The few days before Lent on this Catholic Continent are quite something to behold. When I thought of Carneval (CarnAval in spanish) I thought about Rio, and colorful costumes, and Venetian masks... but I did not think of all out water war; 3-year-old ninos spraying foam in my face, two hundred year old women armed with water pistols; waterballoons being launched from the roof. No, I didn't think of that. Shame on me.
All countries celebrate Carnaval differently. In Ecuador, we'd read that the best places to experience the celebration was in the cities of Ambato and Guaranda, though those two cities have very different celebrations.
After spending 6 hours on the bus from Quito (a journey that should have taken 2.5 hours, but EVERYONE is leaving Quito for the holiday) we arrived in Ambato and went in search of a room. We finally found one (overpriced, very grotty) and headed out to explore the town.
Luckily(?) in Ambato there are laws against throwing water and flour at people. Instead, the town's celebration is called the 'Fruit and Flower' festival. They definitely live up to the name. In the main plaza there is a huge mural of Jesus, the Bible, the Holy Spirit... made out of flowers and fruit. The whole thing - oranges, mangos, mora, blue flowers, white flowers, (bread for some reason), dried beans. It was the bomb dot com. In that plaza there was also a stage on which a 20-person band came out and played music for the gathered crowd of two hundred odd.
The following day there was a huge parade with floats and dancers. All the floats were flower or fruit themed and had beauty pageant contestants on them (a big thing during carnaval...). Before seeing the parade go past, Kristen and I decided to paint each other's faces to get in the spirit of things. Kristen painted an Aztec-ish design, while I painted colorful changing leaves and cubist trees... Kristen's turned out much better. By the time we were finished painting, there was a crowd of eight to ten people, mostly kids, hoping to get their faces painted! We painted a couple, and the crowd grew when we told them that it was 'gratis', free. This went on for a few minutes until a lady came over and yelled at us - she was painting faces, but charging people! So she was telling us to go elsewhere. We had noticed them, but since we hadn't planned on painting other people we didn't think about it. Oops. But we packed up, watched the parade and then headed to Guaranda.
Guaranda is a town that is famous for only one thing - their celebration during Carnaval. Our bus pulls in and we see why - everyone, I mean EVERYONE, is soaking, covered in flour, covered in foam, painted, kind of drunk and having the best time in the world. Unfortunately we couldn't join the festivities immediately as we had our bags and needed to find a hotel. Not surprisingly, everywhere was full. We ended up having to spend $45 on a okay-ish room. Better than what some people had to do - the following morning we noticed that a lot of buses and coaches had housed people for the night.
We walked around the town and got squirted and had waterballoons thrown at us, but all in good fun. Kristen had more action beccause she's a very pretty girl - a popular target during the water-throwing celebration (I'll let you guess why).
In the evening, in the main plaza (the waterthrowing had stopped with nightfall) there was a huge concert. Over a thousand people were in the plaza. On the fringe of the crowd were dozens of stalls selling all kinds of food - meat skewers, beer, fried pigs skin and intestines (umm..), fried plantains... the works. It was the most awesome atmosphere.
The following morning we wandered around the town and found the traditional drink of that town for this festival - a blue licorice-flavored liquor that is more potent than it looks (but about as potent as it tastes!). We bought a 500ml bottle for $1.75. I drank about half over the course of the parade (about two hours) and ended up with quite the buzz. The store that sold us the liquor also let us taste other traditional drinks, including this spice-flavored milk, which was delicious.
The parade here was less formal than in Ambato, but the atmosphere was more pleasant. There were many dancers, floats and masked performers who filled the streets.
Since we couldn't afford another night at $45, we had to leave around 3pm for Quito on the bus. Relatively painlessly, we arrived back at our hostal around 10pm, having had a full weekend and an extra free day to rejuvinate before heading back to work.
Photos and videos to be posted soon about the festival - unfortunately I can't post many photos because there's a maximum GB allotment.
Thanks for reading!
All countries celebrate Carnaval differently. In Ecuador, we'd read that the best places to experience the celebration was in the cities of Ambato and Guaranda, though those two cities have very different celebrations.
After spending 6 hours on the bus from Quito (a journey that should have taken 2.5 hours, but EVERYONE is leaving Quito for the holiday) we arrived in Ambato and went in search of a room. We finally found one (overpriced, very grotty) and headed out to explore the town.
Luckily(?) in Ambato there are laws against throwing water and flour at people. Instead, the town's celebration is called the 'Fruit and Flower' festival. They definitely live up to the name. In the main plaza there is a huge mural of Jesus, the Bible, the Holy Spirit... made out of flowers and fruit. The whole thing - oranges, mangos, mora, blue flowers, white flowers, (bread for some reason), dried beans. It was the bomb dot com. In that plaza there was also a stage on which a 20-person band came out and played music for the gathered crowd of two hundred odd.
The following day there was a huge parade with floats and dancers. All the floats were flower or fruit themed and had beauty pageant contestants on them (a big thing during carnaval...). Before seeing the parade go past, Kristen and I decided to paint each other's faces to get in the spirit of things. Kristen painted an Aztec-ish design, while I painted colorful changing leaves and cubist trees... Kristen's turned out much better. By the time we were finished painting, there was a crowd of eight to ten people, mostly kids, hoping to get their faces painted! We painted a couple, and the crowd grew when we told them that it was 'gratis', free. This went on for a few minutes until a lady came over and yelled at us - she was painting faces, but charging people! So she was telling us to go elsewhere. We had noticed them, but since we hadn't planned on painting other people we didn't think about it. Oops. But we packed up, watched the parade and then headed to Guaranda.
Guaranda is a town that is famous for only one thing - their celebration during Carnaval. Our bus pulls in and we see why - everyone, I mean EVERYONE, is soaking, covered in flour, covered in foam, painted, kind of drunk and having the best time in the world. Unfortunately we couldn't join the festivities immediately as we had our bags and needed to find a hotel. Not surprisingly, everywhere was full. We ended up having to spend $45 on a okay-ish room. Better than what some people had to do - the following morning we noticed that a lot of buses and coaches had housed people for the night.
We walked around the town and got squirted and had waterballoons thrown at us, but all in good fun. Kristen had more action beccause she's a very pretty girl - a popular target during the water-throwing celebration (I'll let you guess why).
In the evening, in the main plaza (the waterthrowing had stopped with nightfall) there was a huge concert. Over a thousand people were in the plaza. On the fringe of the crowd were dozens of stalls selling all kinds of food - meat skewers, beer, fried pigs skin and intestines (umm..), fried plantains... the works. It was the most awesome atmosphere.
The following morning we wandered around the town and found the traditional drink of that town for this festival - a blue licorice-flavored liquor that is more potent than it looks (but about as potent as it tastes!). We bought a 500ml bottle for $1.75. I drank about half over the course of the parade (about two hours) and ended up with quite the buzz. The store that sold us the liquor also let us taste other traditional drinks, including this spice-flavored milk, which was delicious.
The parade here was less formal than in Ambato, but the atmosphere was more pleasant. There were many dancers, floats and masked performers who filled the streets.
Since we couldn't afford another night at $45, we had to leave around 3pm for Quito on the bus. Relatively painlessly, we arrived back at our hostal around 10pm, having had a full weekend and an extra free day to rejuvinate before heading back to work.
Photos and videos to be posted soon about the festival - unfortunately I can't post many photos because there's a maximum GB allotment.
Thanks for reading!
That sounds so very awesome! So much fun! I would have loved to see that. We might just have to go there when Papa retires! I wonder what they do for Easter Sunday? Very impressed that you're finding out so much and facing hours on buses to go check it out. (Can't wait to see the photos! Just post some when you have a chance, leave them for a couple of weeks and delete the old ones to make space for the new ones...)
ReplyDeleteIt's so great that there are still so many places in the world where all the people of a town go out together in the streets to celebrate! I Wish we still had that here.
Thanks for posting!! Great descriptions which allow me to visit Ecuador vicariously!