Exploring Ecuador - Day 1 Driving to Maca

Dear Family and Friends,

We have tried to be creative while waiting on the Covid-19 vaccine to finish being tested and distributed.  Besides walks in Cuenca, we have taken a couple of road trips that I have recently posted about on the blog.  

These trips have turned out so well that we decided to do some exploring of Ecuador and see some things that we might not have seen otherwise.

Chuck, an excellent trip planner, set up a travel itinerary that will keep us traveling for a couple of weeks.  We head first to Macas, which is in the Amazon rainforest.  

I brought my laptop along and have good intentions of posting on the blog as we are taking our trip.  We will see how well I am able to do this.

We packed Puff Puff and left Cuenca on Wednesday.

Here is our route on Google Map.

This is a beautiful drive down the Andes to the Amazon region.  The beauty comes at a price however. There are landslides, especially during the rainy season and it has been raining every day the past week. We even came up with a plan B for just in case we encountered a landslide that had the road closed.  

Just outside of Gualaceo, we saw the beautiful water cascade.  

And a very short distance more, we saw the aftermath of a giant landslide.  This one had been cleared off the road and was not difficult to drive through.

We drove threw several landslides.  All were worse than this one.  In many cases the road was gone with huge potholes that had to be avoided.  We knew we were probably going to make it through because we passed a couple of big buses come up from Macas.

The scenery was spectacular.  Waterfalls were flowing full because of the rain.

When we made it out of the mountains, I breathed a sigh of relief.  It was a beautiful ride but I was sure glad to be on flat ground and good roadway.

We stopped for lunch at a small outside restaurant.  It was specifically for travelers.  We had a typical lunch.

We drove to Macas and then followed Google Map instructions through Macas to the outside of town.  We stayed at Hosteria Farallon.  We were one of only two or three guests.  

Here is Chuck sitting on the porch outside our room enjoying his pipe and tablet.  

There was a nice size swimming pool.  It rained the whole time we were there...so no swimming for us.

We enjoyed a nice dinner there and went upstairs to watch a little Youtube and then we went to bed.

The next morning, we drove back up the Andes to Riobamba.  I will share that adventure with you next time.

Love,

Nancy and Chuck