A few days touring around Northern Ecuador

After a great week of fun in the sun on the coast at Raul´s place in Manglaralto (Kamala Hostel), Raul kindly offered to take us on a tour of Northern Ecuador for a few days while we waited for our flight to the Galapagos. So we hopped a bus to Quito and headed to his parents place to pick up their car. Raul´s family was extremely welcoming and of course couldn´t let us leave without sending us off with a delicious lunch.

First on our agenda was a trip 2 hours north of Quito to the town of Otavalo. Otavalo is a beautiful little town set in a valley surrounded by 3 volcanos (Imbabura, Cotacachi, and Mojanda - just in case you were dying to know). The town in renowned around Ecuador for its huge market on Saturday (which apparently has been going on since pre-Inca days). Unfortunately we were there on a Wednesday, but there was still a pretty cool mini market which was extremely colourful and vibrant and there was still enough wares on sale to give Lyds a chance to try on numerous outfits and then finally buy something random that she really didn´t need (although she assures me she did). Another contrasting thing about the town was the people. Otavalo is largely indigenous, so it was amazing to see how the physical appearance of these Ecuadorians was so vastly different from their compatriots only 2 hours South.

Here´s some pics of our time in Otavalo...

If you can´t see them properly than click on the link here - Otavalo

From Otavalo we headed south-east to a little mountain town called Papallacta. The drive there was spectacular as we passed through several quaint towns and small villages while driving and descending at heights of between 3,300m and 4,000m above sea level. The views were amazing and as we got to Papallacta the ecosystem began to transform from alpine to tropical jungle as we touched on the edge of the Amazon basin. The draw for this trip though was to visit the Papallacta Hot Springs. We spent a great few hours testing our bodily extremes as we jumped from freezing pools to scalding hot ones. The only downside was that the springs are funnelled into nicely tiled and filtered pools. Beautiful and clean to swim in, but it kind of detracted from the natural surroundings...

Here´s some pics of our time in Papallacta...

If you can´t see them properly than click on the link here - Papallacta

From Papallacta we headed south to visit a Hostel run by a friend of Raul´s near the town of Machachi. The Hostel was a huge beautiful old converted farm house. The night we spent there was close to freezing (well it was probably about 15C, but for us that´s COLD !!). We had to contend ourselves with making it through the night with a few bottles of wine in front of an open fire while playing some classic games of Jenga. The next day we hit the nearby hills for a few hours of Horseback riding. Machachi is surrounded by 4 Volcanos including Ecuador´s 2nd highest - Cotapaxi (a climbers favourite apparently). We struck it lucky with a beautiful day for riding which enabled us to take in all the incredible views, as these photos can attest to...

Here´s some pics of our time in Machachi...

If you can´t see them properly than click on the link here - Horseriding near Machachi

After Machachi we had a pitstop in Quito for the night to hit the town, and for Raul to take us to one of his favourite restaurants. As it was run by one of his cousins, so we were treated to an absolute feast. As this photo attests to, it also included the most ludicrous, yet delicious BBQ meal !! I skipped two meals after wolfing this down....



The next day it was off to the town of Mindo. Once again we took a spectacular drive through the Ecuadoran countryside to get there. Despite being only 80kms west of Quito, almost as soon as we left the city limits, the land and weather changed from arrid, mountainous hills and fine, partly cloudy weather to a deeply entrenched Cloud Forest, with a constant drizzle. Besides the amazing scenery, Raul wanted to take us to the Butterfly reserve in town. The Reserve was fantastic and allowed us to get up close and personal with the Butterflys. Unfortunately we were a bit late, but early every monring you can actually see them turn from their Caterpillar cocoon to grown Butterfly.

Here´s some pics of our time in Mindo...

If you can´t see them properly than click on the link here - Mindo

Overall a fantastic and busy 4 days of travelling. Raul, we can´t thankyou enough for being a tour guide extraordinare and many thanks to your welcoming and generous family !!