After arriving back to Guayaquil we repacked Rosi and left the next morning.
We wanted to head towards the Chimborazo the highest volcano in Ecuador and actually the highest point of the earth if you measure from the center. Because of the slightly elliptical shape of the earth, the Chimborazo with its 6263m is about 200m further away from the center of the earth than the Mount Everest. We were drawn to it also for another reason. Some time ago we both had read the book „The Invention Of Nature: the adventures of Alexander von Humboldt, the lost hero of science“ from Andrea Wulf about the life of Alexander von Humboldt and his trip through South America inspired us. On this trip one of his big goals was to climb the Chimborazo, which he almost succeeded in the year 1802. He just made it to about 5600m. For us it was easier. We drove up to 3800m where we slept next to a beautiful mountain cabin and could already get a glimpse of the volcano. The next morning we wanted to drive to about 4600m and hike up to over 5000m, but sadly the weather did not allow us. It was pouring rain and the visibility was really bad. So we just passed by the entrance of the Chimborazo National park and made our way further north.
The highways in Ecuador are exceptionally good, in many cases way better than the Autobahn in Germany. Therefore we could travel way faster than in most other countries. After a few hours we passed the huge city Quito with wild highways up and down around it, crossed the equatorial line and were back on the north half of the globe. We did that on the way to Mindo a little town in the cloud forrest. The road was winding through a huge valley but in perfect conditions. We made a little stop at the Los Armadillos cafe for a coffee and because we read that you could see a lot of humming birds there…. and that was a slight understatement. The place was literally humming from the humming birds. We counted way over 15 different species of humming birds, from tiny green ones to huge black ones. The place was amazing! We had a good coffee and a fresh made sweet empanada filled with pineapple jam while the humming birds were flying all around us.
From there it was another 30 min to Mindo and we arrived right before dark on the parking lot of a weird Hostel.
After sorting out, that we could stay over night we had a little walk in the city and booked a bird watching tour for the next morning. Bird watching made Mindo famous. Now you can do all sorts of adventures like tubing and zip lining there, but we decided to stick to the real reason why this little village got famous. For dinner we stopped at a local barbecue place and fell to bed with a full stomach and enough meat leftovers for the next two days.
The next morning we were picked up at 6AM in the morning by Sandy and her driver (I guess he was barely 14 years old). We drove to a little lodge in the forrest and they presented us a breakfast that was better than in most Hotels, while we were watching birds. And what than happened was intense: The sun shortly after rose and Sandy found new bird after new bird within seconds. She was naming all of them and could even imitate their sounds. They were flying one after the other to the before placed bananas in front of our hideout. There were at least 6 different kind of colourful finches, two different kind of toucans and many other bigger ones that she spotted in a way that I would have never ever been able to see. At the same time there were 10-20 humming birds around us. Linda and me were totally amazed and did not even know where to look. At times it was overwhelming. While Sandy was explaining which birds was which, she thought her driver how to spot birds, discussed with the lodge owner about politics and ate breakfast and drank coffee …ALL at the same time. You could see that she was in her element and feel that this was her passion. After watching a while we went back to the car and got dropped off with Sandy in the middle of a narrow road in the cloud forrest. The next thing that happened, I have never seen before. We just walked along the road. Sandy heard a bird, named it and than made the sound of the bird, either with a speaker she had with her or just with the mouth and EVERY TIME the bird showed up. I cannot even name the birds anymore. Most of them were really colourful. If you a really into it HERE is a list of all the birds we saw.
We were back at the Hostel at 10 AM and totally happy about the experience we had. From there we drove back in the direction of Quito and up North towards the boarder to Colombia. On the way we crossed the equator twice. The second time we stopped at a little museum that built a solar watch ON the Equator. It was pretty cool, since it explained the way solar watches work and also how they work differently on different spots on the globe. Pretty cool experience. Of course Alexander von Humboldt was mentioned in there as well.
From there we drove all the way to the Finca Sommerwind, two hours south of the border to Colombia. The german Hans created a nice camp ground with a german beergarden and some german beers and food. It felt good to relax there for a few days and connect to other travellers. We had some Flensburger, Currywurst and Bienenstich paired with the feeling of being on a real european camp ground.
After a few days we passed the boarder to Colombia and tried to cover as many kilometres as possible, since the boarder region was supposed to be dangerous. After a few nights in really nice, but always gated sleeping spots, we made it to Salento. Salento is know for the coffee in the region around it as well as for the Cocoa valley which displays the national tree of Colombia, the wax palm. The palm can grow up to 60m of height and (unlike its normal habitat in the jungle) in the Cocoa valley a lot of them are standing free. The view is really beautiful and the palms are indeed very impressive. The whole cocoa valley is really touristic and somehow a big travel destination for all the colombians, but we could sleep at the main parking spot just under the palms and when all the tourists were gone, the place had a very different magical feeling. It does not happen too often, but here we could really enjoy the fact of sleeping in a van with an incredible sunset view from the bed.
The next morning we drove through Salentos beautiful little village to the ecological coffee farm El Recuerdo, where we made a short but really cute and informative tour through the farm. After the degustation and a fresh caffeine kick we continued our way up north. Close to the city of Manizales we choose another beautiful spot. The host was incredibly friendly and we got a nice welcome drink that matched the incredible view. But the last two kilometres were again extremely challenging for Rosi and we collected a few new scratches on both sides of the too narrow path. Nevertheless we really had a great nights sleep there and the next day we reached the city of Medellin where we met up with Naomi, a colleague and friend of Linda.
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