Laguna Quilatoa is by far the most beautiful thing i have seen this trip. This part of Ecuador is ripe with active volcanoes, and it was one of those volcanoes that somehow created this lagoon.
After a short ride from Zumbahua we arrived at the top of the crater. At this point, the earth, with the exception of local farms, was made entirely of sand. Walking to the edge of the crater, we could see the turquoise lagoon hundreds of feet below us. It is one of the most turquoise body of water i have ever seen, and practically every inch of the backdrop was either blond sand or blue sky, with the exception of a few green and yellow shrubs.
A two hour decent through hardened stone and loose sand took us to the bottom of the lagoon, where we could see that the water was crystal clear. There was a beautiful family of indigenous people living at the bottom of the crater that watched us from their boat while we sat on the flat sand.
The air was decidedly thin due to the altitude, and I found myself out of breath within the first 10 seconds of the ascent. With a lot of breaks between shorter and shorter intervals, I think I made it up about 30% of the way before I really thought I was going to need an emergency helicopter lift out of there. I couldn't´t stop my legs from feeling like they were going to give out under me, and I felt like I was going to be sick.
Like magic, an entrepreneurial indigenous man appeared in front of my eyes with a beautiful auburn donkey. His smile said ¨you need a ride up on the donkey: your body hasn´t acclimatized to the altitude yet¨, but his words said ¨$5¨. It was the only Spanish he spoke. After some hand-signal negotiation, he agreed to take me to the top for a slightly better price, but in all honesty, I would have paid $100 for that donkey ride. On the ride up the man whispered sweet nothings of encouragement to the donkey (okay, well actually, he was calling the donkey a bitch, but his voice was sweet-bitch was the only other word of Spanish that he knew). At any rate, the donkey was quite out of breath, and I felt badly for the poor thing-it seemed like I should have given the donkey some yummy donkey treats instead of giving his owner American dollars. At any rate, the value of the money was made clear to me by an indigenous woman who was in the same line of work as the man who allowed me to ride his donkey. She was so old and frail that she couldn't walk down the steep crater without using her cane for support, but she was willing to go through the pain and suffering of the walk with her small horse, just in hopes of finding other non-acclimatized tourists.
After a big meal we took a bus to the town called Chugchirun. The bus was full of indigenous people in their traditional garb, black skirts and dark hats, with brightly colored ponchos. There was a variety of luggage on the bus with us, non descript cardboard boxes, packages of fresh fruit and veggies, and canvas bags with live chickens squabbling inside.
Chugchirun is even smaller than Zumbahua, there is one single dirt road with a few shanty bodegas and not a single restaurant to be found. Problematically, very few of the towns residents have retained their traditional culture: due to the amount of tourists that the lake sees, the traditional way of dress has been replaced by jeans and t-shirts.
That night a few of the little girls from the town came and did a few dances for us, dressed in their traditional attire. White shirts with beautiful bright embroidered flowers, matching embroidered belts and brightly colored scarves on their heads. Of course at the end they passed around a collection plate, and didn't wait to leave the vicinity before they counted their earnings.
Since we were in the middle of nowhere, we only had two options for leaving the next day. One option was a 4am bus. The other option was to ride with a milk truck part of the way, and take a bus for the second half of the journey. Of course, I chose the milk truck.
This was an extraordinary milk truck, and riding with it was one of the best experiences of the trip so far. First, let me say that the driver of the truck had two businesses going simultaneously, he was both buying and selling milk. The milk truck was a beat up old white pick up truck, and in the bed of the truck there was his 8 year old son (yes, it was a school day), two gigantic blue buckets, and local who wanted out of Chugchirun. He was older, and barely spoke any Spanish. For the hour and a half ride there was standing room only.
For the whole ride we passed family farm after family farm. The farms were planted on the sides of the mountainous land, the hills were so steep that it looked like the farms were sticking straight up into the air. Each farm had a few cows, sheep, a donkey or two, and of course, many doggies.
The buying and selling of milk was fairly straightforward. Women or small children would come running out to meet our truck carrying either a plastic or metal bucket. The milk sellers handed their full buckets up to the little boy, who poured the fresh milk into one of the big giant blue barrels. When we sold milk to people, it came right back out of the same barrel. They told him how much they wanted, and he filled up their buckets for them. Fresh milk. No sanitation. Yum
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