Hotel Riviera-Sucre Otavalo

... and Rita, it was like being at home, lovely food and an open fire place. Very relaxing.<br><br>Day 2<br>Up early and off to the markets. First stop the animal markets. <br>Warning the following is not for the faint hearted. <br>I have never seen anything so sad. There were thousands of animals being thrown about, stuffed into bags and boxes, some half dead making the most terrible noises. Puppies, kittens, guiene pigs, chickens, rabbits, cows, pigs etc...all ...

... and a collectivo were waiting. A taxi offered us the trip to Tulcan for $3.50, we declined instead opting for the collectivo for $0.75 each, so we saved a massive fifty cents.<br><br>About 20 minutes later we arrived in Tulcan, a simple but busy looking town, and we were dropped off at the bus terminal. As soon as we arrived there was a bus just about to leave to Otavalo, which we jumped onto without having time for even a toilet break and we were away. We paid $2 each, and $2 for Jody ...

... the first person we asked for directions sent us right to our destination. We pulled up in front, unloaded our bags, paid the driver and prepared to wish him "bueno viaje" when we discoverd the door to the hostal was locked and no amount of knocking, pounding, cursing, etc., brought forth a response. Fortunately, the lovely restaurant next door was open and serving lunch, so when I went in and asked the nice lady if she knew where everyone was she immediately called ...

... which itch like mad and are hot as hell. I went to the farmacia last night and indicated my problema, she gave me Calamine lotion. It's taken some of the heat out of them but I still want to tear my legs to bits. The Valle de Chota struck me as an interesting place. The inhabitants of the little towns we were passing through were mostly negro and in some of the places I saw signs about festivals celebrating black art and heritage. The valley is ...

... in school! <br><br>The bus ride back was uneventful except for the fact that we played Crazy 8s eight times and it was a massacre. Gabe wouldn&#8217;t love me sharing all the details, so I won&#8217;t mention who won 8 times, muahaahaaaha. They are currently building nice new modern bus terminals to the south and north of Quito which are nice, but inconveniently leave people stranded outside the city. So, once there we had to grab a ...

... a long way from Otavalo, up an unpaved, windy, potholed, dusty road. After probably an hour we got there, and $8 looked more like a bargain price as the guy turned around to drive back to town. We started heading to the south side of the lake, where there was supposed to be a camping spot. Where we got dropped off, we noticed two signs. One was for a circuit trail that looked like it went around the lake. The other went up the Andes to a nearby peak Fuya Fuya. <br><br ...

So today we came down from 3583m about sea level from a beautiful eco lodge in the andies. This was only 15km from the columbian border :!. This was just above a town called el angel, not said like that of course. We caught a ute down and got on the local bus which was SO packed but they kept on putting more poeple in, aparently we were lucky not to get one with chickens in it. We then got off at Otavalu and caught a taxi from where the bus dropped us off ...

... anything because I didn't want to carry anything around for the rest of my trip. Seeing the native (tiny) people in their colorful outfits was almost as interesting as the stuff they were selling. I don't mean to be insensitive, it's just an observation, that a lot of the indigenous folks don't get much over 5 feet tall, especially the ladies. I felt like a giant for a little while! Next on my journey, I head westward to check out Ecuador's beaches and coastal villages.

... br> <br> It´s quite proposterous when you think about it.<br> <br> But not nearly as proposterous as what I had to say to Monica:<br> "Hello, I´m a complete stranger and I was just wondering if you could put this great big needle in my ****."<br> <br> Had this situation taken place in a Hollywood script writer´s head, the following scene probably would have gone down something like this:<br> <br> Monica would have cocked her head to one side ...

... to Quito, we met up with the driver, Omar, that our hotel had arranged, and we were off to Otavalo. We decided to spoil ourselves a little and Hacienda Pinsaqui turned out to be a great choice. The grounds were beautiful with cobblestone paths, gardens, and fountains. Simon Bolivar had once stayed there.....prior to the earthquake that leveled the hacienda (and Otavalo) in the 1860s ...