I Adore Ecuador

Dear family and friends,

After my visit to the Galapagos Islands, I joined a small group tour for a transverse of Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia. I met my group in Quito, the capital city. Besides myself, there is a guy from Norway, and seven women, three from Norway, three from England and one Australian. All the others are between nineteen and twenty-five. Our leader, Alex, is a Bolivian guy who grew up in Montréal. As well, we have a tour leader trainee with us. Alex and the trainee, an American guy, are likewise, under twenty-five. I stick out a bit.

I like Alex a lot. He is energetic, enthusiastic, and very knowledgeable about anthropology and archaeology, his father being a professor of archaeology at Laval University in Québec City. The archetypical machismo Latino, Alex is handsome with raven black hair, deep brown eyes, and he has the physique of a professional dancer, which he was before becoming a tour leader. He has all the moves. Charming, engaging and considerate, he did complicate the group dynamics a bit, however, by singling out one of the Norwegian girls for special sleeping arrangements from the very first night.

I really liked Ecuador. After Argentina and Chile where there is almost no evidence of indigenous people and limited colonial architecture, Quito, and the other few cities I visited, were a welcome change. And I must add, after Chile, dining is again an agreeable activity with lots of tasty local and international foods available.

Ecuador is one of the smallest countries in South America, only slightly larger than the U.K., but it has the greatest bio-diversity of any country in the world. It has 25,000 identified floras as opposed to only 17,000 in all North America. One-half of all the birds of South America, some 1,500, are found in Ecuador, and this is more species of birds than are found in North America, Europe or Australia. There are 120 species of hummingbirds alone. This bio-diversity is a result of the great number of habitats the country exhibits. Lying on the equator as it does, habitats range from tropical rainforests to the cold of the high Andes. Without question this immense richness of species was a factor in the development of the Galapagos Islands. It is doubtful those islands could have developed as they did had they been off the coast of California.

Pre-Colombian history of Ecuador is lost in time as the indigenous peoples had no written language. What is known is that the original Shyri people were subjugated by the Inca in the late 15th century, but shortly thereafter, the Inca themselves were vanquished by the Spanish Conquistadors. In 1526 Huayna Capac, the last of the great Inca chiefs, died having consolidated an empire that reached from northern Argentina and Chile, through Bolivia, Peru and Ecuador. When he died, Huayna Capac, unlike all his predecessors, split the empire between two sons, one based in Quito, the other in Cuzco (Peru).

Fatefully, the Spanish had arrived in South America in that same year, 1526. Six years later when Francisco Pizarro arrived, he found a divided empire engaged in civil war. The Spanish, mounted on horses, covered in armour, swinging steel swords and shooting cannons, appeared god-like to the natives and although resistance was intense, the brutal outcome was inevitable. The Spanish hacked the Indians to death in battle, while the Indians responded with their weapons - clubs, spears, slingshots, and arrows. In 1533 the Inca Empire effectively came to an end.

After the conquest, Ecuador was ruled as a province by the Spanish from Lima. For the next two hundred and fifty years, life for the ruling colonialists was comfortable and peaceful; for the Indians and mestizos it was abject misery. Ecuador gained its independence from Spain in 1824 as part of the campaigns of the great South American liberator, Simon Bolivar from Venezuela. The usual turmoil followed independence and during the twentieth century Ecuador had more military regimes than civilian; the latest period of democracy only began in 1979. Today reasonable stability seems to have been attained.

Today some 2 million people live in Quito which sits at an elevation of 2,850m, the second highest capital in the world after La Paz, Bolivia. It is surrounded by majestic mountains behind which even taller snowcapped mountains can be seen. At this elevation on the equator, Quito enjoys a spring like climate year round. At this time of year, close to the spring equinox, I notice the shadow I cast at noon is a mere puddle around my feet as the sun is truly directly overhead. Quito's colonial center has been declared a World Heritage Cultural Center by UNESCO to help preserve one of the richest colonial enclaves in South America. I spent several days wandering the twisting cobble stoned streets of the 'Old Town' and many hours sitting in Plaza de la Independencia, flanked by grand colonial buildings, just watching the locals.

One day our group took a short bus ride north of the city center to La Mitad del Mundo, the Middle of the World. This is the place where in 1736 Charles-Marie de La Candamine took measurements that showed this place was indeed the equator (the measurements themselves gave rise to the metric system). Today a 30m high stone trapezoid monument marks the equator and nearby a museum showcases several demonstrations unique to the equator - two basins, one a few feet north of the equator, the other equi-distant south, illustrate the clockwise vs. counterclockwise direction of water flowing out of them, a third basin right on the equator shows water dropping straight down and out. Another demonstration shows that an egg can be balanced on the tip of a pencil, apparently gravity being in some state of equilibrium that does not exist away from the equator. All very interesting.

On another day I and two others went to the nearby city of Otavalo to take in the Saturday market, one of the most famous markets in South America, with hundreds of bright stalls and thousands of shoppers. The market itself dates from pre-Inca times when natives from the jungle came to trade for products from the highlands. Today the market is a combination local and tourist market, but the goods are undeniably oriented to tourists with the emphasis being on woven goods. Otavaleños were famous for their weavings at the time of their conquest by the Inca; the backstrap loom is known to have been used in this area for 4,000 years. Their ability as weavers was brutally exploited in sweatshop like conditions by the Spanish after the conquest but it did have the effect of instilling a great knowledge of weaving amongst the Otavaleño people. Their products are now highly regarded and are sold around the world making the Otavaleño the wealthiest Indian group in Ecuador if not in all South America. Pride in their success is reflected by traditional dress worn by the locals, not just at the market, but every day. Men with long ponytails wear calf length white pants, reversible blue or gray ponchos and dark felt hats. The women wear black woven skirts, beautifully embroidered and crocheted blouses and shawls, and they sport many strands of glass beaded necklaces, usually gold in colour. The women, ever so tiny, some less than four feet tall, also wear tiny little felt derby hats perched on the very top of their heads.

From Quito we caught a bus to the city of Baños a few hours south. Sitting in an idyllic mountain setting, Baños has been long popular for natives and tourists as a holiday destination. 'Baños' means bath, in this case meaning hot springs. There are several baths about, some hot springs are fed from the active volcano Mount Tungurahua (5,016m) which towers over the city, other baths are simply fed by water melted by the volcano. The volcano was semi-dormant since an eruption in 1918, but in 1998 seismic activity was recorded causing authorities to issue a yellow alert. The next year clouds of ash and steam spewed out and lava could be seen flowing at the top. The alert was raised to orange meaning an eruption was 90% probable within a few months and all inhabitants, some 18,000, were ordered out of the city. After some months of dislocation and no increase in volcanic activity, the locals pressed to be let back in to their homes. Many clashes with the military occurred, some which resulted in deaths, before the people were allowed to return. When they did get back to their homes, people found many had been ransacked by the army. Mount Tungurahua continues to spout steam and ash today, officially at a yellow alert level, but it is also understood that raising the alert level to orange and asking the people to leave would have little effect. 

We had great views of the mountain spewing its clouds of steam and ash, but I couldn't help think I was being a bit like Harry Truman (not Harry Truman the President) on Mount St. Helens when it was heating up before it blew (Harry was subsequently buried under 300 feet of ash). What the hell am I doing here?

Our last stop in Ecuador was the highland city of Cuenca, the third largest in Ecuador with 400,000 people. The terrain surrounding Cuenca is so rugged that it was not until the 1960's that a paved road reached the city. Now filled with automobiles, Cuenca should be a model for all South American cities with its narrow cobble stoned streets, white washed buildings with red-tiled roofs, and spotlessly clean. Cuenca is one of the two centers in Ecuador where Panama hats are made (the other center is Montecristi). Panama hats were never made in Panama; they were always made in Ecuador. The hats are made from palm tree fiber and while both cities make excellent hats, the best is a 'Montecristi Fino', a hat that can take up to six months to make and costs close to $200US in local stores. The very best are made with such fine fibers the hat can be passed through a ring with ease.

With our visit to Cuenca over, the group is now headed for Peru. As I said, I liked Ecuador very much, but I am looking forward to getting back to sea level as I have certainly felt the effects of the high altitude we have been in. The rest of the group seem not to have minded the altitude so much but there has been considerable discussion about the 'low down' treatment some have received at the expense of others more favoured. It’s been exciting so far. Best regards to everyone.

Merv.