As trees passed by at high speed, sharp curves running under the crushing power of the large tires and the altitude meters were climbed slowly but surely, I tried to imagine what would actually happen if the driver had a stroke, an unattended moment at the wheel or just hit a wall of pure insanity. There was no way, that anyone in the bus would survive a drop from the road down through the thick forest onto the floor of the valley. And the worst part was the knowledge of the nighttime sneaking in making it impossible for anyone to actually locate us if it happened. Chances of survival were slim and the stories about these kind of buses racing off the road in other countries, definitely did not make me more able to sleep. But witnessing the awaken Colombians trust in the driver, comforted me - just a bit.

Colombia has, together with other South American countries, a relatively high number of road blocks and checkpoints. Passing through them seems most of the times like a waste of times, but they are actually not very time consuming. Normally. After a few hours of driving, we arrived at the very peak of the mountain range and at the first military outpost. Having a spectacular view of the flatlands of Colombia on one side and the hillside with the narrow winding road on the other side, passing time as the military searched the bus for drugs, persons, contrabands or guns was almost a joy. Since the bus obviously did not have a toilet on board, this was a perfect chance to relief oneself - and many did, as the soldiers were swarming like bees in and on the bus. Nothing found, no crimes committed, no harm done and after a half an hour we were heading on.

As we were shaking and bumping further into the mountain range, people seemed to have no problems falling asleep with an instant. But to my big surprise, and probably to the sleeping passengers bigger surprise, another roadblock prevented us for further travel only 1 km ahead. Same procedure as before: everyone out of the bus, present identification, up against the bus for a body search, stand still in the chill mountain air for 30 minutes and return to our seats when the military found no contrabands, drugs, hidden persons or guns. I knew I had probably 6 hours ahead of me, in driving time, but these kind of interruptions definitely slows the ride down. Accompanied by the condition of the road, I realized that it was going to be a very long day and I had no idea of what to do when I got near the Ecuadorian border.

Arriving in Pasto, a fairly large city 1,5 hours from the border, at 22:00 I had no idea of what to do. I hadn’t been eating all day, I had reduced my normal intake of water to prevent me from frequent visits to the toilet while driving, I didn’t know if it was possible to cross the border at night and I didn’t know how long it would take to get me to Quito - the capitol of Ecuador. All things considered, I opted for a sleep over in Pasto and luckily there was a hotel right next to the terminal that would provide a nice bed, a TV with hundreds of channels, hot shower and almost subzero temperature in the room. The room was cheep and I had no regrets of my choice.

Crossing borders is to many people a stressful experience, but to me, it almost seems like checking in and out of a hotel. Approaching the border, in a manner that can not be described in a different way than "unprepared", I find it pretty easy. It is almost checking in an out of a hotel. You need to check out of the country you are leaving and you have to check in to the country you are entering. Sometimes you have to pay for leaving, as you would do when leaving a hotel and sometimes you have to pay to enter a country, as you would pay in advance at some hotels. My border crossing to Ecuador was amazingly smooth and I couldn’t believe it when I actually were in Ecuador. "So this is it? Colombia is right there, and here I am eating my breakfast at 15:00 and my first meal in Ecuador while looking back on Colombia", I thought as I was eating my breakfast at 15:00 and my first meal in Ecuador while looking back on Colombia. The rice tasted exactly as it did in Colombia, so did the fried banana, the meat and the salad. The water had the same taste and the only thing I immediately noticed, was that the prices had dropped - with several thousands. In Ecuador they use US dollars and there are no zeros on the bills. How nice. For some reason I do not like too many zeros. Eating a meal and pay 6000 for it seems just useless and when the bill for my first Ecuadorian meal were presented to me, I almost felt like being home, when it only cost $3. 3 is a number I can relate to. 3 is a number that is easy to say, both in English and Spanish and there are actually no use of trailing zeros at all. The number 3 makes me realize the value of the meal without trying to do heavy mathematical calculations from one currency into another one and finally into a third one. Even though the Danish currency is my current currency of choice, US dollars are frequently used by everyone else, so when I calculate a price of anything, I convert into US dollars first and then into Danish kroner. I do not know the exact rate of the dollars, neither against the Colombian pesos or Danish kroner so I can actually loose a lot of money in my conversions.

Still not knowing where I was or how I would get to Quito, my trip from Colombia was mainly made up of several short trips. Even though it took me approximately 8 hours to get from Colombia to my final stop in Quito, I changed means of transportation 5 times. Every time I changed car or bus, I found myself in a situation where I basically just put my body inside a vehicle and hoped that it actually were going to transport me in the right direction and I was constantly surprised when the drivers told me I had to swap. The strange thing is, though, that I always seem to end up where I want to go. It must be my gift. It must be what I am good at.

I had a name for a hostel in Quito but unfortunately not an address. Arriving in a big city where the cabdrivers are either stupid, illiterate, jerks or just sneaky bastards can be an experience. After have spending a few minutes on the Internet, to try locating the hostel, I managed to find a cabdriver that actually could read the note with my writing on it. The note was just like this:

El Centro del Mundo Hostel
L. Garcia 569
L. Garcia E722
Avenue Amazonas

We agreed on a price, $3 and I was headed for a new home. The address is somehow confusing, because the house actually have 2 kind of addresses. Both "L. Garcia 569" and "L. Garcia E722" are the actual house and the "Avenue Amazonas" is just a big road nearby. After spending a bit of time trying to locate the hostel, we found it, and now the sneaky cabdriver wanted $4 for the ride. "Because you gave me the wrong directions", he said. Having the experience of "reasoning" with the Cuban landlord, I knew that reasoning was futile. I managed to steal back my $5 note from him, saying that I will not pay more than $3 and a heavy verbal battle arose. Since my Spanish vocabulary is very limited when it comes to wordbattles with cabdrivers, I finally had to retreat as he apparently did not want to listen to my words - at all. South American reasoning is a fucking flavor of the month at an ice cream shop in fucking Himalaya. I hate dishonesty and sneaky business. To some extent, I can understand why people are racist.

Even though $1 is nothing, when I compare it to the price of the whole trip, but it is the principal and the knowledge of this kind of situation repeats itself regularly. $1 here, $1 there and $1 on the other side adds up to a significant amount in the end. And when I through my boots in the equation and the money that were stolen from me, it adds up to even more. I think I will find a way to outsmart these people. I will get my money back. You just wait and see, South America!!