November 22, 2015

It was time to create another miscellaneous post, because I had a few photos and thoughts I needed to put somewhere that didn’t fit elsewhere, and, well, frankly, because I have a couple of more days in Vilcabamba and I don’t want to publish my thoughts on this town until I am well clear of it.

Since Mexico, I’ve been attracted to the large number of old-school Toyota Land Cruisers. I had no idea there were so many of them, and that so many still exist in Latin America. I love these old trucks, especially the “B” series with the diesel engine.

Not all are Toyotas. There are Nissan versions, as well as others.

I would love to have one of these, especially the diesel version, but I looked at what they are selling for both here and in the U.S., and I could buy a new fully loaded pickup truck instead.

The other vintage vehicle I saw in Colombia that was extremely popular there was the Renault Master. The current Renault Master looks a lot like a Mercedes Sprinter van, but the older generation Master is a much smaller, “Fiat-like” wagon. These things are everywhere in Colombia.

Finally, here’s a few shots from a recent hostel I stayed in. This place was actually great; very comfortable. Just an example of the building process here.

Is one of these doors for giants, or is one of these doors a bit on the short side? Note: this is NOT an optical illusion. The two doors are side-by-side.

Answer: the bathroom door is a bit on the short side. I almost knocked myself unconscious twice in the middle of the night.

And a few other things came up “short” in the bathroom as well. There wasn’t quite enough room between the sink and the shower stall for the toilet, so the toilet is half way into the shower.

These are the kinds of “design considerations” that make a place like Magic Stone B&B in Baños stand out, where the design and construction were done right.

Oh, and all that stuff I posted a while back about the different names for flat fixers in the different countries? Well, we’ve come full circle: just like in Mexico, in Ecuador they are again referred to as Vulcanizadores. Odd how quickly things change just crossing a border, even in the same general language.