After swapping buses twice and successfully crosssing the Ecuadorian border, it was chicken bus sleeping time and thank god for Lisa's sleeping bag to protect me from not freezing from the ice-cold air con!
We woke up at 6.30am in Quito only to realise that my iPod had gone AWOL, shit! I searched down the back of my seat to find only my headphones, so it seemed as if my iPod had detached itself from them during the winding bus journey and flew across the floor giving someone on the bus a lovely present...brilliant!!! Lisa was shocked at my calmness but after all her trouble having her passport, iPod and bankcard stolen a month earlier, this was only a mere material loss.
Then we realised that we had no dollars (money used in Ecuador), oops. So we shared an over-priced taxi to the hostel with 3 swedes we had befriended on the bus all who had shockingly perfect English! When we were told that we couldn't get into our room until 12pm, we napped in the lounge, had some brekky, tried to keep ourselves awake in a coffee shop and found an internet cafe before checking-in for another 2 hour nap. Having a bed was heavenly!
We didnt want to waste one fo our 2 days in Quito so we took a taxi (despite heavy rainfall) to the Old Town to have a look around. And my god was it dead, everything was shut, even the cathedral. So we had a sandwich and the best jugo (juice) ever, Naranjilla, in a small cafe under the cathedral. But after two creepy men following and even police officers asking if we were alone, we decided to head back to the hostel.
We got to chat to the lads in the next room to us, 3 English and 1 Canadian (who was still high form crazy jungle juice) and they certainly didnt hadnt been creeped on, oh the joys of being a female!
Later on, we decided to go out for dinner to a place we had spotted earlier that day, named an Absolut Vodka restaurant, we were curious to try it out. We saw cuy (guinea pig) turnovers on the menu, a typical meat eaten in Peru especially, and after months of resistance not to eat an English home pet, we got 2 to share accompanied by mushroom curry which ended up as a literal plate of mushrooms covered in a drizzling of yogurt and curry powder, no wonder it was named "Most Healthy" on the menu.
In the restaurant, once again, we hit a drinking barrier, an unknown drinking law, no alcohol after 3pm on Sundays apparently to stop Ecuadorians drinking all weekend long. But just like Peru's 'no drinking on election weekend' law, it was easily broken for us gringos, beer in a cappucino cup for disguise...ok then.
After a long day we called an early night at 10.
For our second and final day in Quito we ventured to the equator. Tired after an hour and half bus journey, we finally arrived there. I didn't really know what to expect, just a line on the ground I guess, but it was much more than that, with restaurants, souvenir shops, a huge monument and even a bullring. Through the entire area there was a yellow-painted line indicating the equator.
Then we jumped a bus back to the centre of Quito where we got a taxi to the Teleferico, the cable cars which permit amaxing views of the whole of Quito. Despite her fears of heights, Lisa still joined me. When we arrived we thought we were at the wrong place, all we come across was a pretty dead theme park playing 60s creepy theme park music. Thankfully, we then found the cable cars and jumped on. After pausing at the top for some photos, we descended back to Quito.
Back to the hostel later on, it was nearly free rum and coke time. Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday the hostel gives out a huge bucket of FREE rum and coke to all and fill it back up for only $1 each, not bad hey?! Also its a really good way to get everyone soacialising in the hostel. Afetr the rum and coke had dried up for the third time, Lisa, I and the lads from the next room decided to go out.
The night then was filled with spinning around the pole positioned in the middle of the dancefloor, refusing cocaine numerous times, getting salsa-ed by numerous people, getting on th bar for body shots, finding Lisa asleep in the corner of the club and listening to the most tragic story ever in the toilets.
A lady about late 30s old me how her English husband had been killed whilst being mugged in Quito 9 months earlier and nothing was being done about it, so so tragic! :(
NB: body shot : when a girl lies on the bar and others take shots from their belly button.
After a razy and actually emotionally-ending night, we were up early to catch our flight to Colombia, hangover.com! But at least we got to the airport on time...
No comments:
Post a Comment