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This Old Hacienda
Owners, though, are driven more by pride of place than simply offsetting the costs, says Mary Gostelow, the editor-in-chief of WOW.travel (and an enRoute columnist). “It’s an evolution of use, a willingness to share.” In Ecuador, keeping the keys to the ancestral home helped preserve hundreds of years of history. At Hostería Hacienda Pinsaquí I came across a picture of the sixth-generation owner’s dapper grandfather sitting at a dinner party with Frida Kahlo. Walking through the bar of Hacienda Cusín, now owned by Brits who preserved its rural quirkiness, I saw a phone from 1895. Reportedly, the telephone operator in town refused to connect international calls. Rumour has it that after someone burned an effigy of her on New Year’s Eve, she moved to Queens, New York. While the haciendas of Mexico are upscale retreats for international trendsetters, Ecuador’s properties are more like live-in museums, offering cultural insight not found in, for instance, the touristy markets such as Otavalo. When you’re not horseback riding through the páramos (grasslands) and cloud forests around Hacienda Zuleta, for example, you can explore its condor rehabilitation program. At San Agustín, you can work on your farmer’s tan milking cows or collecting eggs – and then eat your labours in the rich locro soup of avocado, potato and cheese. “Today, discerning travellers are into experience,” Gostelow says. “They want more than just a bed and food and drink. They want ambiance and food for all their senses.”
But most of all, there’s something personal and nostalgic about staying at a place that’s been in the family for generations – even if it isn’t your family. Write to us: letters@enroutemag.net |
