Chugchilan to Baños
Trip Start
Mar 02, 2005
1
6
28
Trip End
May 07, 2005
Baños,
Ecuador
Monday, March 7, 2005
Chugchilan is located on the far side of a big loop that begins at the city of Latacunga which is on the Panamerican Highway. From Latacunga one can get to Chugchilan by either taking the northern route or the southern route of this loop - they both meet up in Chugchilan after a four hour drive. There are two daily buses leaving from Latacunga along this loop, one leaves at 11:30am and takes the northern route, another leaves at noon and takes the southern route. However, to return to Latacunga, the daily bus leaves from Chugchilan at 3am! This was explained to me as follows: the farmers in Chugchilan can take the 3am bus to Latacunga, arrive at 7am to do their daily business and then return to Chugchilan on the 11:30am bus which will get them back to their farm by 3:30 with enough time to tend the sheep or llamas before dark.
However, I didnīt really feel like waking up to catch a 3am bus. So instead, I hired a truck along with three other travellers to take us on the 1.5 hour ride to the town of Zumbahua. We had to stand in the back of the four wheel drive truck, holding on to the side so as not to bounce around too much when we hit a bump (there were no shortages of bumps on this dirt road that was in terrible condition because it had rained a lot the night before). Multiple times I actually went up in the air after a particularly large bump. From Zumbahua we caught a regular bus for the 1 and a half hour ride to Ambato, and then from Ambato it was another hour downhill to Baņos.
