After all the fun we had on the short equator tour, Alexa and I decided to check out some other tours offered. We found a cool tour to this place called Quilotoa, a crater with a beautiful blue lake in it that just seemed like such a spectacular destination. Now, because we were both broke college students, the USD 60 fee for the day trip just seemed too much. Though in hindsight it would have most likely been better to just take the tour, but as someone who was working three part-time jobs while in college, I was stingy with money and we were set on going. So after some Google research, we found a blog describing how to get there from historical Quito. Being young and slightly brave, we figured that between the two of us, we could easily get there on our own accord if we left the next day.
Our internship had a car picking us up on Monday but we had both arrived on Wednesday, as the tickets were significantly cheaper than showing up over the weekend. So after a few days in Quito, we figured we could get there and back in time for pickup. We left early the next morning at around 7:00am by Uber to the Quitumbe terminal in Southern Quito.
Once we arrived, we wandered around the many stands and had to keep asking until we found the bus to Latacunga, our next stop. We hopped on that bus where we got off in Latacunga to find the bus to Chugchilan. We were told the bus would leave around 11:30am so we walked around and got some snacks. We almost completely missed the bus. We found out in this instance that buses often do not arrive or leave on their scheduled times. So the bus started leaving at 11:00am and we had to sprint down the road after the bus waving our arms like crazy tourists would. Luckily, it stopped and we were able to hop up the stairs repeating “gracias, gracias” a million times. The bus driver just waved his hand at us and I have a feeling it is quite common.
An interesting thing I found with the buses all over Ecuador, is that there are vendors or people selling items and food that hop on the bus and ride a short ten minutes, walking up and down the center aisle selling items. Then when they’ve finished, they walk back up to the front to tap the bus driver who pulls over for them to hop off on the side of the road. They then cross and hop a bus going the opposite way and do that all day.
At this time I was only carrying my small daypack as we locked our stuff up with the Community Hostel in Quito. Also, at this point in time Alexa and I were completely running on faith and some random person’s blog on the internet. We had no plan or idea where we were going but we had faith in my limited broken Spanish and our luck.
We had read online that Chugchilan was where a hostel many backpackers stay is located. So we hoped they had room for us just to walk in and get some beds. As we sat together with our bags by our legs, I stared out the window while Alexa napped and was soon terrified by the view. There we were driving at high speed down this half dirt half paved road. The back tires, where we were sitting, would be half off the edge of the cliffs leading into a gorge with a thousand foot drop. I would watch them spit up dirt as the bus moved to the side for passing cars and couldn’t help but think I really didn’t want my life ending on this bus ride. I kept telling myself that these bus drivers do it all the time which means they must know what they’re doing and how far to push to the side.
We assumed that like in America, when you have a destination the bus stops there, so when we bought a ticket to Chugchilan, we assumed the bus would stop there for us. Instead they keep going unless you run to the front and tap the driver. By some chance, I happened to look out our bus window and see a sign for Hostel Cloud Forest, which was a hostel I remember reading in a blog.
I quickly shook Alexa awake, we grabbed our stuff and went running up the rubber aisle. Our bags were clung close to our chests so as to not smack anyone with the dangling fabric of strap adjustments. I wasn’t quite sure what to say so it sounded something similar to, “Disculpame, lo siento pero puedo bajarme aquí?”
Luckily he understood and stopped so we only had a small amount of walking to the hostel to do. The hostel was by far the coolest one I‘ve been to. It had a super funky looking outside that had hammocks hung all over with multiple stories of rooms, the beds were covered in bright purple fuzzy blankets and bright pink pillows.
We lucked out and got a room with two other people for the night. The beds came with dinner so at 7:00pm Alexa and I made our way to the dining room that was filled with a bunch of rowdy backpackers drinking beer. We met a really nice couple at dinner and shared stories.
They were married and from the U.K. They had sold their house in the UK and took the money to go on an epic journey across South America, up through central America and up the west coast of North America into Canada. They had already been traveling for 5 months. The guy wasn’t too happy as he explained, “This stupid budget gives me only a beer a day, we should’ve sold the house for more if I knew this would happen!”
Dinner was really good. There was a thick potato soup with other veggies in it, noodles with sauce, white rice, chicken, some green veggies, and then a peach for dessert. It was a wild and fun time as it was like a large family dinner of backpackers and hikers all cheering and discussing their lives together. The later it got, the louder we all got sharing stories of where we came from and what we had seen. The beer was flowing and with full bellies, I don’t think there was a single person in there that didn’t have a smile on their face. At some point the hostel was also kind enough to give us all maps for the next day’s hike to the finish, Quilotoa. Apparently there was a whole thru hike starting in a different town to get there, that a large part of me wishes I had time to do. Though Alexa and I were tight on time so I had to be thankful for just being able to just see it as we planned to catch the morning bus through this town to the town at the top of the ridge of Quilotoa.
The next morning we were the first to wake as many were still conked out from a late night’s sleep. We decided the night before to catch the 6:00am bus to Quilotoa, as the next bus would be in the late afternoon and wouldn’t give us enough time to get back to Quito. The goal was to catch a 12:00pm bus back to Latacunga to make it back to Quito in order to get our stuff and be ready for a pick up from the internship on Monday morning.
At around 5:25am, Alexa and I were just finishing going to the bathroom, when that unmistakable sound of gears grinding and puffs of exhaust came speeding around the corner and passed the hostel, rapidly heading the other direction. The 6:00am bus had passed by early. At that moment we were hoping it was an earlier bus that had just been running late but after waiting another forty-five minutes, we knew we had missed it.
We made the decision to just hike up to Quilotoa as it said it takes about four to six hours to hike. The hike was absolutely stunning and we walked through a couple of Andean villages, where the children would laugh and greet us. At each town we had to keep asking where Quilotoa was and many thought it was funny watching our complete confusion as they pointed at this relatively far off tip in the sky.
I didn’t realize that we would be walking through towns and valleys before we even reached the mountainside of Quilotoa. It definitely took us way more than four to six hours to get to the top. I don’t regret it though, as we were able to see such a different side of Ecuador. We followed along dirt roads, through small Andean farming villages, and along valleys that were patched together, like quilt work with different shades of green. We made kids laugh and smile as they ran beside us, kicking a soccer ball around.
I think the funniest part was when we were finally on the mountainside of Quilotoa, on our way to the crater ridge. Alexa and I were barely making it up the switchback dust road and this little Andean woman walked right past us in her traditional skirt garments and heels, taking zero breaks as she smiled and waved, speeding right by us. Both Alexa and I had asthma so we were taking turns on who needed to stop every few feet to calm down our wheezing. I feel we may have looked quite comical to pass by, considering we were only making it five feet before we bent over, hands propping us up on our knees and our eyes stared at the boring light brown sand of the road.
Getting to the top of the ridge and seeing our first views of the lake inside of the crater was an indescribable feeling. I was so proud of us both for pushing so hard to get there, as against the odds, we had made it. It was unlike anything I had ever seen before. You can stare at pictures all day but it was so much more massive and the pictures just cannot capture that. Across the crater we could see a winding trail from rim to lake, where you can walk down to the water and it was a pleasant surprise considering we thought it was only a viewpoint on top. After the initial relief and happiness wore off, we realized we still had a two hour ridge hike along the crater to get to the main viewpoint and the town next to the rim.
Once again, in hindsight, I’m so happy that we completed that ridge hike, it was amazing and fun but we were both absolutely exhausted. The feeling of awe never left me for the entire rim hike but I was starving as we were surviving only on packed oreos and ritz crackers. We hadn’t prepared for such a grueling hike to see the crater, as originally we were supposed to be on that morning bus.
During the rim hike we ran into two herds of sheep that I thought might be free roaming but suddenly two little Andean children came running out to see us. They tended to the multiple sheep and goat herds that wander around, block the trail, and eat. My stomach and body ached with gratitude, as we finally reached the town on the rim and I got some real food to re-energize it.
When we got to the top, no matter how tired we were, we knew we needed to hike down. We told ourselves we had come this far so why couldn’t we go further? At the bottom, I was shocked to truly see how high we had been and be able to touch the dark blue water. Unfortunately, we knew we were still on a time limit so we didn’t have long and had to get moving. Alexa took a mule ride back up but I was determined to get up there myself (of course to also save money). I was lucky as with the amount of breaks needed, I got to soak in the view for just a little bit longer.
There were some shops and vendors back in the town at the rim, so we asked around to find the bus to Latacunga. From what I understood, we were supposed to stand on a nearby road and wave it down when it was passing by. We waited for hours, waving down every bus that sped past asking for Latacunga. At around 5:00pm we finally caught the correct bus and I got to enjoy hours of watching the bus tires grapple with loose rocks on the side of a cliff.
We hopped onto the final bus back to Quito but ended up getting off at the wrong terminal in Quito. It was late so we just got a taxi back to the historical center of Quito. The problem was that we were so far away from the historical center, that the taxi driver had no clue where he was going and he didn’t have GPS. So I had to try to direct him, using Alexa’s phone, my broken Spanish, and hand signals. Finally we got back to the community hostel to get our stuff, say bye, and I headed back to Hostel Revolution.
I was pretty terrified walking back to my hostel alone in the middle of the night. I walked briskly through the deathly silent streets and looked around to find everyone was off the streets even though this was a city. I quickly jumped and hid behind buildings when I would hear voices and tried to duck and cover my head with my hood to conceal the fact that I was a girl alone. Finally at 11:00pm our hiking adventure had come to an end and I was tucked into my bed sleeping and ready for the jungle.