Quilotoa Luck!

After four different buses, some incredible scenery from the window and sharing my seat with a local we reached Quilotoa. Quilotoa is the biggest Crater Lake in Ecuador and is situated about 3500m up and yes VERY COLD!! We were given some warning though and the young boy who meet us from the bus as a way of getting us into his hostel offered us a room with a wood burning fire (how could we resist?).

To finish off an energetic day we headed along the tourist path to the bottom of the crater, a 500m accent. We had been given expectations of a ‘bar and restaurant’ at the bottom (due to the sign advertised by Princess Toa Hostel). However we were not in luck with any more than the warm cinnamon drink and a big bag of crisps which were severely over priced, bit of a sneaky trick if you ask me considering to get out of the crater you had to back up the same 500m track! By the by we decide to walk up the track (there was an option to take a horse but we had some training a few days before in Quito for big climbs!). It took ages and a good few stops on the way as we left the crater the mist mysteriously dropped in and it was beautiful.

After a quiet night in the hostel, as there really wasn’t a lot to do in those mountains apart from let the wood burn, we woke up to the same mist that had really closed in over night. This was a bit disappointing as we had planned to walk the circuit around the crater in the morning before heading off to our next destination. After milling around the hostel and eating breakfast (note to self: wood burning fires also make great toasters!) we were granted a small spell of clear weather, so we packed up and went for it. In total the walk was four and half hours about 5.5 miles long but with ascends and descends constantly as we walked along a ridge. Also the frequent drop of hundreds of metres on both sides in most cases made it not really a route for the light hearted, luckily as the guide book had suggested we had taken a stick, and although the advise was in case you came across wild dogs I found it more useful for balancing on the tricky edges.

 

Back to the bit about luck, we just happened to run into a trio that we predicted were eating cheese and pickle sandwiches on a picnic blanket! They asked if we had done the circuit and we replied with an exhausted and relieved,’ yes!’ We talked awhile to Maz, Karl an Tim, members of the Arte del Mundo Foundation, asking what they were doing up on the crater edge etc, one thing to another, it only turned out they were only heading our direction for our next stop in Baños, which was perfect. Beyond that they were the friendly faces we saw for then next few days as they invited us to stay in their accommodation and to even offer a volunteering hand…