After two days of simple and primitive lives in Pimpilala, we almost fainted in front of the extravagant la Casa de Suizo. La Casa de Suizo was built upon a small island in the middle of Napo river. The only means of transportation to and from the outside world are motorized canoes. During summer, the peak season, this hotel would be packed with “French people wearing strange shoes”, Carlos told us. It must have been the low-season, 911 didn’t help either. The five of us plus another well-dressed lovely single female guest were the only clients in this "Castle". During our two-days stay, we visited an animal shelter and a plantation. We learned where chocolate and coffee came from.
Then we started going south. From the tourists infested hot spring town Baños to Cuenca was a seven hour bus ride. Volcano Tungurahua, still bellowing ashes from its 1999 eruption, followed us the entire bus ride from Baños to Riobamba. After switching bus in Riobamba, we entered the southern end of the famous “Avenue of Volcanoes”. Every peak carried its own clouds, and every cloud castle hid a volcano crater inside. South of “Avenue of Volcanos”, we entered the agriculture land of Southern Ecuador. All the mountain faces were covered with the well organized quilt-like farm land, no matter how step it was. Often among the various shade of green patches, we would spot an indigenous peasant in his/her rainbow colored clothing. They were either resting, herding, or planting. Dark red, indigo blue, aqua green, rich yellow, etc. etc. when it came to color, they were daring and passionate. Once you walked up close, they were the most quiet and humble people. Their coloring reminded me of Tibet. Is it because both lived on the highland? Do they see brighter colors, living closer to the sun?
According to any travel book, Cuenca is said to be the most beautiful colonial city of Ecuador. It was surrounded by green mountains and splendid waterfalls. In Spanish, Cuenca means “the bowl of the river valley”.
In 14th century, before the Inca started expanding their empire northward, Ecuador was divided into two kingdoms. The one in the north was called Quitu, it meant “Middle Earth”. Today’s Quito was evolved from it. The southern kingdom was called Canari.
The fertile volcanic farm land in-between the Avenue of Volcanos attracted the Inca. As Inca Empire started their northward expansion, the hardy Canari warriors fought heroically. They stopped the Inca army from advancing for as long as ten years. At the time Canari capital was called “Guapondeleg”, it meant “Land of Paradise”. When the Inca finally defeated Canari after the last bloody battle, they renamed this city to “Tomebamba”, which meant “the Plane of the Knife”. One could simply imagine which kind of a battle it had been.
Whenever Inca Army conquered a new country, it would force migrate the defeated native people to the peaceful part of Inca Empire, and move some of its own tribal people to occupy the new land. Thus, Quichuan people left their home by the Inca’s birth-place, the Lake Titicaca, and went north with their advanced irrigation skills, sweet potato and coco. Together, obedient llamas also moved north.
The Inca that conquered Ecuador was Tupac-Yupanqui. He married a Canari’s princess, their son, Huanya-Capac, later divided up the Inca Empire among his own two sons. The northern portion was given to Huanya-Capac’s favorite son, Atahualpa, whose mom was from Quitu tribe; the southern portion was given to Huanya-Capac’s older son, Huascar, who grew up in Cusco with his Peruvian mother.
After Huanya-Capac’s death, came the famous 6-year civil war between Atahualpa and Huascar; and the conquest of the Inca by Francisco Pizarro and his 175 Spaniards. During his nine months captivation by the Spaniards, Atahualpa learned Spanish, writing (Quichua was a spoken language but without any written record), and playing chess. Pizarro even convinced Atahualpa to be converted to a Christian. After Pizarro received a roomful of gold as ransom for the Inca, he personally executed Atahualpa.
The Spaniards built “the City of River Valley” (Cuenca) on top of “the Plain of the Knife” (Tomebamba).
We arrived in Cuenca at night. The city was quiet. We could hear echoes of our own foot steps upon the cobble stoned street. Our shadows were dragged onto the sculptured walls of the old church in the old town. The city was divided into old and new by Tomebamba river. Our hotel was in the new town, which was filled with beautiful newly constructed villas.
The Cuenca under daylight was a noisy and polluted modern city. After breakfast in the central square, we couldn’t wait to get out.
Carlos told us that Cuenca has always been a very conservative city. At night people rarely went out. Nightlife was non-existent. When we asked him about all the modern villas in the new town, he said they were all built with money sent in from Europe or North America. In fact, the city’s permanent residents were largely made up of grandparents and their grandchildren. The parents were all working in developed countries. Their jobs were usually the dirtiest and lowest paid ones. They saved their pennies and sent them home to build these lovely villas for their children and parents.
The next day, we went to Cajas National Park outside of Cuenca, elevation 3300 meters. It was a cold and lonely place, many glacier lakes intertwined. The entire place had a hunted beauty. Due to its remote nature, we had to rent a taxi for the round trip. We negotiated for a $6/hour rate while the taxi was waiting for us in the park. Unfortunately our taxi was defeated by the elevation before even reaching the park. We had to get off and walked the last 2 km. The driver said he would go back into town, fix his car and came back for us in 2 hours. We picked an easy circular hiking trail, because all of us except Sarah were experiencing some degree of high attitude sickness. Every uphill step we took was laborious. I had to stop constantly to catch my breath.
We had no written proof from the driver, and there was no telephone at the ranger station, either. We were a little worried as we reached the end of our hike and the park entrance was in sight. A pickup truck suddenly appeared on the road, it stopped in front of us, and the driver offered to give us a ride back to town. We were very tempted. However, we voted not to take this offer and to continue back to the park, in case our taxi was waiting. As we watched the pickup truck sped away, we were wondering whether we had made a very stupid decision.
As we reached the gate, we saw a yellow taxi from far away. My heart leaped into joy!
After fiver hundred years, after being betrayed over and over again, the descendents of the Inca Empire still kept their words.
