Problems with protests

Our time in Banos was short. We arrived the evening of the 23rd of October after a tricky journey from Latacunga. We planned on having two and a half full days in Banos before returning to Quito the evening of the 26th. The reason for the quick return to the capital was that we were flying to the Galapagos Islands the morning of the 27th. Whilst I have written up what we did do in Banos, it didn’t exactly match our plans…

The evening of the 25th we headed to the hot springs in Banos. It was a short walk from our hostel and we didn’t think there was any point in taking our mobiles, so we left them in the room. We had a nice relaxing couple of hours before slowly heading back. We briefly considered going for food before going back to the hostel but decided to have a shower first. When we got back to our room we each had at least ten messages and missed calls from Fernanda.

Fernanda is the owner of Casa CarpeDM hostel and travel agents in Quito. We had stayed there when we had been in Quito, we had planned on staying there again before flying to the Galapagos, and Fernanda was the one who had helped us to get an amazing last-minute deal for a cruise in the Galapagos. We quickly phoned her back and she was mightily relieved to have finally contacted us. The reason that she had been trying to reach us all evening was that it had been announced that there was going to be mass country-wide protests against the government the following day. Major roads were going to be blocked and there was going to be a large march across Quito. Due to the road closures she didn’t know if we’d be able to get back to Quito the following day so highly recommended going back that evening.

By that time there were no more normal buses that would get us back before the barriers went up at 11pm but luckily CarpeDM had a bus dropping off people in Banos as part of a tour that could take us back. It gave us about an hour and a half to get packed, settle up with our hostel in Banos, try and get something to eat and get across town to the meeting point with the mini-bus. It was a rush but luckily our hostel was able to prepare some wraps and kindly didn’t charge us for them as compensation for paying for a night we wouldn’t be spending there. We hurried across to our meeting point and even though the bus had only been there for less than ten minutes, the driver was quite annoyed and frantic to leave. He then proceeded to race through the streets and roads to make sure we were passed the relevant access points before the cut-off time. It was a close call but we made it and got dropped off at the hostel a bit after midnight.

It was certainly not how we thought we’d spend our evening but it goes to show how important being flexible is whilst travelling. It also helps to have nice people looking out for you!

We spent the following day just relaxing in the hostel and doing some planning for the time in the Galapagos. We could see some of the march from the window on the top floor of the building but everything happened peacefully and there were seemingly no major issues. The road to the airport was also clear so we were calm about our journey the following day.

At 6am on the morning we were due to fly there was a load knocking on our door. The protesters had blocked the road to the airport overnight. There was another old route going through the hills but it would take twice as long to get to the airport so we needed to leave in half an hour. Luckily we were mainly packed but it still wasn’t the relaxed morning we’d hoped for. Thankfully the roads weren’t full of traffic so we were able to get to the airport in good time.

Everything worked out well in the end but we were lucky as events could easily have transpired so that we missed our flight. When reading travel blogs it can often make it sound like everything is fun and idyllic and the lucky so-and-sos doing the writing don’t have a care in the world. Well I certainly am exceptionally lucky that I’m able to travel but I wanted you to know that it isn’t all plain sailing and it’s not without stress. Not that I would change it at all though.