the van. This also was impossible to find, whoever had
stolen this had left no trail. Professionals.
After an embarrassingly long time looking, we gave up and
drove away. Somehow through the tears Jenjen spotted our rubbish, mauled and
abandoned (minus the chicken bones…) some 200 metres away from the scene of the
crime. But, no flop. Please take a minute to mourn this great loss, and to wish
Steve luck in mastering the art of hopping.
Colombia seems to know when are planning a short day of
driving and puts road works after road works in our way to ensure that even if
we think we are just driving for 3 hours, it ends up being 5. At every stop at
least 5 people walk past offering water, coffee, oranges, windscreen washing,
tyre checking etc etc etc. We’re getting repetitive strain injury shaking our
heads, it really is a health risk.
Making ourselves at home in a cable car carpark for our last
night in Colombia we get endlessly harassed by a pair of locals wanting nothing
more than to chat and be friendly. Embarrassingly they knew more English than
we did Spanish… We got a picture of Jenjen with them because we guess it might
have been a bit weird if it was Steve in the photo.
Disregarding all advice to get to the border early, we
headed to one last attraction in the Colombian mountains. A big massive churchy
cathedral thing built across a gorge because nothing says believe in god more than good
engineering.
And so with that we made our way towards Ecuador (which
translates to Equator). The border is crazy, hundreds and hundreds of families
waiting in huge lines for their turn to seek refuge across the border. Luckily
for us there is a “tourist” line at both sides, but it still takes an agonising
4.5 hours of standing in queues before we finally make it across. We joined the
Ecuador entry queue, asking a gentleman handing out wrist bands, if we were in
the correct queue and he said yes, yes you are. So we waited for 2 hours and
upon reaching the front, this same gentleman was there and told us that since
we didn’t have wrist bands we would need to go to the back. Ahaha, no but also
no and with a bit of extra no on top. Google translate helped us explain that
it was him who hadn’t given us wrist bands when asked TWO HOURS AGO, and the
amigos around us in the queue also attested to the fact we hadn’t pushed in. Needless
to say we didn’t go to the back.
It really is hard to explain how that sound of the final
authorisation stamp really feels. Like a cross between getting a pony for
Christmas and a really, really good sneeze.
So that was Colombia, a bit of a mad rush but a great start
to South America. It was huge, beautiful and again filled with lovely people
and amazing locations. We felt safe the whole time, the driving standards are a
little less insane than some countries we have been through prior and we felt
welcome wherever we went.
So apparently drug trafficking is a problem and so a police
stop just into Ecuador involved a big sniffer dog being tossed into the van. He
didn’t even brush his paws, we would expect better manners from a figure of
authority. At least he didn’t steal Flip.
We found a lazy church, a few chairs thrown into a huge cavern
with a cross at the front and noted how quickly the scenery had changed from
Colombia. The lush green mountains replaced with deep canyons and sand.
North and South, and there exists a point at which you are
between the two. The long fabled Equator, we reached it! Neither up nor down,
we marvelled at this halfway point in our long drive. Just outside of Quito,
the capital of Ecuador, there is a “Mitad del Mundo”, “Half of the World” park
where you can take selfies straddling the hemispheres. The only thing is,
thanks to the modern technology of GPS we can see that this location is not
quite accurate thereby rendering it a complete and utter fallacy! Liars,
cheats, bastards whatever you call them we went to find the real 0 degrees, 0
minutes and 0.0 seconds Latitude. We found it, tucked away on a dirty
backstreet a few hundred metres north of the disgustingly misleading tourist
attraction built by the kind of person who dives in the penalty box.
But we went anyway and it was great! They even had mock
historic houses with information about the cuisine. Poor cute but apparently
delicious guinea pigs.
They even had Llamas! They weren’t very interested in us
until Steve saw a stack of neatly arranged plant (probably to be left alone)
across the way and grabbed a handful. Suddenly the eyes widened, the beasts
came right to the fence and snatched that whatever it was right from Steve’s
hand. We don’t know what “thank you” is in Llama language but they didn’t spit
on us, so that is probably it.
Another night, another drive in the dark and another weird
camp spot. This car park in the centre of Quito is a popular overlander
stomping ground, charging just $2 per 24 hours next to a quiet park.
Two hours of walking in the morning and we were in the
historic district and so began a day of great timing.
Great timing 1. We sat down in a park, a guy started playing
“Feliz Navidad” on the saxophone in the centre of the park. It was a lovely
backdrop to a busy and lively square. He was then joined by a flute player, and
then a couple of trumpets, and then more instruments we don’t know the name of
before they all walked up onto a staircase and were joined by dozens more
forming a full (we guess?) brass band. It was incredible, suddenly we had a
front row seat to an amazing live performance by the Fire Brigade band.
Great timing 2. We wandered into a big ol’ church just as a
ceremony kicked off with smells and candles and procession stuff. But it was in
Spanish so we got bored and left.
Great timing 3. A huge flock of pigeons left then returned
to the church face but not a single one pooed on us. Perfect timing.
Great timing 4. We stopped to pick up Christmas goodies at a
supermarket inside a mall. But we couldn’t find the shop itself, until we
spotted a couple of the workers who run your loot down to your car for you. So
we tagged along, followed them into the elevator and tracked them all the way
back to the source of chocolate, biscuits, alcohol and all other festive
treats.
You know when you think something, but you don’t say it out
loud because as soon as you do you know that you will summon the gods of
“jinxing it” accompanied by the powers of “sods law”? Well just a day prior to
Quito Steve commented, out loud and stupidly, that we hadn’t got a puncture
yet. Well, guess what we found in the tyre? Yeah, a big fat screw. Do we leave
it in since the air is holding? Or pull it out before it works in deeper?
Ahhhhh why did Steve open his big fat stupid gob. Well, we pulled it out, and
the air stayed inside, man we love these tyres. Warning heeded, we have stopped
saying anything out loud we now just text each other like that couple in the
restaurant you laughed at once.
Oh but what’s this, driving in the dark AGAIN we headed up
towards Volcano Cotopaxi. Actual snow near the actual equator, nuts. As we
pulled into our camp spot we scared a pack of maybe wild Llamas, they do move
fast! We spent the night at 12,000ft where it got pretty chilly.
The moon was so bright that using a long exposure, Steve’s
photos came out like broad daylight despite it feeling pitch black to the naked
and puny human eye. You can see below the night time what looks like daytime
photo, and the photo of the camera having just taken a photo but with a phone
camera to show what it actually looked like. Magic!
Quick stop in the park as we cut through on the way to our
Christmas destination, we picked up a couple of German hikers at the entrance
gate and gave them a lift in exchange for sharing the research they had done on
the park which was a lot more than our exactly none.
Christmas eve, we park up at a hostel in a town called Banos
with a little line above the n that we don’t have on our keyboard. Banos with a
little line above the n translates, no kidding, to bathrooms or toilets. This,
obviously, was a continual source of amusement.
Navidad en Banos, aka Christmas in Bathrooms. Hahahaha.
The hostel also had a sign detailing the beauty of the town,
one that we had to use the translate app to understand. We hope you can read
the below, but if you can’t our favourite part about “Toilets” is “A landscape
happy and multiple sources, thermal waters, crystal waterfalls”. Hahahahahha
But it is a nice little town, despite the name.
Suddenly it was Christmas day, and right on form the weather
was grey, cold and miserable. After chocolate for breakfast, some family Skype
and a 10am beer we headed into town and found a British themed café for lunch
followed by an Irish pub for another beer before making our way back and almost
falling asleep at 3pm. Instead we chatted to a Mexican and couple of French
cyclists also making their way south. It was a nice day, different, but nice.
We hope you had a good one, if not try being a good boy or girl for once and
Santa will bring you better presents. Stop wasting time reading this blog and
go volunteer in a soup kitchen etc.
Boxing day chore day, laundry is dropped off in town and we
restock our supplies from the local market for peanuts. $7.50 US buys us most
of a chicken, two cabbages, a lettuce, a big bag of green beans, a huge bag of
carrots, a bunch of tomatoes, half a dozen bananas, three mangoes and a dozen
eggs.
Jenjen asks Steve again, “what’s wrong?”. He’s been staring
into the distance not saying a word for ages, lost deep in thoughts with eyes
glazed over. This has been going on for days. Why is Steve so distant? Is it
something I’ve done thinks Jenjen.
Steve asks Westy Rick again, “what’s wrong?”. He’s been making
horrible noises. A nasty metallic rattle under weird circumstances has been
consuming every waking minute of Steve’s thoughts. This has been going on for
days. Is it something I’ve done thinks Steve.
Investigations begin, off all the issues we could encounter
a blown engine would be catastrophic. They don’t have them down here, not until
further south. We have taken an engine with 266,000kms, removed it from a 1.5
tonne Subaru and put it into a 2.3 tonne van and trashed the knackers off of
it. Jenjen hops in the driver’s seat for
the first big stint behind the wheel. Steve in the back with the engine cover
removed we carve our way along a mountain pass. A couple of weeks ago we
watched the Italian Job (the real one) so Steve, completely unhelpfully begins
singing “This is the self-preservation, society….” But Jenjen manages not to
Big Willy it and so there was no need to listen up lads.
Anyway the engine sounds terrible when it rattles, like a
washing machine full of ball bearings, so in the hopes it will make some
difference the fuel pump and 4 month old fuel filter are replaced. The black
crap that comes out the back of the filter reminds us of the terrible fuel
quality we are inflicting upon the poor engine. Basic fuel in Ecuador is the
cheapest we have encountered so far, $1.48 US for a gallon! 0.52 CAD or 0.30
GBP per litre!!! But maybe it’s mostly water, so perhaps we’ll try the “Super”
tomorrow which is twice the price, it better be good…
So there we are, Christmas has been and gone and we continue
down through lovely Ecuador with virtually no traffic, a rattling engine, lots
of mountains and amazing scenery. Have a good start to 2019, well once the
hangover wears off obviously.
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