Locally Trial Traveling in Baños, Ecuador

A couple of friends came from Spain with her 17mo daughter to traveling around Ecuador on a budget. I thought we’d join them some days and see how budget traveling works for us (me and my 4.5 years old).

Here some thoughts on what I’ve found during this trip:

- Transportation: Carlos is such a good bus traveler. We left the house at 8.20 am and arrived at 1pm, taking the local Trole Bus, then a Bus for Ambato and then another bus to Baños. He didn’t complain during the trip, other than saying he wanted to arrive, when we were almost getting to Baños. I wasn’t required to pay a ticket for him, even in the Quito-Ambato bus, where he had a seat. If the bus would’ve been full, I’d paid a ticket for him (US$2.5)

- Accomodation: Nice and cheap (US$5 per night). We got into a nice budget hotel with shared bathroom (you can choose private bathroom as well). The room is clean and comfortable but simple. There are kitchen facilities, which is great because I’m able to cook and save. I love that I can cook because I feel very comfortable with what I’m feeding Carlos- and myself. Carlos did’t pay anything either.

- Luggage: It was challenging to fit everything inside my backpack. I brought the one I use for our everyday outings in Quito. Still, I managed to package food like carrots, macadamia, salami and pickles, nori, and a bento box with Tuesday’s lunch. Of course, I brought my small (and old) laptop with me.

- Internet access: Wow! The hostel has wireless connection and I found another network in my room.

- Walking around: Carlos is already used to walk a lot in Quito. He doesn’t walk as fast as I do when I’m alone, but he walks like my mom or other adults I know. Enough to wonder around and do some trekking. I carry his things on my backpack so he saves energies.
- Pictures: He takes good pics of me, which is nice. I’ve let him use my camera from very young and now I can trust him to take OK pictures most of the time. It’s great to have someone take pictures of you when you travel

- Food: Wondering around the town we were able to find free range eggs, oats, olive oil, brown rice, yogurt and vinegar. The local market carries a variety of vegetables as well, so I have plenty of ingredients for healthy meals. I even found where to buy free range chicken and fresh unpasteurized milk! I believe in most towns in Latin America there must be whole food ingredients available, and most cheap hostels offer kitchen facilities.

- Water safety. I’m not sure of this. Anyway, I’m using the Steripen I recently got for review to purify tap water for drinking, cooing, and brushing our teeth. At least the water tastes good. I’ll let you know

- Unschooling and learning: If learning happens even when we’re in town, just imagine when we’re traveling! We brought Carlos’ flute so he was practicing in the central plaza for a while. I’m sure I wouldn’t have to worry about him learning anything while we travel. It just happens.

All in all, I’m learning good tricks and gaining experience traveling locally. Living in Ecuador is so great that allows us to escape a few hours from the city and be in a totally different environment. We’ll be definitely doing more local budget traveling before deciding to leave to other countries.

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