We were up at 06:00 hrs. and off to the baths, after which Baños is named. Dawn was just lightening up the cloudy sky. We woke ourselves truly up by jumping between the icy cold pool and the hot brown pool. Jackie was in his element.
We also went out and sat under the waterfall with freezing water pounding on our backs for as long as we could stand it before scampering back to the warm embrace of the hot pool. What a great way to start the day.
Quite a few of the local indigenous Indians were here to start the day in similar style, most of them content to stay in the warm pool. We went on to the Panderia (bakery) for a mountain of warm croissants and hot chocolate.
Back at the Timara Jackie loaded up his bicycle and bid “adios” yet again to Annika, Anja and Hannes. I will meet him again in Cuenca on Wednesday if all goes to plan. I trooped down to the Bus Terminal and bought a ticket for the 10:45 hrs. minibus to Riobamba for 90 Sucres.
Riobamba, full name San Pedro de Riobamba; Quechua: Rispampa is the capital of Chimborazo Province in central Ecuador, and is located in the Chambo River Valley of the Andes. It is 200 km (120 miles) south of Ecuador's capital Quito and located at an elevation of 2,754 m on the Avenue of the Volcanoes.
The city is an important regional transport center and a stop on the Pan-American Highway, which runs through Ecuador. Riobamba is one of the largest cities in the central portion of Ecuador's Sierra region.
Riobamba takes its name from a combination of rio, the Spanish word for "river", and rispampa, the Quechua word for "plain."
The women in the sugar cane stalls around the Bus Station yard were busy hacking up lengths of sugar cane with machetes. On the bus we passed Jackie pedalling furiously uphill at 11:30 hrs. There was little to see apart from green hills and political graffiti. At 12:00 hrs. noon we arrived on the outskirts of the town and I alighted the bus and walked into the centre with my bag on my shoulder, reminding me, by it’s discomfort, to get the handle repaired.
After a lot of frustrating wandering about on vague directions I found the Hotel Metropolitano by the train station at Borja and Lavalle. It was 600 Sucres, relatively expensive, but it was only for one night and I was pissed off with trudging around the streets with a faulty bag on my shoulder.
The room was like a traditional old hotel room with a desk, a chair, a wardrobe, a footstall and a coat stand in matching brown hardwood. There was a wash basin in the corner and when I washed a couple of T-shirts, I was astounded to find hot water coming out of the tap.
I went out for a wander around the town. There were a new style of indigenous Indians here with white bowler-type hats instead of trilby hats. I walked up to the Terminal Terrestre on the outskirts of town at the junction of Avenida D. L. Borja with Eplicachima. Here Micheal Jackson’s “BAD” blared out as I perused the efficient transport offices and bought a ticket to Cuenca for tomorrow morning at 07:30 hrs. for 625 Sucres.
I wanted to buy a couple of postcards and the excessively nice old lady insisted on showing me every card that she had in stock, which was about a thousand of them! She then took about fifteen minutes painstakingly sticking on the stamps, skilfully tailoring the size of the stamps to fit between the writing on Jackie’s postcards. Next each one was slowly but accurately stamped with an “Airmail” rubber stamp.
I popped into the Parque 21 de Abril which was on a hillock offering fine views of the town and the surrounding volcanoes. On April 21 of every year, the so-called "Battle of Riobamba or Tapi" is remembered, when in 1822 on the plain of Tapi, there were clashes between the troops of independence, led by Antonio José de Sucre, against the royalist forces.
It rises on the historic hill called Loma de Quito, for its resemblance to the famous Panecillo, a hill located in the centre of the historic part of the Ecuadorian capital. However, the weather was dull and cloudy and the smell of sewage from the wooden hut on top precluded one from loitering for too long.
I got a couple of photographs of the local indigenous Indians in the main square and then decided to get a haircut. I found an old-style barbers’ shop which looked like one that you would see in a gangster movie set in the 1920’s. There was a huge mirror in which you could watch the Indians outside the shop coming and going with their bundles and babies.
I failed to find a shop that would be able to mend my bag and returned to the hotel for a shower at 17:30 hrs. The water was lovely and warm after it had run for a bit. I went out to eat at 18:30 hrs., walking into the town centre.
Indians were cooking, eating and chatting in groups of two or three along the sidewalk. A young child dressed in scruffy rags walked past me carrying a grubby baby on his back. In contrast to this poverty, some of the shops are very modern and American-looking with brands such as Levi Strauss (the genius who decided “I think I’ll make a pair of trousers out of this old tent”) and Fred Perry carefully copied/counterfeited.
I ate a poor Chop Suey in a Chifa Restaurant and called in to one of the fast-food cafés along the 10 de Agosto for half a chicken to fill me up. On August 10, 1809, the First Cry of The Independence of Ecuador was proclaimed in Quito. The half chicken was massive, and I was forced to admit defeat on the huge mound of rice and salad that came with it.
I was tempted to buy a small transistor radio, but didn’t really have enough Sucres, and decided maybe I would wait until I got to Cuenca. Back in the hotel a woman buzzed impatiently on her staff summoning bell and was completely ignored. Music from the funfair behind the hotel is blaring.
Riobamba is like a bigger version of Ibarra with a few old colonial buildings and a lot of non-descript streets, but lots of picturesque quaint Indian folk. Around the Ferrocarril Station there are a few stalls with braziers selling hot food and many poor people trying to sleep under sacks and blankets.
The Ferrocarril Railway Station in Riobamba was designed by William Alanson Wood, its construction was financed by the Banking Society of Chimborazo and was inaugurated on January 1st, 1925.
The story goes that the layout of the railway began in 1873, during the government of Gabriel García Moreno and culminated in 1960 during the presidency of Velasco Ibarra. There were 13 presidents who worked for this project of vital importance for national development, however it was General Eloy Alfaro who during his government gave the greatest impulse to this work.
The younger, more affluent Spanish descendants wear Western-style fashions and there a few Amusement Arcades to keep the teenagers off the streets.
My alarm clock is definitely “up the Swanee” (broken), with the minute hand hanging down loosely. Probably shaken to bits by recent bus journeys. Hopefully, I will wake up in time tomorrow without having to rely on it.
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