¿Puedo ir a Baños? - Day 1

Friday, 12 August 2011

Last weekend, we spent the three days and two nights in Baños. Many of you who remember anything from high school Spanish class might recall that el baño is the bathroom. Remember that the word is derived from the act of bathing, not some of the other unmentionable actions that take place in that room, and, in the case of Baños, Ecuador, is in reference to the hot springs found there. Baños is a small town situated between a volcano and a river. It is surrounded by many waterfalls within a close distance and is at a lower elevation than Quito, somewhere between the highest parts of the Andes and the Amazon jungle. Upon arrival, we met Juan, our guide for the weekend, who was very dedicated and made sure that we all had a great time.

The first thing we did was go in search of lunch. Juan asked us what we were interested in, and we told him we wanted something authentically local. Juan said there was nothing more local than cuy. If you read my last post on Otavalo, you will remember that cuy is the local word for Guinea Pig and is a popular delicacy in Ecuador. We found a local spot right in front the the central market that specialized in cuy. In fact, I'm pretty sure cuy was the only thing on their menu. The cuy was cooked whole then chopped up into smaller portions for individual plates served with potatoes and rice. I believe I was served the right half of the little guy's chest. It was actually very good; it tasted like the dark meat of a chicken. The only drawback was that there was very little meat for a lot of effort.

Several cuy being cooked on the grill.

Marvelous presentation.

After the meal, we walked through the city and visited their main cathedral. One very interesting fact about it is that many of the stones that make up the cathedral are poreus volcanic rock. The cathedral was built in its particular location because of a vision of Mary seen during a volcanic eruption. Inside the church, there was a painting depicting this event.

After the church, we headed away from the volcano toward the other side of town, where we found a tall ravine carved out by the river which flowed down below. From a bridge connecting the center of Baños to the other side of the river, we could look back at the city whose northern most neighborhoods are sitting atop a cliff, which made for a fairly stunning view. From the bridge looking down, we saw this . . .

As you can see, there is a quaint old Indiana Jones style bridge spanning the ravine. I really wanted to get down to it and stand on it, but I just couldn't see any way. It was simply too far down. Then I was informed that there was one way that I could get down there. The stated cost was $20, but I only had $19. Fortunately, I was able to talk the nice man into accepting that amount. When it was explained to me exactly how they planned to get me down there, it seemed a bit extreme, but one only gets to stand on bridges like that so often . . .

This is the part where I nearly lost my cuy.

Almost there . . .

We have touchdown!

So I finally got to stand on the bridge. We had to dodge gaping holes and avoid the planks that seemed to bend and creek too much, but it was worth it. Later I discovered that there was a path down into the canyon. This got me pretty upset when I realized that instead of paying those guys $19, I could have walked down for FREE! Oh well, live and learn I guess. If I ever come back to Baños I'll just take the free way down.

After the bridge, we hiked up to a ridge on the eastern end of Baños. From there, we could just barley make out the summit of the volcano between the clouds. A view of this summit from Baños is masked by the foot hills because the volcano is so close to the city. Also, we got to look out west over the small town of Baños. It was easy to make out the river to the north and the base of volcano on the south end of the town.

With a little zoom action, one can see the San Francisco bridge off of which I jumped.

We spent a good bit of time exploring the top then returned back to our hostel. For the evening, we rode in a Chivas, which was a stadium seating style bus open on both sides complete with blaring music and flashing lights. We took the Chivas up to the same lookout spot and tried to listen to a young man explaining geography to us while a group of young people talked over him. The we drank watered down, non-alcoholic canelazo, a drink which is normally very tasty and very popular here in Ecuador. Then, after watching some campfire comedy that none of us understood, we jumped back in the Chivas and rode ears-plugged, eyes-closed back to our hostel to end the evening. It was an anti-climactic ending to a fantastic day.