Greetings from Otavalo

Hola everyone,

Greetings from Otavalo, in the Andean highlands north of Quito. We arrived here on Sunday as planned, after a fairly uneventful and reasonably comfortable 2 hour busride from Quito.

We are truly in Ecuador now, althought this is a very large town it is very very different from the big city of Quito. On arrival we crammed into a little storefront restaurant for an Amuerza, a complete lunch of chicken potato soup, juice, and fried chicken with rice and veggies. Very authentic (down to the chicken feet in the soup), very delicious, very cheap. We are truly in country now.

It was a short ride in a group of taxis up to our hostel, in the hills above town. How can I describe this place? Words like gorgeous, fantastic, perfect, and ideal sping to mind, but words will not suffice. A simply beautiful spot, high on a hillside with stunning views, soft grass for our tents and a sweet little hostel building to accommodate us and feed us. There are even hot showers. We could not ask for a better spot for acclimatization.

Wasting no time, we took a short hike in the rain our first afternoon here up to a little waterfall, then another hike in the hills above town yesterday, then we hiked down into town today.

This group of kids is FANTASTIC. Yesterday we messed up and walked about a mile down a steep cobbled road, then had to turn around and climb that unnecessary hill and there was not one complaint, we just turned around and huffed it up the hill. Back at the hostel it was pretty cold and rainy but spirits were high, the kids recording very silly videos on their cameras, others reading, writing, hanging out.

So, things continue to go extremely well. In Otavalo today we are checking out the market and basically wandering around. I just came from the covered market, with an extremely graphic meat market that was kind of a shock to some of the kids i was with. We don't usually see massive platters of beef livers, or tubs full of entrails for sale at our markets, after all.

Time is short. Tomorrow we{ll attemt the nearby Fuya Fuya volcano climb, to about 12,500 feet or so. Day after that we set out for our long trek.

Adios!

SL