The Devil's Nose

The next day, after a wakeup call at 4:30, we headed south from Riobamba to the tiny town of Alausi. The town is below a giant statue of St. Peter.

We're here to go on a famous train ride down the Devil's Nose, but we had some time before the train took off, so Rosemary and I decided to go see St. Peter first.

We had to climb a lot of steps, but we made it with time to spare.

The mosaic work on the statue was just incredible.

We went back down and got on the train. Our group had a car almost to ourselves.

This part of the railroad was an engineering marvel in its time - built over 100 years ago, between Alausi and Sibambe, our destination. The two towns are only 6 miles apart, but 2000-feet difference in elevation.

Off we go!

Looking straight down, you can see the train station in Sibambe.

So how does the train get down there? At one point, the train goes backwards down a switchback, then forward again on another switchback.

We made it to the river!

once we got to the river, the train stopped briefly so we could get a picture of the Devil's Nose. You really need a lot of imagination...

Yes, that's it.

There was a museum in Sibambe that showed a picture of the switchback going down the Devil's Nose mountain.

We were greeted at the bottom by some dancers who tried to get us to dance too.

But I spent some time getting to know this cute little alpaca.

All too soon, it was time to get back on the train and climb back up the hill.

We then got back on the bus and headed farther south. Hmmmmm.... I hope that's not dinner....