Lago Quilotoa

After spending some time in Salcedo with our “old” friends Linda and Chiquis, our new friend Jab, and his donkey Remedios (read the donkey story in our last post), we decided to take a trip to Lago Quilotoa, a lake in a volcanic crater.  We would leave Remedios behind, happily resting her broken hoof and munching on grass all day long, and come get her on the way back.  The five of us piled into the car and wound our way through the Ecuadorian páramo.

We arrived at the lake, found a spot to park Cubby – yes, all five of us had been living cozily together in Cubby since meeting Jab in Cotopaxi – and went to take our first look at the lake.  It was beautiful!

We took some pictures and looked around, but since it was already late, we decided to wait until the next day to hike down into the crater to the lake.  Instead, we had some dinner at one of the small stalls near the lookout point.  There was a nice Quichua woman making and serving the food, with her three sons to help her. 

The family convinced us that we had to try the cuy, or guinea pig, since it was a local specialty.  The woman raised the guinea pigs at her house, so we had to “special-order” the cuy for the next day.  Some of us were a little unsure about eating the furry little pet, and others didn’t want to spend much money, so we decided to order one $12 guinea pig and split it 5 ways.  It wouldn’t be much, but at least it would be a chance to try this supposed “food of the future”.

We ordered the cuy, we headed back to Cubby and wondered what to do for the night.  The town was very small, and it was cold and rainy.  So we bought some beers, and ended up being invited by the family that owned the store to stay and talk with them for a while.  They had a wood furnace in the room – so of course we said yes!  We hung out there for the night.  It seemed like everyone from the town stopped in at some point, and it turned into quite a party.  We met a bunch of guys who invited us to their soccer game in the nearby town of Zumbahua the next day.  And, at one point, the Quichua girls even dressed Linda up in their traditional hat and scarf!

Linda, you fit right in!

The next day, we hiked down into the crater.  It was a steep hike down, but worth it!

Once at the bottom, Ricardo swam in the lake, but only for about a minute because it was too cold!  We rented kayaks and had some fun paddling around the lake.  We had heard legends about a whirlpool in the middle of the lake that sucks people down in, but luckily we made it out alive!

After kayaking, it was time to hike back up – we had to be on time for the cuy, and then to get to Zumbahua for the soccer game.  Steep as it was, we made it back up in under an hour, with time to shower before the cuy dinner! 

We arrived hungry from the day’s activities, so the plates of 1/5 of a cuy plus some boiled potatoes, were, needless to say, a bit disappointing.  I was the only one of the group to have eaten cuy before (10 years ago, in Peru), and I must say that the cuy I had before was much better.  Guinea pigs are small animals anyway, but the one we had in Quilotoa must have been sadly undernourished.  It was small, rubbery, and once divided into 5, provided not even a mouthful of meat for each of us.  Of course we told the señora that we liked it, but I don’t think any of us will be venturing to eat cuy again anytime soon…

We hurried off to the camper, to drive to Zumbahua for the soccer game.  When we got there, we learned that our team (named Familia Unida – yes, really – they go by the initials F.U.) was missing a player, and Chiquis volunteered to play with them.  Despite the cold weather, the huge puddle in the middle of the field, the repeated unfair calls by the referee favoring the opposing team, the fight that erupted in the middle of the game resulting in F.U.’s star player getting a red card, and F.U.’s eventual 3-0 loss, a good time was had by all.  Well, ok, maybe just by us… the F.U. players left looking pretty miserable.  They told us that the referee normally plays for the opposing team, so of course he was biased from the beginning.

the fight

 

the cheerleaders

Good game, FU!

That night we went into the town of Zumbahua, where they were having some sort of a fiesta in a large parking lot in the center of town.  There was a stage set up with live music, and about 50 people, most completely wasted, dancing to the music.  We stayed for a while, danced a little, and talked to some of the locals.  When the party was over, we ended up moving Cubby into the same parking lot, and staying there for the night. 

The next day we drove back to Salcedo, where we found Remedios the donkey obviously feeling much better – she seemed happier and was even running around in the fields.  We knew she needed more time to recuperate before getting back to walking many miles a day again with Jab.  We agreed to transport Remedios again, in the camper, to a town called Baños, which was everyone’s next destination anyway.  Baños turned out to be a great destination for all of us – we’ll tell all about it in the next post!