Baños
Last Saturday we took the buss one hour south to the small city of Baños. It’s set on the hillside of the Tungurahua volcano and was last evacuated in 2008 because of volcanic activity. While there we rented mountain bikes and aimed to do a cycle tour from Baños to Puyo, a village 6.5km away. However, someone in our group – no names mentioned – lost energy 4.5hours after take-off so we aborted the tour. Instead we hitchhiked with an old truck back to Baños, quite an adventure in itself. Nevertheless the scenery on the way was definitely worth the trip. When we came back, tired and frozen, we all thought we we’re worthy of a huge feast so we treated ourselves with a local specialty called Cuy – also known as Guinea pig or Marsvin in Swedish. What can I say… It tasted a bit like chicken but chewier. And to be honest it wasn’t very much meat on it, and not very good either.
From Baños - an excursion
From Baños - an excursion
Me Oscar and Anders enjoying beers and coffee at lodge in the mountains.
The local specialty: Cuy, aka Guinea pig
Quisapincha
Quisapincha is a small town a 20 min buss ride from Ambato. We read in our guidebook, and heard whispers all over town, about its high quality leather manufacturing. So we decided to check it out. It turned out that the whispers were totally right and also the prices were around a ¼ of what you’d pay for the same things in Sweden. We acted like children on Christmas Eve and bought bags and other leather accessories like it was no tomorrow. We even returned a few days later and had 9 laptop cases custom made from a local “leather tailor”. Still waiting for them as of now. However, since none of us really knows anything about leather, only time will tell if the quality really is as high as we think…
