Parque Condor Otavalo

Wednesday, January 28th, 2015 Otavalo
After breakfast at the Dona Esther, we took a taxi ($4) up the hill northeast of town to the Parque Condor, a bird sanctuary where they rehabilitate wounded condors, eagles, hawks, falcons and owls. It's only $4.50 each to enter. There are numerous big cages and beautiful gardens to walk through to see all the birds mentioned above. We were sure to get there by 10:30 am so we would have an hour to walk around before the show at 11:30.
The Parque Condor has a small stone amphitheater overlooking the Otavalo valley. A bird handler with a big leather glove and a leather bag of food, including dead chicks, brought out hawks, falcons, owls and finally a bald eagle that he let loose to soar over the valley until he called them back by holding up a dead chick for them to eat. The whole demonstration was in Spanish but fortunately we had been talking with a Dutch guy and his girlfriend, originally from Ecuador, at the park earlier. The woman spoke fluent Spanish, of course, and translated for us throughout the show. This show was a highlight of our trip so far.

After the show, we walked down the hill back to town, past Laguna San Pablo, a medium sized lake that we could see in the distance. It took us about 70 minutes to walk back to our hotel down a dirt and cobblestone road past the farmers' fields. We each carried a stick in case of stray dogs (a trick learned in southeast Asia) but the few dogs we saw were very docile.
After we re-grouped in our hotel, we walked up to the Shenandoah Pie Shop near the Plaza de Ponchos for a huge piece of blueberry pie and ice cream. It was $4 each but well worth it. After another hour of relaxing in the main square and a couple of beers in our room, we ate in the restaurant in our hotel. Again, for $20 all in we had Pollo Pintado (chicken in chocolate sauce) and Chuleta a la Cranberry (pork chop in cranberry sauce). Both were excellent. Chicken in chocolate sauce might sound strange but it was actually great, tangy not sweet. Since it was a cool night we took a table right in front of the wood-fired pizza oven and enjoyed the cosy ambience while we chatted with an American couple and their daughter as well as another older woman staying in the hotel. It seems that there has recently been a big international Jehovah's Witness conference in Quito, so this woman and her friend are part of a large number of Jehovah's Witnesses floating around the tourist areas in the vicinity. Luckily no-one seems to have brought pamphlets so there was no reason for Anita's sisters Lori and Lisa to call and warn us like they do at home.

Otavalo Part Two

Tuesday, January 27th, 2015 Otavalo
Although breakfast is not included in the $54 per night that we're paying at the Dona Esther, they have a good restaurant where we can get a substantial breakfast for less than $5 each, so it's not a bad deal.
After breakfast, we packed some water and our rain jackets, just in case, into a backpack. We walked north of town about an hour to the Peguche waterfall. There's a nice park there. We enjoyed the walk there and back.

In the afternoon, we visited the daily food market, which reminded us of many markets in southeast Asia. Every type of fruit, vegetable and meat is available although refrigeration for the meat is non-existent. There are some small food stands but, since we're not used to the local germs, we're not eating here. In Quito, we met a woman who got sick from eating at these food stands while her partner was fine. However, we're not taking any chances or putting our Dukoral oral vaccine to the test.

We also walked up to the Plaza de Ponchos, where all the woven textile goods made here are on display at a daily market. There are lots of really beautiful blankets, ponchos, hats, and clothing for good prices but we just can't carry anything.

For dinner, we went to Mi Otavalito, a restaurant on Sucre, the main street, that got good reviews in Lonely Planet. It has great atmosphere with a couple of cow heads on the walls and other rustic decor.  I had chuleta (pork chops) in mushroom sauce while Anita had beef in a wine sauce. Both were very good. With a large beer to share and a 10% tip, we spent $20. Excellent restaurant.

After dinner, we went back to the beautiful main square in front of City Hall to relax and watch the people.

To Otavalo

Monday, January 26th, 2015 Otavalo
After breakfast at the Cayman Hotel, we took a taxi to the Terminal Carcelen in the north of Quito for $12. It was a 20 or 30 minute ride. Taxis are very cheap in Ecuador.
At the terminal, there were at least a dozen different bus companies but we knew the one we wanted from our research at latinbus.com. That's a very good web site for bus schedules in Ecuador. We bought tickets for $2.25 each. Bus travel in Ecuador is usually about $1 per person per hour of travel. The drivers' helpers all shout out the name of the town where their bus is going, so although the terminal is big and chaotic, it's not hard to find the right bus. For a little over 2 hours, we traveled north along a winding but good, new highway to Otavalo, enjoying the high sierra scenery. Once in Otavalo, we got a taxi for $1 to take us to our hotel, the Dona Esther. We're always careful to negotiate the taxi price before we get in. It doesn't take long to figure out the price that we consider reasonable. That's not to say that we're not paying more than we should a lot of times. We don't mind getting ripped off a little bit; we just don't want to be treated like total gringo assholes.
We checked into the Dona Esther with no problem. Most hotels here want cash, not credit card, so we're always careful to have enough cash in our body safes or hidden pockets, next to our skin, along with our passports and credit cards. Nobody's getting our important stuff without a knife or a gun. So far, in all our travels, we've turned down lots of scams but have never experienced the threat of a violent attack. However, we try to be wary travelers.
The Dona Esther has atmosphere to spare. The rooms are all entered through a balcony surrounding a courtyard. The walls are stucco and the floors are wood. The rooms are a bit dark but that's okay.
After we settled in, we went for a walk around town, looking for the restaurants in our guidebooks. We found most of them. Since it was lunchtime and we were hungry, we went to a small restaurant that we never heard of but it seemed to have lots of local people eating there. In Ecuador, many small restaurants have set menus for breakfast and lunch that are very cheap. We paid $3 each for soup, fruit juice, chicken, salad and fries. We were so full that we bought mangos and some pastries that we took back to our room, and didn't bother going to a restaurant for dinner.

In the afternoon, we spent about an hour sitting on a bench in the town square, just watching the people. In Otavalo, there are mostly indigenous people, Quichua, I think, who have been here since before the Incas and the Spaniards. The women, especially, wear traditional long skirts, embroidered white blouses and carry infants wrapped in a shawl or blanket tied on their backs. It seems that there is a baby boom on in Otavalo. There are infants everywhere. The younger men mostly wear modern clothing. The older men are often immaculately dressed in white shirt, white calf length pants and dark blue poncho, and black fedora. Everyone has long black hair, usually in a braid that often reaches their waist. The schoolchildren are all in neat uniforms and even the little boys have long braided hair. Generally, everyone looks prosperous and proud. The weaving industry here has provided a good income, it seems.

We're careful in cities not to be out in unfamiliar areas after dark. Since Ecuador, being on the equator, has within 9 minutes of 12 hours of daylight and 12 hours of dark all year long, we mainly relax in our room in the evenings and go to bed early. Besides that, the roosters and traffic are almost guaranteed to wake us at 5 am in most places. Again, we're used to this from travel in other developing countries. Luckily, if we feel like vegging in our room, we get Netflix on our ipad as part of our subscription at home. This may not sound too exotic but it suits us.

Last Day in Quito for Now

Sunday, January 25th 2015 Quito
It's actually, Saturday January 31st but I'm trying to catch up on posts. The slow internet is very frustrating. So I'm pretending it's last Sunday.
Today was our last day in Quito and the sunniest, warmest day we've had yet. We have no real touring plans for the day, just meeting Josh's friend Parshan for lunch here in the Mariscal at the Magic Bean.

 Our hotel, the Cayman, is well located in the Mariscal but at least the side street we're on is a bit quieter.

Parshan is originally from Guelph and went to university in Toronto. She is an architect working here in Quito. We really enjoyed our lunch with her. We're hoping to get together again near the end of our trip.
In the afternoon, we enjoyed the sunshine in the garden at the Cayman Hotel. While we were there, we met a couple from Lethbridge who had just returned from the Galapagos and had a wonderful time there. We're back and forth all the time thinking if we want to go to the Galapagos, the Amazon, both or neither. Anyway, today the Galapagos sounded good. We also traded dog and monkey bite stories from southeast Asia. While Anita had gotten bit by a dog in Cambodia, this guy actually got attacked by monkeys on the island of Kho Phi Phi in Thailand and had to do the whole series of rabies shots. Ah the good times.
In the evening, we packed up because we wanted to get a reasonably early start for Otavalo the next morning.

Quito Ecuador

Sunday
January 25, 2015 Quito
We're a little behind on our blog so we'll catch up the last few days.

Tuesday, January 20th, 2015
Having already packed and re-packed many times, we were ready to leave for Ottawa by about 10am. Thankfully, the weather was clear and the roads were good.
No trip to Ottawa is complete without lunch (V13 on the menu) at the Oxhead Vietnamese restaurant in Kanata. It's not fantastic but we like it. From there it was a short jaunt to the Days Inn on Hunt Club near the airport, where we stayed overnight. We just ate snacks in our room and watched a movie on DVD. "The Hunger Games" was better than we thought it would be although it still seems to be made mostly for teenage girls.
Wednesday, January 21st, 2015
Our flight wasn't scheduled to leave until 11 so we were able to have breakfast at the hotel and still get the 8 am shuttle. As we checked in, we arranged to be on standby for the 10 am flight to Toronto and were able to get on that plane.
It worked out well because we had to clear US customs in Toronto and that took awhile. It wasn't busy at all but for some reason they thought we had checked 3 bags not 2 so we had to sort that out. After clearing customs and security we tried to use the complimentary Maple Leaf Lounge pass that we had gotten due to our Aeroplan status. They wouldn't let us in because we were travelling to Houston on United Airlines not Air Canada even though we had booked our travel on Aeroplan Rewards and took the flights they gave us. We went to Air Canada customer service to complain but got nowhere. They'll be getting a nasty letter from me again.
Although the UA plane to Houston seemed new, it had no entertainment service at all so we read and relaxed. In Houston we had to switch terminals to catch our flight to Quito an hour later. It's a fairly big airport but there's an efficient monorail between terminals so we got to our gate in plenty of time. Then our plane was delayed about an hour so we even had time to grab a sandwich for supper. Finally we took off but at least we had a 3 seat row to ourselves for the 5 1/2 hour flight to Quito. This time there was seatback screens but there was a $4 charge for their use. There aren't many free perks left in air travel, especially with United. At least we avoided changing planes in Newark, the black hole of North American flying.
We arrived in Quito about 12:30 am, cleared customs and got our packs with no problem, and then found the taxi desk. For $25 a nice lady with a long braid and shawl drove us right to our hotel, the Cayman in the Mariscal district. Quito is a big city that stretches north/south between the surrounding mountains.
We checked in and got to sleep shortly after 2 am, which is not bad. There is a lot of street noise through the night in the Mariscal but we slept pretty well.
Thursday January 22nd, 2015
We actually felt better than we anticipated after our long travel day so after breakfast and a shower, we took a cab down to the old town. We saw the National Basilica and then walked down to the Plaza Grande.

Quito Part Two

Monday January 26th, Otavalo
We were rudely interrupted during the last post by uploading problems. However, we'll try again.

 Our first stop in the Quito old town was the Basilica del Voto Nacional. There's a rickety ladder to climb up to the top but we were feeling a little shaky so we didn't bother.

Anita the tourist is in front of the Basilica.

From there we walked down to the Plaza Grande, the Plaza San Francisco and around the old town. We toured through the Compania de Jesus, which is an extremely elaborate Jesuit cathedral with walls and ceiling covered with sculptures finished in gold leaf. It took 160 years to build.

 

The next morning, Friday, we rode the Teleferiquo gondola up the mountain but could hardly see anything because it was overcast and cloudy at the top.

There was a good musician up there anyway.

On Saturday morning, Ashley and Will, some friends of our niece Hannah, toured us through the school where they work, Carolinas park and a huge modern shopping mall where we had lunch.

In the afternoon we took a cab up to La Mitad del Mundo, the middle of the earth, just north of Quito.  I'm still having internet problems so I'll publish this and try again.