Nariz del Diablo

Several weeks ago, I took a quick trip down to the Chimborazo province to check out the Nariz del Diablo- Devil's Nose- portion of the newly restored tourist train. I traveled with two gringa friends Mary and Tiffany, who were continuing further south on a longer trip, and were nice enough to let me join them for a bit. The train left from a town called Alausí.

Train tracks in Alausí at night

Central plaza and street view- this town was so charming!

Church and store fronts

This is probably picture overload, but look at those hills! And so many fire trucks for such a tiny town!

First we bused about 3 hours to Riobamba, had a quick but satisfying lunch, and then continued another 2.5 hours or so south to Alausí. Alausí is a World Heritage Cultural Site (like Quito and Valparaíso, two cities I love), and I wasn't surprised to quickly love its small town feel and looming hills all around.

Tiffany and Mary in the bar

We explored around a bit, ate some soup, and then settled into a cute little bar next to our hostel for a glass of wine before going to bed. Mary and Tiffany have been living and studying near Cotacachi in an indigenous village called La Calera, and it's always interesting for me to hear about how different (or how similar) life is for them out in La Calera.


 Early the next morning we hopped aboard the train. The railroad system used to play an important role in Ecuadorian economic and social history- it allowed products from the sierra to travel to the coast, and it was pretty important in shipping cocoa during in the cocoa boom. Now the train tracks are mostly abandoned, although there has been a new push to repair them for touristic purposes. We were on the train for about 1.5 hours, and rode through the always beautiful rolling hills down to a train station in a "town" called Sibambe (there was nothing BUT the train station in the town).

Steep switchbacks were required to get down to this level. I love these hills

This section of the train track is supposed to have been one of the most dangerous to have built, and includes impressive engineering feats including switchbacks with steep descents.

More hills (L). See the Devil's Nose sloping down towards the right? (R)

We stopped near Sibambe, you can see a cliff that is shaped like the slope of a nose, although it's named the Devil's Nose after the 2,000+ Jamaican workers who died in the construction of the track.

At Sibambe, there were traditional Sierra indigenous dancers performing for us, and a mini museum.

Dancing

This gem of translation at the mini-museum. The sad thing is that they probably paid someone to translate this for them, and that person obviously turned to Google Translate or Babelfish or something.

After our train ride, I immediately hopped on a bus to Quito and Tiffany and Mary continued south to Cuenca. There was (like lots of Ecuadorian sites) a lot of transportation involved in getting there, but this was totally worth it. I've heard about the Nariz del Diablo train ride for a long time, but I've never had a good moment (or the travel companions) to go. I'm glad I went!