called ‘Salinas de Bolivar’ in the heart
of the mountains. The route there
took us through the back of beyond,
with mainly llamas as the key traffic.
The only real obstacle was a missing
bridge, which meant doubling back
on ourselves for a few Kms and back
up a very rocky section of road much
to my delight! Or not! We reached the
town and found a little hostel in the
centre with a safe place for the bikes.
The owners thought we were with
a bike rental company so bent over
backwards to find us space, however
when they realised we weren’t they
didn’t seem too fussed, especially
as we decided to stay two nights. It
was great, a typical small town with
only one or two places to stay, one
really good place to eat and a small
store selling textiles made out of Lla-
ma wool. I caved and bought a scarf
and Kelvin bought a poncho, which
he later realised took up a lot more
space than he first anticipated. Oops.
Watching the locals playing volleyball
in the centre of the square was great
fun, with people of all ages either join-
ing in or sitting around watching and
passing the time of day.
Following our chilled stay in Sali-
nas, it was off to Chimborazo, one of
the highest and most impressive vol-
canos in Ecuador, standing at 6268m.
Our route took us on some very inter-
esting roads, some passing through
the middle of several huge crop fields.
We persevered as we were enjoying
the adventure, eventually popping out
onto a reasonably good tarmac road.
We could see the magnificent Chimbo-
razo in the distance, the top of which
was covered in bright white snow. It
didn’t have the typical triangular vol-
cano shape like Cotopaxi, but it was
amazing none-the-less. We made it to
the entrance to the road travelling up
the volcanos, where there was a down-
hill mountain bike competition going
on. Some locals waved us passed and
told us that we should go up to the top,
so we headed off. Kelvin was ahead
TRAVERSE 97
and after a long while of travelling up
and up the dusty dirt road, Steve and
I were waved down by a truck, who
explained to us that motorbikes were
not allowed up the volcano. Ooopsy.
We stopped however Kelvin had al-
ready gone on to the top. As we waited
for him, we watched the crazy moun-
tain bikers zooming past, dodging the
rocks dotted around the mountain and
skidding their back wheels around the
corners. I think I’ll stick to my motor-
bike thanks! Kelvin finally returned
and told us that a police officer at the
top had chatted to him quite happily
and didn’t say anything about the ban
on motorbikes, however just before
we were all about to set off back down
the hill a local ranger pulled up and he
was not happy. We then left.
The final volcano on our little loop
was Tungurahua, which is an active
volcano and has had several major
eruptions over the years, the last be-
ing in February 2014. We hoped that
it would keep quiet for our visit! We