Ecuador

When you fly into Quito, you are hovering over miles and miles of green pastures, rolling hills, and quaint houses. It was beautiful. Once you arrive to the capital city, Quito, that natural beauty fades away. Though Quito does have some beautiful parks within the city. 

After a couple days in Quito we decide to take a day trip to Canoa, a small beach town about a 6 hour bus ride from Quito. We decided to make hostel arrangements once we got there. The bus dropped us off at 5AM and we realized that the town was dead ... not one soul in sight. Shit. After walking around dark buildings with our pepper spray in hand, we found a hostel with some hammocks in the front. We took a nap until the sun came up. 

We spent a few days in Canoa, mostly on the beach, then headed back to Quito to heal our sunburns and head off to the next town. 

** Quito was our base for the two weeks we were in Ecuador, since all the buses leave from here. We  paid the hostel to store our big bags and just traveled around with our small packs.. made life SO much easier **

Next stop, Otavalo, a city in the Northern part of Ecuador known for its markets. We booked an AirBNB about a mile from the center of town. When we arrived at our house, we were greeted by Miryan ("Medium") who invited us in for breakfast. She made us fresh juice from her garden, hot bread and jam from the bakery down the street, and cheese from her neighbors cow. Seriously the best meal I had in Ecuador. 

The rest of the day was spent walking around the town. Carnival was coming up, and we saw bags of colorful flour and canisters of foam on every street corner. It was going to get messy. 

Unlike Brazil, where Carnival is celebrated by massive parades and lively street parties, colorful costumes, and loud music.. Carnival in Ecuador is a bit different. When I think of Carnival in Ecuador, I think of kids running arounds spraying people with silly string and getting bombed by water balloons. No one is spared. 

Of course being two noticeably tall blonde foreigners, we were prime targets. 

On Saturday we went to the market. Lots of handmade jewelry. There we brushed up on our bargaining skills. 

There were women selling chickens that were not quite dead yet. 

Lots and lots of meat ..

..and bags of spices, flours, and sugars. 

From Octovalo we bussed back to our base camp in Quito, where we got ready for our next journey, the Amazon!

From Quito we took a night bus to Largo Argo, which is the entrance to the Southern part of the Ecuadorian Amazon Jungle. 

The town itself was really sketchy and we were told it wasn't very safe. It ran along the boarder of Colombia, and drug trafficking has been known to be prevalent in the area. 

After being dropped off in Lago Argo, we waited a couple hours for another bus to take us to the entrance of the jungle. 

Once we got there, we hopped on a motorized canoe. We boated up the river for a couple of hours until we got to our lodge. 

We were deep in the Amazon Rainforest. 

We spent about 4 days at the lodge with about 10 other people. 

All the huts sat on stilts partly because half of the ground was marsh, and to also keep all the large animals from coming into our rooms. On our first night, we saw a giant crocodile underneath one of the rooms. 

That night we did a night hike and walked around the jungle with our guide. We saw lots of spiders. HUGE hairy spiders.

The next morning we put our rain boots on and trekked around the jungle.

Our guide pointed out various plants and their medicinal properties. 

Everything in this rainforest was gi-normous. The trees, the bugs, the animals. Very Land Before Time. 

Cold cervezas, si por favor!

After a hot and sweaty hike, we decided to cool off of in the lake. 

Me: "Are there any piranha's in this lake"

Guide: "Don't worry about it"

OK!

We did see a massive boa constrictor snake perched up on a tree

... along with a beautiful sunset 

The following day we took the canoe to a very rural village about an hour away where we were going to learn how to make "bread" from Yuca roots. 

Our guide pulled out a couple roots for us to skin..

.. then shred, form into a balls, ring out all the moisture..

.. cook like a pancake- flipping it over a couple times..

.. then eat! It tasted like cardboard. 

After dinner we went to bed, where I had the worst sleep- between the bug bites that wouldn't stop itching, the thick hot humidity, and incredibly loud noise of the rainforest. 

But how could I complain, it was an adventure. The Amazon is truly a beautiful place. 

Here is a picture of a giant frog that wanted to take a shower with me. 

Our last stop on our Ecuadorian adventure, Banos!

It was still Carnival, so we were walking down streets with caution. 

We met a fellow traveller from Costa Rica in the hostel that night and the three of us decided that we were going to do the popular bike ride from Banos to Puyo. 

We stopped along the way to watch a girl bungie jump off the bridge... making bets whether she was going to back down or not. 

I did not realize till halfway that this little bike ride was 30 miles long. Somehow I did the math wrong when converting kilometers to miles. I was pissed. 

The next day we went to the "end of the world swing", which we thought we could hike the trail up but it was too long- so we hitchhiked. 

This view was worth it 

Ecuador was a beautiful country, though it did lack a sort of charm that Colombia and Peru had. The people were nice, the food was cheap, and the places we visited were off the beaten tourist path- which I liked.