Hosteria San Luis Ibarra

... vegetables, let me tell you about the bus terminal here in town. It's at the northeastern edge of town, only a couple of years old. The busses run all day to nearby towns - Otavalo and Ibarra being the two largest - and it's amazingly organized for Ecuador! There are overhead signs showing the destination of the bus parked there and the conductor is standing by the bus shouting out the destination name. At any given time there will be 20 to 30 busses coming and going ...

... anyone to help fix it. Now its Monday morning and our first order of business was to find someone to repair the tire. It didnt take long, we found a "vulcanizador" less than a mile from the hotel and pulled over to have it fixed. This place was run by three generations - all working on tires and very friendly.

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... I was ahead of him. When Ania and I boarded the bus, we took the seats indicated on the ticket. And sure enough, when we looked to our left, our collaborating “friends” were sitting right next to us (the man who told me to cut in line and the man whom I cut in front of). Ania and I looked at each other. Hmmm…Perhaps this was a trap? The bus lurched forward, and as each minute passed, my thoughts raced… “Why did they let me ...

... These stone huts at 3583m above sea level in an Eco reserve. Warm showers, there was a both but it was so cold the stones that the bath was made from made the water too cold. We took a couple of walks that day and so some amazing trees and plants. These one plants only grow 1cm per year and one that we saw was 7m, that's a 700 year old plant! The reserve was famous ...

... in large crowds to inspect pigs, sheep, horses, cows, dogs, chickens, guinea pigs, cats, geese, etc, etc.... Afterwards, we popped to the food market near the centre of the town where fruit, veg, poultry, etc were on offer. Then, after popping back to the hostel for breakfast and a shower, we visited the nearby crafts market which seemed to sprawl through the streets of the town in a never-ending manner. In the afternoon, we departed by bus to Quito, the capital of Ecuador.

... and sliding forwards down a fifth cascade. A night at the thermal baths felt fantastic after so much adventure. Thanks Luke and Holly for pushing our limits! Next stop was Quito, Ecuador's capital, where we spent just one night after hearing too many stories of people getting robbed on their way to, from, and inside the city. We made the most of our one afternoon there ...

The Otavalo market was without doubt the biggest street market I´ve ever seen I think I saw all of it, I spent 4 hours trying! As I was awake at 6.30, due to the baby next door, I got up and had a look at the animal market on the outskirts - I found it by following the protesting domestic aminals being led/dragged there. The first field was full of baskets of chickens of all sizes, ducks geese, turkeys, rabbits, guinea pigs, puppies, kittens and piglets ...

... it. He did a ****ing Pet** Pan acr*ss the sidewalk, b**ks flying ev**ywh**e. I th*ught "h*ly ****". Then the dude jumps *ut *f the car and ev**y*ne is laughing, he's p*inting and yelling at the dude *n the gr*und "I g*t y*u, y*u m*th********, I g*t y*u!". And the kid is m*aning, he's like "yeah, y*u g*t me, g**d *ne". Turns *ut it is a new trend h**e t* run *v** y*ur friends. But a d*g?.... S* Diana sh*ws up pr*nt* like planned Wednesday m*rning. S* we take a ...

... finding out we are Australians, tell us they are trying to move to our country and we stand on the footpath in the midst of this pretty, comfortable city and the man tells his wife that Australians aren`t scary like she thought, they are like us. I should probably have warned her that we are not the best representations of Australians...3 blondes...that`s not really even it but the people here talk to us and we can talk to them and there is some kind of two-way ...

... with Ecuador instantly. One of the first locals to greet us was an elderly man. His wife in tow, was somewhat nervous. He was interested in immigrating to Australia. He seemed somewhat depressed at the prospects for South America. He needed an escape. It was quite sad really. Seemingly a well educated man with a degree in Environmental science, he was looking for an out. Ecuador had failed to pay its due. His only prospects apparently were an organic farm ...