Border Crossing Ecuador to Colombia

Traveling from Ecuador to Colombia turned out to be the border crossing journey from hell. Typically it’s easy breezy unless you have crap luck. All in all don’t let this experience speak too loudly but you’re welcome to have a laugh at our expense ;). The poor luck was mostly due to bad timing. The journey was two days of insanity complete with huge lines, a call girl hotel, an unlucky run in with a waiter you will come to know as the “Soup Man” and much more.

Route

• Quito to Tulcan – $7.50 – 6 hours North Terminal/ 7 hours from South Terminal.
• Tulcan Terminal to The Ecuadorian border Rumichaca – $3.50 taxi – 10 minutes.
• Cross the bridge by foot into Colombia
• Transport to Ipiales Terminal – $1900 COP (<$1USD) via colectivo or taxi 6-8000 COP ($2-3USD) – 20 minutes
• Ipiales to Pasto – 10,000 COP (~$3USD) – 1.5 hours

Quito to Tulcan

Good Luck-

This is usually an uneventful bus ride leaving from both the north terminal ($7.50, 5-6 hours) and south terminal (6-7 hours) of Quito. If you’re a normal human being then this will be an easy yet gorgeous ride through the hills and mountains. Take this ride during the day to take full advantage of the scenery.

Bad Luck-

If you’re like us then you would have unknowingly stumbled into the chaos that is an Ecuadorian holiday. Okay, okay to be completely transparent we knew it was a holiday but we were unaware of how many people would be headed for the border. Turns out there are a ton of Colombians living in Quito itching to visit their homeland any given chance. Not to mention all the Ecuadorians that travel across the border to buy goods in light of Ecuador’s outrageously high import tax which is of course passed down to the consumer.

Tulcan to Rumichaca (the border town)

Good Luck-

This is a ten minute ride from the bus terminal to the border control. We heard about colectivos here but we didn’t spot any on our arrival. A taxi costs $3.50 and it’s easy to find someone to split the small costs with since nearly everyone is going in the same direction.

If you’re a normal human being this will be an easy stamp out of Ecuador.

Bad Luck-

If you’re like us you’ll run into a mob of people waiting in the line of 5-6 hours. Turns out there are some indigenous communities on strike. They are blocking the road between Pasto and Cali. Buses full of would be travelers to Cali are returning to the border.  Just our luck! On the bright side Ecuador and Colombia share a friendship bridge. You can cross from country to country without stamping in and out. We ended up crossing and spending the night in Colombia until morning when we crossed back to get our stamps. I’m not exactly condoning you to do the same. I imagine you can get into a lot of trouble if stopped within the country having entered illegally. We felt okay doing so given the situation. Not to mention we asked a friendly military member at the border and this was his recommendation.

Rumichaca to Ipiales

Good Luck-

After stamping into Colombia you can take a taxi to Ipiales for 6-8000 COP ($2-2.50USD) or you can take a colectivo to the bus terminal for 1900 COP (<$1USD).

Money exchange handlers are present on both sides of the bridge. Exchange only enough money to get you to Pasto. The exchange rates on the border will be criminally low. There is an ATM outside of the Ecuadorian immigration and another at the bus terminal in Ipiales.

If you get to Ipiales early enough then there is a short detour trip you can take to Las Lajas. This is a church built into the side of a cliff 15 minutes by colectivo via Ipiales terminal. This is a must if in the area ! The church is an amazing architectural design and worthy of a few hours of your time. The colectivo costs 2500 COP (<$1USD) each way. It’s free to walk around the site. The museum charges a small fee.

If you’re a normal human being and left early enough you can do this all in the same day and continue on to Pasto.

Bad Luck-

If you’re like us then you’ll have arrived to Ipiales after dark following the hectic lines in Quito. Ipiales is not very pleasing to the eye. The streets are largely full of trash and there are a fair share of shady looking individuals. If waiting for sunup to check out the church I recommend Hotel Dinastia for your stay. We paid 50,000COP (~$17USD) for a double room, more than we usually pay for a room but it didn’t feel too safe wandering around looking for a better deal. The hotel is quiet, clean and run by a super friendly local man. In the morning he will hold your bags free of charge while you visit the church.

Ipiales to Pasto

Good Luck-

This is about a 1.5 hour ride for around 10,000COP (~$3USD). There are multiple different size vehicles available, the larger the cheaper yet slower travel. These leave throughout the day into the evening.

If you’re a normal human being you can spend a few days in Pasto to look around the city and visit the lagunas or catch a night bus into Popayan, Cali or Bogota. Note that many online searches say the road between Pasto and Popayan/Cali is dangerous at night. We cannot wholly confirm nor deny this. A few days after our Pasto stay we took the 3pm bus to Cali passing this area in the night. Our bus didn’t have any problems. Still, there may be some truth to all the online reports.

Bad Luck-

The No Show

We arrived in the afternoon and waited around to meet our couchsurfing host in the evening. Long story short he never showed.  After about an hour past the time we said we would meet he finally returned our messages. He asked us to walk to his home. He was unable to come meet us. We thought sure, after having walked a bit during the day the town looked safe enough. We headed out in the direction we believed the house to be, wrong choice. After walking two blocks it was clear that this area is not super safe in the night. We headed back to the terminal to contact uber. Our driver basically drove in circles for 30 minutes and never picked us up. Resorting to yellow taxis they all denied us saying that the address was too close to warrant a ride even after we plead our safety case. At this point we continued to contact our would-be host to no avail.

Yellow Taxis & Hooker Hotels

We flagged down the next taxi to take us to a downtown hostel that was recommended by other travelers. It was completely full, just our luck! We asked the driver to help us find another place to stay nearby. He took us to another accommodation a few blocks away. It was a very basic hotel with not much appeal to the eye but in all honesty it wasn’t the worst place I’ve stay this trip. The place was basic and old but at first glance I thought it would be okay until the morning when we could safely search for another place. After having been in the place for 10 minutes I walked down to the shared bathroom at the end of the hall and when walking back I noticed what could be nothing other than an old wrinkly street hooker walking towards the exit. As I walked passed the room she left from I peeked inside and saw an equally wrinkly man getting dressed and my suspicions were confirmed! Needless to say we grabbed our bags are ran out the door! No refund needed! It really surprised us that a place like this could be found within a few blocks of the central square. Furthermore we are eerily suspicious whether or not the taxi driver knew what was going on inside this place. We think this might have been his idea of a joke, he is probably the life of the party when telling his drinking buddies how he set the tourists up. In hindsight it was all part of the adventure and now I get to write an awkwardly funny post about it so in reality I get the last laugh, right? 🙂

If you ever find yourself in Pasto I recommend Guachales Hostal 20,000COP (~$7USD) per person.

Stranded in Huffington Post’s Ugliest City in the World

We spent more days than necessary in Pasto. Originally we wanted to visit some of the nearby lagoons but this area was closed for road work during our stay. We continued to hangout in Pasto for three days hoping that the strike would end so the road to Cali would reopen. Luckily it did and costs us 40,000COP ($13USD) per person for the 9-10 hour ride, but not before our run in with The Soup Man.

The Legend of the Soup Man

The lunch time specials in South America come with soup and a drink in addition to your main dish. Most times the waiter will automatically bring you the soup of the day. Although there has been a few times when they neglect to bring the soup and when you ask them about it they smile and say something along the lines of soup being optional upon request. We have never had a problem getting the soup after making it known that we know it comes as part of the meal until The Soup Man of Pasto. This man brought all the surrounding tables soup and neglected our table. Once we asked him about the soup he said he would bring it. Our meals came, went and after 20 minutes of waiting we then decided to attempt to pay and leave. We were met with an aggressive Soup Man refusing to lower the meal price for the incomplete meal. He was super grumpy and demanded full payment so we told him we would need soup then. It seriously felt like we were in that episode of Seinfeld, The Soup Nazi (check out the clip here). We waited 15 more minutes and nothing. We went back to the desk area where he threw his hand in our face and walked away. In a fit of anger we threw the payment on the counter minus what we thought soup was worth and left. After a half a block it kind of dawned on us what had happened and we hurried along to our hostel out of fear that he would call out to one of the police walking around. And from that day forward the legend of the Soup Man will stay with us forever, right along with the boogie man and Freddy Krueger.

Afterthougths

All in all the Ecuadorian-Colombian border crossing should be uneventful unless you have the luck we had. Visit Las Lajas and avoid prolonged time in Ipiales and Pasto if given the choice. Keep in mind that the South of Colombia is not use to seeing many tourists. They do not seem to understand why they are there or want them there very much (in my opinion).

To address the Soup Man situation it wasn’t about the couple bucks the meal costed but more of the countless times the bad apples try to take slight advantage of the tourists. After a few episodes you reach your limit and refuse to be taken for the ride. This was one of those times.

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