Similar to my flawed research on Guayaquil I hadn’t checked on Cuenca which was my next city to visit except to know that it was high in the Andes like Quito and therefore I should have thought about the fact I would be climbing some altitude to get there. So I headed off in the morning for the 4 hour ride in cloudy warm conditions. The road was okay but was heading up and then up and then more up. At a couple of thousand metres I actually broke through the cloud and it was a lovely sunny day and not only that but I had a beautiful view of the clouds below me. This must be a common occurrence as I started coming across nice restaurants with amazing views. I stopped at one and had a coke an took a few pics.

I ended up stopping at quite a few lookouts because I just kept going higher and the views got better. Although it’s difficult to photograph. I’m guessing the moisture comes in off the South Pacific and can’t make it any higher up the Andes which are so big and so it just gets trapped there and fills the valleys. Ecuador doesn’t have as much traffic and being a smaller country has less roads to maintain and so they a bit nicer than Colombia.

I stopped on the side of the road to try and photograph one of the winding roads going up a hill and surprisingly had phone reception and got a message to call my daughter. I said I’d find a safer spot to call back which took me half an hour because I lost reception and it was so windy. I ended up pulling into a cheese tasting shop??? and using their Wi-Fi. Nothing important but it was nice to talk to someone about how beautiful the scenery was. They kept giving me cheese samples. I bought a bottle of water but no cheese.

I knew by my speedo that I was getting closer to Cuenca but I was still climbing. And then finally I summited at what I will call Sticker Pass. It’s very common for overlanders on bikes and in vehicles to have a sticker made for their trip and put them all over the place. This one was ridiculous. Google informed me it was Tres Cruces Pass (Three Crosses) and was 4160m. My body informed me that it was cold and a thermometer on a sign reinforced that saying it was 6 degrees. A quick calculation with my travel speed of 70km/h and it was just below zero on the bike. No wonder I was cold.

The views were great. Lots of lakes which I found surprising, and I had noticed a few sport fishing lodges along the road which I thought was weird and fish on the menu on a few restaurant notice boards. Guess I know why now. The road down was steep and it didn’t take long to drop down 1600 metres into Cuenca at 2560m. Which I was grateful for. I hadn’t prebooked as I was getting in early but had a place in mind and it was great. Hostal Morlaquita. At $2 above my budget max of $30AUD it was a steal. It was almost new with big, well appointed rooms. And a lovely bathroom with a proper shower and shower rose and hot water. I kept extending my stay as I had a few things that I needed to do.

First thing I need to do is to tell you how to say Cuenca. It’s really easy as it’s pronounced Quenka. Half the stuff in Ecuador has a Q in it and I have no idea why they changed the Q here for a C. Anyway, Cuenca is a lovely city of less than half a million people. I didn’t find that there was a lot to do but it was nice to wander around in. The first day I spent most of the time laying on my bed because my room was so nice but also because my quick assent from the coast had given me a bit of altitude sickness and I was feeling pretty ordinary. The next day I felt much better and the bike had a well needed wash for $8 and I found a Honda workshop that was able to give the bike it’s slightly late 6000km service. Mainly just check it over and change the oil and filter and oil and check the chain. It was $80AUD.

There were the usual churches and stuff and a nice market with great fruit, but I’ve added a photo of people’s front fences. I couldn’t work out why every fence had some sort of drop down shelf? Some had internal access to the shelf but most didn’t.

I also ended up in a really ritzy part of town which was almost like a leafy Melbourne suburb with flash restaurants and shops. Except of course for the armed guards standing out the front. I tried sneaking a pic through the window. I went there to try and have a nice plate of bacon and eggs. I almost succeeded. But it was Aussie prices. And I went back to that area again for a Thai meal because I needed some veggies.

I managed to catch up on some exercise, some sleep, the blogs, some life admin and some laundry. And make a few preparations for the next part of the trip as I was ready to head south to the border and over into Peru.

And the shelf mystery was solved when I saw someone putting out their rubbish. I then also noticed there were no bins on the streets and no where to put them anyway so it was a good solution. The garbage trucks just seemed to drive around town all day/night everyday.

KMS 6820