On the Road Again...

Our flight from Quito was not until 11:55 pm. We were hundreds of miles away in Canelos. After breakfast at 8 am, we said goodbye to Dagmar and Tiago and walked into the village with Christof. There had been an intense lightning and rain storm during the night, but it was still muggy out. We were sweating by the time we got to the bus. We stowed our luggage and hopped on for the short, one hour drive to Puyo. Upon our arrival we found a taxi, gave the driver the note that Christof wrote in Spanish, and he took us to the crossroads where we could catch a bus to Tena. We needed to do this because not all of the buses go to the station in town. There was already a fairly large group of people waiting, including an older gentleman from the village of Canelos. We waited and waited and waited. Meanwhile three buses went in the other direction towards Puyo. One group of people gave up and crammed themselves into a compact sized taxi. We contemplated our options and decided to wait a little longer. At one point, the man from Canelos pulled a large plastic bottle out of his bag. He drank from it, passed it to his two friends and they drank too. He motioned to Craig and Craig shook his head and pointed to the two water bottles on the outside of his camera bag. The man smiled and put the bottle away. A few minutes later, he smiled again and laughed. It occurred to him that Craig was declining the  "water" because we had our own. It then occurred to us, that he wasn't offering us water at all. Unfortunately (or fortunately) we missed our opportunity to try authentic "chica."

Finally, a bus approached. A man jumped off the bus yelling, "Coca, Coca, Coca. Tena, Tena, Tena." The crowd rushed the curb and as soon as the bus stopped, everyone was trying to get on. This included four women who were selling food and drinks from their bus stop stand. We had backpacks that needed to be stowed so we took care of that, then tried to cram our way into the doorway. We were too late. Apparently, all the empty seats were taken, and no standees were allowed. People reluctantly disembarked. We retrieved our luggage and returned dejectedly to the sidewalk. If this was the process, how were we ever going to get back to Quito?

About ten minutes later, another bus appeared. We quickly sprang into action. The man jumped off the bus yelling, "Tena, Tena, Tena." Craig raced to the back to stow our backpacks while Lynda pushed her way onto the bus. As long as we could get seats, we would be on our way. It worked! We sat back and breathed a sigh of relief. Two hours later, we arrived in Tena. It was even hotter there. Then we needed to find a bus to Quito. The similarity between bus stations in Ecuador and bus stations in Turkey is uncanny. They are a madhouse. It was 1:45 pm. We were directed to a kiosk and got tickets for the 2:30 bus to Quito. Our original plan was to go to the hot springs in Papallacta, but we soon realized we were not going to have enough time so we went as far as Pifo, just outside of Quito. From there we had a short taxi ride to the airport. We finally arrived at 7pm exhausted, dirty, hungry and triumphant. We made it! Our first order of business was "banos" then food. We found a large booth at TGI Fridays, dumped our gear and treated ourselves to a grand meal. We made up for the lack of food during the day and the upcoming lack of food on our flight to Houston.

We were able to sleep for most of the flight from Quito to Houston. After clearing US Customs and Immigration, eating breakfast and buying duty free, we were ready to board our last flight to Vancouver. Home in time to do some laundry and get ready for work on Monday. The only question that remains unanswered is "Where to next?"

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