quito - peru, Vilcabamba

We caught a bus to Loja, a pleasurable ride of only 5 hours, but didn´t see anything of it as we imediately boarded another bus to Vilcabamba. Here we met Krishna (not the god) a Trinidadian who´s lived in London for quite a while and Juliet, who is swiss, and lives there now. They were headed for an eco lodge in Vilcabamba to volunteer for a bit, we were going to much more luxurious bungalow´s to chill out before the slumming it, that awaited us for the forseable future.
Vilcabamba is a small, pretty town set in stunning surroundings, mountains, hills, greenery in parts almost tropical.Our hostal was 2k up a hill, overlooking the town with spectacular views. Taxi´s were pick ups, so we chucked our backpacks and ourselves into the back and zoomed up the hill. Peiter greeted us, a German who runs the place with his brother and volunteers who work for keep. They have 3 hounds that patrol everywhere, a mum,dad and puppy who make it feel very homely. It´s beautifully laid out, with a restaurant, bar with pool table, pool and a mixture of rooms and bungalow´s on stilts with incredible views from their decks, all with hammocks to laze on. These cost about 16 quid a night, well over our normal budget for SA, but what you got for the money (breakfast , friut, yogurt, crepes, juice, coffee, included) made it well worth it. Ñow we´re on 5-8 quid a night.
The first day, we took a walk into the hills nearest to us, an undemanding 3 hour walk ending in town. Not that far into it, we came across a small shack selling drinks and snacks, and just outside were to indigina men getting pissed on beer. They were very friendly and we all shook hands and spoke in broken spanish. They managed to teach us quecha (indian language) for hello and wanted us to go with them and listen to one of them play music. We were tempted for the experience with indigina, but with them being a little pissed, we decided to thank them and explain that we had just started on a walk. Lot´s of hand shaking again and we left, feeling quite priviledged to have had such direct contact and communication with some indiginous people. The next incident was strange, suddenly around a corner, heading for us, came two donkeys/mule´s tethered together, saddled but riderless, at break neck speed with a dog sprinting at their heels barking and snapping. The front mule kept on bucking and kicking out at the poor mule at his tail while running. We stood completly still, fearing any movement might leathally put us in their path, they all sailed past and wound down the hill in this fashion, all in our view. They continued for a kilometre or so, until the lead mule managed to veer off the track and into a field. This pissed the dog off even more, so he tried to heard them back out of the field until he got booted by the lead mule and ran off squeeling in pain, there after keeping a healthy distance away. Now the mule´s didn´t know what they were doing, the rear one was dragged all over this field, through rough bush, up and down and a across, until finally some children and then a man appeared to try and retrieve them from their own lunacy. Absorbed as we were, we didn´t wait for the final outcome, we were hungry. As well as the drama´s, the scenery was magnificent and walking through the outskirts of town was fascinating, the small crops, homes with their animals, children watching us with suspicion, adults not so interested and more accustomed to gringos.
The next day we planned to climb mount Mandango, when we got up we thought we´d postpone it to another day, good decision. As we walked to the restaurant, down the path came Neil and Ashley, dirty clothes, no boots, walking in their socks, the soles of their feet obviously painful, heads low. They had got up at 4am and climbed Mandango to see the sun come up, at the top they´d walked along the ridge for about an hour hoping to come down on another path. Suddenly, from nowhere, first one and then four balaclavered men with guns ran towards them. They got them to strip down to their pants, took money, cards and a passport as well as their boots. One was whacked on the head with a gun because he was slow removing his boots, they then were told to run. It took them 2 1/2 hours to get back down in their socks.They were obviously shaken, but took it pretty well, the next day they were on a horse ride into the mountains along with us. The two policemen in town couldn´t really do much other than file a report for insurance. Ashley had to go back to Quito to get a tempory passport that would give him 5 days to get to Lima in Peru, where he could get a 7 month tempory passport.
Another day, we visited the nature reserve and eco-lodge that krishna and juliet were staying at. It is run by two Argentinian biologists and their family, who rely on volunteers to help them manage the site. They are learning about botony and have linked with university of Loja, who will examine and identify species of plant that they find, they have identified over 500 species up to now. They have crafted numerous trails around the reserve and have meticulously attached little signs to interesting plants identifying them, hundreds in total. Amongst so many, we saw the san pedro cactus, which contains a powerful hallucinagenic that attracts soap-dodgers to the area in numbers. There were lemon, tangerine and avocado trees and bamboo and coffee plants. They just pick a few coffee husks a day, dry them for a couple of days in the sun, extract the beans and then roast them, grind them and drink their own coffee. We had some with K&J and it was beautiful coffee, so bought some to carry with us.
We came back again to have lunch with K&J and had a great afternoon chatting and getting slowly drunk on chilian wine. We carried on into the evening and went to a bar in the town and met a woman who was convinced she had had a relationship with sinaid o´conner, but looked spookely like her, I think "she had issues". Things continued to deteriate as we met a Nigerian woman who claimed to be the wife of a man in a famous family in the pharmacutical industry. I won´t say the name becuase later we witnessed him hitting her in the face, we attempted to protect her and managed to keep her away while the man was evicted. She said she wouldn´t go back, but it was obvious that she would, as is so often the case, with all the money she might have now, she was still a slave.
We recovered the next day, which was very wet, unusual for this area at this time of year. In the evening we left to catch the night bus to Peru. We crossed the boarder at about 3am and had to get off the bus and spend ages waiting for the immigration to stamp the passports, however, this is mean´t to be the easiest boarder to cross. No bribes needed at least, so back on the bus and into Peru we go.