Adiós Loja - Volver a Cuenca

On Friday night, we went the Loja Symphony Orchestra performance of works by Debussy, Beethoven, and Saint-Saëns. It was free entry and eventually it was packed. The conductor was a young woman from Europe who has won various awards as a conductor and had a list of accomplishments from around the world, as long as my arm.

Returning to the same theater on Saturday, there was a Women’s Dance Festival. Interestingly, the first performance was a 50-50 mix of men and women, all very youthful. Other presentations were

majority women, but others included men as well. After two hours, we skipped out. They charged $3 entry for this.

We were looking forward to this Loja stay. The description of our accommodation claimed it was a studio apartment in one area, but a one bedroom in another section. It is indeed one large room with a bed in the center of it. One of the best parts of our time here so far is having breakfast together each morning, sitting at the table. Here, the

table and chairs were not so giving.

The cooking area only has a gas stovetop, but no oven. For long-term stays, this really limits cooking options. There is no coffee maker, but a cloth sleeve used for making coffee; this is inefficient and not hygienic for multiple guests.

Neither the kitchen nor the bathroom has hot water taps.  The shower has the electric heating for water, but though brand new was not effective no matter how much playing with water pressure we tried.

Seeing the dog in the picture on AirBnB, we thought this was an added bonus. We love dogs and was

looking forward to having some doggie time. What we did not find out until our arrival was that there are three dogs. They are loose very early in the morning, barking continually until they are taken in at night or someone is paying attention to them. This made sleeping in later than 7am difficult.

James said the SuperMaxi supermarket was 10 minutes away, but we did a healthy pace walk there and it took us 35 minutes. We mostly did taxis to and from town, which cost $1.75 to $2 each way. Not a lot of money, but if you are coming and going during a day, it is a nuisance. I would rather have stayed closer to the downtown for easier access. We had the directions printed out for taxi

drivers as James said they would all know where the area and streets are located. Numerous times, we had to direct drivers who were totally clueless.

Sonia, the owner of the apartment we stayed in, claimed she could not get us a taxi by calling. We did succeed in getting one on our own. The driver had no idea where the shuttle place was, so Ron had to direct him. When he did not pay attention, we ran into major traffic, causing panic, thinking we would miss our shuttle.

The shuttle driver looked to be about 15 years old. He was so thin; his pants were hanging to his knees. His waist could not have been more than 24 inches. This is the person we risked with our lives

in order to return to Cuenca. Surprisingly, he was a good and safe driver. Being the drive was 4 hours, we stopped for lunch, which was a bladder blessing.

Prior to leaving Loja, we received this e-mail from our Cuenca accommodation.

“Dear Guest

We have your reservation.  We are waiting for you 8th 

Please let me know the aprox time of *Arrival,  by email or by phone. Dunia's personal number is 098886761

We offer a clean and orderly room when the new guest arrives to our hotel. 

For environmental reasons, we do not change sheets daily, 

We offer additional service room cleaning, if you need, please ask in reception

We have shared kitchen for guests

The breakfast is selfservice service

*To have these economic prices, we have a minimum Staff, for this reason we ask you the arrival hour, to wait for you.”

When we arrived, we immediately took a taxi to the Hostal a Casa Naranja. We arrived at 3:55pm. I had e-mailed her stating we would be there by 4pm. We rang the bell and stood outside the door for 45 minutes. No one answered. Ron had to go to a phone store to call the number given, but it went right to a message. After 45 minutes, we were tired of standing on the street with our luggage and found another hotel.

As it turned out, it was a redeeming feature. I found Hostal Colonial around the corner that was less expensive and included a simple breakfast. When I first went in to ask rates, I was told $50. This was $12 more than the hostel, but this place was open. When Ron arrived and the clerk looked the two of us, he asked “matrimonia”? We replied, why not? The price changed from $50 to $32. The place was clean, the room comfortable, and the staff was especially pleasing. As soon as we checked in, I Skyped Hotels.com to tell them what happened. They called the hostel and reported that the one staff member had an emergency, so had to leave before we arrived. I had them confirm, there would be no charges. Later I received this e-mail from the hostel.

“Dear dr Rayan James 

Unfortunately, we have no Staf all the time in casa naranja  for that reason we sent an email where we Ask  your arrival time. We will not charge you any fees. However you got an email saying that it has not been submitted to the hostel, this is just paperwork. I insist we do not charge any kind of fee.”

Frazzled, by 5:30 we were to meet Howard and Mike at their place. After a few false starts, guests who planned to visit them actually did arrive. They had other friends on two different occasions that planned on visiting and at the last minute cancelled out. It was fun to meet Richard and Michael. After a glass of wine and chatting, we moved on to Don Colon’s Restaurant. We had a delightful dinner, great company, a number of laughs and for Ron and the warm wonderful feeling of sharing time with Mike and Howard once again.

To work off dinner in a minimalistic way, we walked around the park. This was a prelude for having ice cream at the local shop. The guys walked us back to our hotel and we had long goodbye hugs.

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Hola Loja - Or We Came Here for What Reason?

Karen, our neighbor on the first floor had offered to drive us to the shuttle, so we did not have to worry about getting a taxi. Being early by almost an hour, we sat in the office reading our books.

“Ryan, they are boarding” Ron said to me. I think he momentarily forgot we are not flying. The very new sturdy looking van could accommodate seven passengers comfortably. There were two young women sharing the back row with me, but only one young woman used the middle seat in the center row. Ron chose to sit up front next to the driver. 

We take off and I am trying to read. The roads are fine, but it still feels like we have hit turbulence. The captain never warned us to fasten our seatbelts, but all of us did so out of habit. Eventually, we reached the highway where it was smooth flying. Oh right, we are in a van, but honestly, we were flying.

The route from Cuenca to Loja has more curves than the famous Lombard Street in San Francisco. Our driver, who was older than a youngster and seemed competent, drove as he was trying to make the finals of the Rallye Monte-Carlo Historique. I could not see the speedometer or the scenery. All I did see was blur of differing colors. If I had a dollar for every vehicle we passed on a winding road, it would reimburse us for this trip and buy us lunch. Our driver seemed to treat the double yellow lines down the middle of the road as decoration or a suggestion for staying on the lines.

After an hour, we stopped for gas. Climbing out of the van for the men’s room, my real need was to move my stomach back in place. It along with my heart was stuffed in my mouth. What really set me on edge was rounding a severe bend in the road only to find a calf standing in the middle of the highway with its rope dragging behind. The driver slammed on the brakes, which were thankfully, very efficient. No animals of any variety were harmed in the making of this journey.

The two women to my left had the good sense to keep their eyes closed the entire 3 ½ hours. Sitting placidly, eyes opened wide, the woman in the row ahead of me had a rosary going. After the calf incident, she started lighting candles

after pulling her statue of Mary of the Highlands out of her coat. She probably would have started with Gregorian Chants next if she were not fearful of scaring the driver. I tried alternating sleep with reading, with keeping from letting out primal screams. My life passed before my eyes so many times, I was sick of reruns. The return trip may require drugs: sleeping pills, anti-anxiety, or the very least, a bottle of scotch.

When we arrived at ELITE tours in Loja, I was beyond underwhelmed. As soon as we reached what looked like civilization and not highways through the mountains, there was nothing impressive. Standing on the sidewalk trying to hail a taxi, eventually two of them stopped, but when they read the address we needed, they just pulled away. One said something as he drove away, but I could not catch it as he was closing the window at the same time.

Ron went into the office to ask them to call for a taxi for us. Within minutes, a taxi showed up and we were driving, and driving, and driving. As we traveled, I had the impression we were staying in a suburb or even a neighboring town. Ron and I looked at each other with ominous thoughts hanging over our heads. When we reached the street, the driver could not find the house. We had been given intensive directions by the American renting out the apartment, but I assured him it was too lengthy translate to Spanish. His e-mail response was that they were for us. A hell of a lot of good that would do us.

Finally, we made it and met James a rather robust American. As three dogs are jumping all over us making more noise than a nursery school class at recess, we are trying to follow

James. Oblivious to the commotion, he is explaining that he rents these two apartments from Sonia who lives in the house in front. He also ‘manages’ another apartment in a different location. “By the way”, he states “there has been some construction replacing part of the roof. They generally don’t start until 8am. Oh, and the dogs bark. Be careful when you leave, because one dog likes to shit on the welcome mat. If she does, just throw it on the lawn.”

By this point, I was ready to test my survival skills with ELITE Tours and head back to Cuenca. James shows us the shower, proudly stating that they just replaced the head. It is

the type where you risk being electrocuted when you shower. After asking if it was set or needed to be turned on, he demonstrated by turning it on. No water pressure – no hot water. After sighing, saying he did not know how it worked, he walked out. This is a one-room apartment. Bed, kitchen, dresser, TV, and two tables are all in one room. 

When asked about shopping, James suggested a small tienda on the corner a block away. We did stop in there, but they had limited supplies of things that were of interest to us. He also suggested the SuperMaxi “10 minutes” away. There were also multiple restaurants in the same mall for our dinner options.

Twenty minutes of walking later, we asked someone where SuperMaxi was, thinking we had gotten it wrong. We were on the right trail; we just had not walked far enough. The mall, basically a strip mall with a food court in the center, was nothing to rave about. We bypassed the places such as Kentucky Fried Chicken settling on something that looked more Ecuadorian. Though it was edible, it certainly is not worthy of a TripAdvisor review.

Mentally, I have been writing my AirBnB review for this apartment. I cannot forget the roosters that start crowing at 3:30 am. Dogs join the medley at 6am. There is only a

stovetop fueled by propane, but the tank was empty. Water pressure, which is so low, it cannot stimulate the water heater into action and the real kicker: the “coffee maker” looks like a windsock. You have to put the coffee in and pour boiling water over it.

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