On February 1st we caught a bus in the morning out of Banos, arriving in Ambato just 1 hour or so later. Since we had pretty much the entire day, we decided to head out straight away after checking into our hotel and filling upon some sandwiches. We were lucky and found a nice hotel called Hotel Piramide for just $20/night – but we had to haggle them down to this price. The hotel had some huge windows looking out over the main street of Ambato, and we’d be glad for this the second time we stayed in the hotel, later in the month for a festival.
Ambato is a city which has been through a lot – the city was almost destroyed completely in an earthquake in 1949. While much of the buildings in the city had to be rebuilt, a few special ones from the colonial period did survive… along with all of Ambato’s natural treasures. The earthquake was one of the reasons that Ambato created its Fruits & Flowers Festival – to thank mother nature for the gifts she DOES give.
Our first destination was one of the best botanic gardens I had ever been to – the very impressive Jardín Botánico La Liria. The garden was created by Dr. Nicolas Martinez Vazcones in 1849 and are on the banks of the Rio Ambato. This garden has volcanic soil and contains more than 300 plant species, including species from five different continents such as the first eucalyptus trees which came from Australia to Ecuador in the nineteenth century, brought by the Martinez family to the garden. There were loads of plants from the native ecosystem of dry scrub typical of the Andean valleys of Ecuador.
At this point we stumbled across the Casa Museo Martinez Holguin. This house was set up to represent the famous Martinez family of Ambato. The adobe, ceramic (made in the ceramic furnace next to the house), and wood floored house was the possession of Dr. Nicolas Martinez Vasconez and his wife Dona Adelaida Holguin from 1821 until 1961, and it was turned over to the city in 1981 for restoration and preservation. The Martinez house was beautiful with numerous rooms containing furniture from the twelfth and fourteenth centuries, and a terrace overlooking the river and gardens. They lived in the house along with their large extended family which included many children. One of these children was Luis A. Martinez, politician, creation of Ambato’s College of Agriculture, and author of the novel A La Costa. Another child was the scientist Augusto Nicolas Martinez. Their other children were very successful too, with the family including painters, volcanologists, and mountain climbers.
Next we came to the house of Juan Leon Mera, built in 1874 in a typical Spanish style. Mera was an Ecuadorian writer and poet. He is best known for being the author of the National Anthem of Ecuador and lived in this house along with his wife and 13 children. Mera wrote the national anthem of Ecuador in 1865 at the request of the Ecuadorian Senate, and he titled it “Salve, O Patria!”, or “We Salute You, Our Homeland!” Once we had seen Mera’s house we continued in a loop past a river and back towards the start of the garden walk, observing the cool flowers along the way.
After the park Colin and I were both starving, and we headed back to the main square of Ambato. We headed into a burger joint and filled up then relaxed in the hotel.
The next morning, February 2nd, we went to the University to view the Museo de Ciencias Naturales. The guards were annoying, but once we got inside we realized the exhibit was awesome! There were loads of stuffed animals, one of the biggest exhibits on taxidermy we had ever seen! My favorite part were the strange, deformed animals on display.
Of coarse there were more ‘normal’ animals and birds as well on display – loads of owls, exotic hummingbirds, birds of prey, and all kinds of tanagers. There were even some larger animals such as an elephant and some monkeys – one of the scariest looking was a white bat called the ghost bat, which is native to Australia and on the verge of extinction because of human mining activities and lack of effort in preservation by national parks. It is estimated in 1980 that there were only 150 left, and no one knows how many there are now, if there are any left at all. One interesting non-animal display was a huge piece from the trunk of the first Eucalyptus tree the Martinez family brought from Australia to Ecuador.
Next we headed across the street to the 200-year-old Casa y Mausaleo de Juan Montalvo. This is where the Ambato-born writer Juan Montalvo lived, and is now the location of his mummified body. Montalvo was a famous Ecuadorian essayist - he wrote one famous work called “Chapters Cervantes Forgot” which was a sequel to Don Quixote. Montalvo however mainly got in trouble for writing attacks (novels and essays) about Ecuadorian political leaders he disagreed with. He even ended up exiled in Columbia for seven years because of his writing. Montalvo and writer Juan Leon Mera (writer of Ecuador's nation anthem) were actually enemies.
Montalvo’s body left behind, we peaked inside a church in Ambato which had loads of colorful stained glass windows. Colin and I decided to go see an agency about arranging a tour to ride a train in Alausi. Since I had heard about the Fruit & Flowers Festivals in Ambato coming up, we arranged to return to Ambato for the festival and do the train ride at the same time. Once that was paid for we figured we shouldn’t waste any time and head off to Quito to see the city before we had to return!
Excited to see a new capital city, we made sure we were booked in with Hotel Piramide for our return stay in Ambato, then headed off to Quito!
Francesca
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