Pasto to Ecuador

I'm in Ibarra, Ecuador. It is a little chilly here given that I am only a handful of kilometers north of the equator, but then according to my altimeter I am 2200 metres above sea level.

I had a pleasant but noisy night in Pasto, after getting assistance from a couple of passers-by to find an hotel. One guy, on seeing me looking a bit lost at a set of lights, walked over to ask if I needed help. What a friendly town. Being high up it was nice and cool and after a stroll around the plaza in the evening it was earplugs in again for some sleep. For some reason the crazy drivers insist on sounding their horns all night... quite what they find to honk at past 3am is beyond me :)

The people of Pasto seemed not only very friendly, but also very short. It is unusual for me to be head and shoulders taller than everyone, I think much of the population is indigenous indian and I guess indians are not tall... I wish I'd bought a Colombian guide book.

The hotel had trouble with their wireless routers so when their tech arrived in the morning I introduced myself and tried to explain there was a DHCP issue and his routers were not issuing addresses. I might as well have been speaking in an elvish dialect. I'm not sure he'd have taken my word for it if I was speaking Spanish ;) But of course as everyone knows with IT, a reboot sorted it and the Internet became available just as I had to get back on the road. But it was nice to play network engineer again for a while.

The best part of Colombia was yet to come, Pasto is located in the Atriz valley about 2,500m up, and the road south to Ipiales and the border with Ecuador was simply breathtaking. The road winds along the side of sheer mountain walls, crosses chasms with waterfalls and rushing rivers, and was one of the most beautiful rides I've ever done. Not an easy statement to make given some of the places I've ridden so far. I found myself wishing I had a helmet mounted video camera for the first time since the Icefields Parkway in Canada. The picture above was taken in the one spot I could stop, and doesn't do the valley justice at all.

After a short detour in Ipiales (ok ok, I was lost), I finally arrived at the border with Ecuador just after 1pm. Being used to the ridiculous nonsense that is a Central American border crossing, Colombia to Ecuador was straightforward, but time consuming as there were long queues for immigration. Customs was excellent though, I got a seat and even free photocopies of the forms leaving Colombia. Waiting for my stamp to get into Ecuador I was surprised when a couple of people approached me and asked how long I had been on the road - they were from London. I told them and explained I had ridden from Alaska, which normally gets at least wide eyes. The guy just said "oh yeah, that is where we came from too". The couple had been on the road for 18 months in their Land Rover. I'd parked the bike behind them and not even noticed the UK plate!

At that point a queue jumper had used the distraction to try to push in, and the London couple said their goodbyes while I (politely) asked the guy to wait his turn. So I didn't catch their names. It took about an hour and a half to complete the formalities and change my Colombian Pesos - back into US Dollars! Sucres are not used in Ecuador, they use the dollar just like Panama.

So it was I rode away from Colombia and into Ecuador, with very mixed feelings. I was sad to be leaving such a beautiful place, with such friendly people. Even the cops were genuinely helpful. But the overriding thought was just that I was glad to survive the roads in one piece. I'd seen families on small capacity motorcycles, four up. I'd seen guys on motorbikes sending text messages, wobbling across the road. I'd seen more enormous craters in the road than I care to remember, and been scared to death looking up to see something hurtling at me in my lane many times. I'm sure my hair is greyer ;)

Getting to Ibarra was easy, the roads are toll roads like Colombia but in much better condition, making it less time consuming to cover distance. Unlike Colombia, bikes are subject to the tolls but when it is 20 cents a time I don't mind so much :) The land was rural farmland, black and white cows and the cool conditions and heavy clouds reminding me of home a lot. That gave way to arid valleys. On one long climb I passed a blue Land Rover with UK plates and tooted the London couple as I went by. I guess they will get to Tierra Del Fuego sometime in the next couple of years :)

Quito tomorrow hopefully, after crossing the equator.

Frase.