I am getting into somewhat of a routine if there is such a thing. I am taking care of this guesthouse for travellers to stay for weekly or monthly basis as they explore Vilcabamba before moving onwards to the beaches, or other cities in Ecuador, like Loja, Cuenca, or Quito, or continue south crossing of the border into Peru, as three guests did not long ago. The three guests that stayed here about a month ago, we all went hiking one day up (Mandango Peak) Mountain, where the historic ’Sleeping Inca’ lies outlining the top of the mountain clearly visible all around the valley looking at the mountain side. Then another time we went for a group hike to the waterfalls (Waterfall Del Palto) or (Cascada El Palto) the four of us bonded somewhat with these two hikes as we enjoyed each others friendships and the talking we did.

This guesthouse keeps me busy by keeping the place filled with travellers, cleaning and maintaining the gardens, especially the vegetable garden, where I planted many different vegetables to eat. At this moment many cucumbers are growing and I am dehydrating some into cucumber chips with seasonings on them, what a healthy snack and addictive like pretzels or popcorn.

Personally I would prefer the weather here to be more sunnier and hotter days, usually many showery days being cool or cold mornings. If we do get a really sunny and hot day here it may follow a thunder shower in late afternoon. I participated in a San Pedro ceremony which for me I had a very pleasurable experience. I am enjoying the stay here, it is a very unique and different world, very different. The way I see this small town called Vilcabamba is liken to and this is not from personal experience but from what I have been led to believe by television, history, and so on being hearsay information, but again liken to being in the ‘Old West’ with dirt roads and seeing cowboys riding horses or donkeys along the dirt roads between the buildings as they line each side of the street, many characters play their parts in this small-town as the shoe repair man speaking only Spanish as he busily repairs shoes and boots all day everyday, or the small Spanish woman selling fresh warm milk directly from the cow that is not pasteurized, sterilized, homogenized or anything else, just fresh raw milk from the cow as is usually still warm, at .80 cents litre. Then you have these small store’s called ‘micromercado’ that decorate every street and each side of the street and at every corner, usually being named after the owner, as with ‘Maria’s micromercado’. There are many of these small neighbourhood stores which sometimes makes things very handy and convenient, if I need a fresh pound of locally grown coffee that also looks very authentic to the Old West, one buys this fine ground coffee in a brown paper bag stamped with blue ink labelling the coffee being 100% coffee, this store is only a few steps away from the guesthouse at the corner, I will buy toilet paper, cooking gas, and drinking water from her as she is so close to the guesthouse, again very convenient with so many corner stores available, its a wonder how everyone earns a living.

Instead of cars and trucks busily on the roads, it is mostly people walking on the roads, or bicycles, horses, donkeys, dogs, chickens, but vehicles, there are some and usually they are taxi’s, there are many taxi’s because many hills here, again Vilca is settled into a Valley completely surrounded by mountains, thus taxi’s come in handy getting up hills and around since the cost for a ride is $1.25 around town. But other than that the only traffic with lots of vehicles is if there is a big celebration like recently with the Carnival which brought families together for the celebration, so people coming here from all around and I suspect many from Loja also.

It seems that this small town is safe for the most part but there are stories of individuals coming from nearby Loja city on the weekends to start trouble and/or hikers being threatened and injured by so called ‘bandits’ along the trails leading to Mandango Peak, even within town hearing reports of so called ‘hippies’ attacking a so called ‘gringo’; being an older caucasian man that was not able to defend off the attackers so well, so for the most part it seems safe, but again many different stories and reports of incidences that suggest be prepared and on guard and not to be alone especially at night or hiking some of the trails.

This area is great for hiking as many, many trails all over, I have been told about 65 different hiking trails have been mapped out to date. (https://www.facebook.com/groups/1525905254122878/) These trails are great for mountain biking, walking, photographing especially the buildings and streets because it takes one back in time of the Old West surrounding or appearance and characters. The school kids here are dressed up in uniforms boys wearing blue pants, shoes and white shirts, the girls wearing shoes, white long socks up to the knees, blue skirts and also white shirts. It is a very interesting and unique place for sure, because of how many ‘Gringo’s’ live here and inter-mix with the local Spanish speaking Ecuadorians, thus there are specialty shops owned by Americans or Europeans, like the French bakery, or Italian pizza restaurante’ but come with the higher specialty prices as well, one can eat at a English speaking restaurant paying for a $10. meal or eat at a Spanish Ecuadorian restaurant for a $3.00 meal, so visitors have a choice and it does seem with the influx of caucasian settlers here from America, and European countries that many pay high prices for things that should be much cheaper, ergo why I have heard Vilcabamba being coined “The Beverly Hills of Ecuador”, because its probably the most expensive place to live in Ecuador.