Ecuador, Day 6

Today was a day of transit and rest. And because today was a Sunday, it seemed like just about everyone from Otavalo to Quito also had rest in mind. Small businesses everywhere seemed to be closed, although the Indian market was starting up again at 7 a.m. in Otavalo. I suppose it’s natural in many parts of the world for Sunday mornings to be slow, and for entire towns to shutter up until Monday.

Since I was unable to find any place to have breakfast in Otavalo, I decided to eat at the restaurant in the Ali Shungu Hotel, where I’m staying. If the meal wasn’t exactly Ecuadorian, at least all the ingredients were. I ordered a fruit salad with cream (think whipped cream), a homemade blueberry muffin (tasted sugar-free), and Ecuadorian coffee (rivals Vietnamese coffee for taste).

My fruit bowl was excellent, and that's the only bottomless cup of coffee I've found yet in Ecuador.

This fairly simple spread cost $8.35, which is a lot. Then again, I was in the mood for fresh fruit, and the flavorful pieces of mango, papaya, apple, banana, and pineapple really hit the spot. The muffin wasn’t worth $2.25, but hey, it was a good try.

I had a long conversation with one of the two American owners of Ali Shungu before I left. She regaled me with some amazing stories about her life in Ecuador over the last twenty-plus years. There were so many jaw-dropping tales that I it would be hard to do justice to them in this blog. If you find yourself in Ecuador, I highly recommend visiting Otavalo – you really have to go on a Saturday to get the full experience of the Indian market, however – and if you do come here, you’d make an excellent choice staying at Ali Shungu or their newer property, Ali Shungu Mountaintop Lodge.

In any case, I left Otavalo and returned to Quito, from where I’ll fly tomorrow afternoon to Cuenca. Most of the streets near my hotel were closed down, and while at first I thought there must be some festival going on, someone at my hotel explained that there’s no festival -- Old Town is like this every Sunday. The lack of traffic was fine with me, because the first thing I had to do was try to track down my glasses, which I’d stupidly left at any number of half a dozen restaurants or cafes before I traveled to Otavalo. I made a list of where I’d been – thank goodness for my blog, which was all the reminder I needed! – and started off for what I was sure would be a fruitless search. Unbelievably, the second place I checked produced my glasses. It took me all of five minutes to get them back. I said “Gracias” about a hundred times to the woman at the restaurant who found them, wishing I could say more in Spanish. But she clearly understood my relief and happiness, and now I’ve got my glasses back! After that I wandered around the city, able to see clearly into the far distance again, and took a couple shots of random subjects.

Cute girl posing beside horse. She looks like an ant next to that animal.

A quick shot of the Basílica del Voto Nacional from a street corner near my hotel.

But I was getting hungry, and I decided to try the food at my hotel -- Hotel Catedral -- as it’s always packed from about 11 a.m. until 4 p.m. At 2 p.m. there wasn’t a seat available in the restaurant, so I arranged to eat at a table in the lobby of the hotel. There were two lunch specials that day, and I chose the one that I more or less understood when I heard the waitress tell me what it was.

I ended up getting stewed beef that was mostly bone and fat, a nice soup of potatoes, maize, and carrots, a small serving of strawberries and cream, and a hard-to-drink glass of warm papaya juice (from a bottle, I think).

Looks better that it tasted. Or maybe it doesn't. Anyway, it was disappointing.

For $3.25 it wasn’t bad, but I could have done better elsewhere. I have no idea why so many people come here for lunch all the time.

After that disappointment I decided to hit an ice cream shop that was founded in 1858 – Heladeria San Agustín, which is located at 1053 Guayaquil Street, between Mejia and Chile.

This charming place is a must-visit for anyone traveling to Quito's Old Town.

They make all their ice creams here, and they also sell an assortment of cookies and other treats, as well as breakfast and lunch. Seeing that Christmas is just around the corner, they were all festived-up in greens and reds, and it was packed.

The employees here, who are apparently all part of the esteemed Alvarez Andino family, were very friendly.

I ordered a blackberry ice cream, which cost a mere 70 cents and was out of this world.

Lopsided but amazing.

From there I came back to my hotel to read, write some emails, and research Cuenca. I seemed to have fallen asleep for about half an hour, and it wasn’t long before I was hungry again – sorry, I know it looks like I eat twenty times a day, but in fact I’m just doing a poor job of describing the passage of time…

Anyway, when it was time for dinner I found myself in the same predicament as earlier – nothing was open! I ended up heading to the Plaza Grande to try some secos de chivo, which I’ve been dying to have since getting to Ecuador, but the restaurant I wanted to try was closed. The only other interesting option I could think of was Los Sanduches Hogarama, also on the Plaza Grande.

This place is in the perfect location: the Plaza Grande.

It was so crowded here that this was the best shot I could get of the sandwiches -- even my own.

This place was filled with customers eating there and taking their food outside. I ended up ordering a lomo de cerdo ahumado y queso, or smoked pork loin and cheese ($4.70), and a blackberry soda (a South American Pepsi product, apparently). It doesn’t look very appetizing in my photo – it’s hard to take photographs of food in very crowded eateries, especially knowing that everyone’s watching me and wondering what the hell I’m photographing a sandwich for – but it was very good. The quality of the pork loin and cheese was excellent, and there was an excellent yellow cream sauce that tasted slightly like oregano.

My sandwich was much, much better than it looks in this photo. Oh, and I won a free drink according to my bottle cap! Whoo! Too bad I forgot and threw it away...

Los Sanduches Hogarama is located at Oe4-36 Chile Street in the Plaza Arzobispal.

Ecuador, Day 5

The Indian animal market in Otavalo

I got up painfully early this morning to make it to the Indian animal market, which opens every Saturday at 6 a.m. It’s held about ten or fifteen minutes from where I’m staying, and I made the early morning walk in utter darkness. In fact, the only illumination came from the headlights of passing cars and trucks along the Panamericana highway, which I had to cross on my way.

As I mentioned in my last post, this market, as well as the craft and food market in the heart of Otavalo, is hundreds of years old, and it seems that for Otavaleños it’s a major social opportunity, too.

On my way to the market – actually, on the narrow edge of the highway, which dropped to a rocky river – I was held up by two Indians who decided to sell their large, waddling pig, which was willingly being led to market by a rope around its neck, to a man who ran up behind us. I didn’t stop to watch the entire transaction, though I did strain my eyes to see him wave three crumpled five dollar bills at them. He was reaching for more money in his pocket as I squeezed past them. I wasn’t exactly sure where I was going once I lost my leaders (the Indians and their pig), but it didn’t take me long to figure it out. All I had to do was follow the blood-curdling screams of pigs farther up the road. They were squealing because they didn’t want to go to the market, and despite their weight the Indians, in great feats of strength, pulled them across the highway. (On a paved highway, pig hooves are like skates, which makes it easier to pull them, apparently.)

My photos of people dragging pigs across the street didn't come out. These pigs were calm, like dogs being taken for a walk.

The animal market itself was really interesting, and for anyone traveling to Otavalo I highly recommend coming here. One sees all kinds of interesting things: angry cows charging through the crowd (watch the people scatter!); bleating sheep all pressed together; mules and horses; chickens in crates and makeshift pens; guinea pigs stuffed in cages; pigs everywhere; truck beds full of every variety of farm animal; and food vendors perched on a hillock, cooking up a storm.

Guinea pigs. In Spanish they're called cuy and are commonly eaten.

Crated chickens. You can see the chickens poking their heads out and looking around, wondering what on earth is going on.

In general cows are tranquil animals. These, however, were not happy being here.

I like the sheep. They're docile and stick together.

These guys were big, but they're weren't even close to the bigger ones I saw in the bed of a truck.

The food stands looked interesting, but I didn't want to risk getting sick...

I don't know if it's a weekend market thing, but whole roasted pigs were all over Otavalo today.

Speaking of storms, it started raining after about forty minutes, and since I’d seen, and smelled, quite a bit of the animal market already, I decided to head back to my hotel. However, once at the door I decided not to bother the guard I woke up to let me out initially, so I walked toward the Plaza de Ponchos to see if the Saturday crafts market was underway yet. Already at 6:45 the plaza, along with several of the streets around it, were filling with Indians setting up their vending booths.

I wandered around town for a while and came upon a bakery that had just opened.

On the corner of Morales and Bolivar Streets, if I remember correctly.

I ordered a croissant and a cup of coffee, and for the next half hour I had a conversation with the bakery’s friendly manager (pictured below), who ended up eating breakfast at my table and inviting me to the beach, which isn’t anywhere near Otavalo. I declined the offer, then excused myself to wander more around the market.

The guy in red liked to talk. He invited me to the beach with his family, but I said no.

For the next several hours I watched the Indian market grow, spreading further out in every direction. By noon, the market – the largest Indian market in all of South America – was easily the size of, I’d say, three or four Malls of America. It covered at least 70 square blocks, and the booths numbered in the thousands. Many vendors didn’t even have booths. Some of them simply occupied the sidewalk, or the middle of a pathway, while some wandered around selling their wares. It went on and on, and I’m not sure it EVER ended.

Colorful fabric stall.

Indian men buying and selling wool.

Chickens lying on the sidewalk in front of a mobile phone store.

I was afraid a strong wind would come and blow their spices all over the plaza.

A typical scene in the early morning. It got much more crowded as the day wore on.

You could even buy large paintings of local people and Otavalo scenery.

Maize stalls.

Colorful yarns for sale. Colorful building. Colorful Indian women.

This girl was supercute. She reminded me of a squirrel with more acorns than it knows what to do with. She was having a hard time holding all three of her toys.

There were many food stalls in the area of Plaza de Ponchos, but also along the surrounding streets. Some of the items being cooked and sold were familiar, but others were completely foreign to me.

Packages of snails with lemon wedges and chopped green onions.

Man carrying a whole roasted pig past a table holding a whole roasted pig.

I have no idea what this food is.

At around 10:30 I decided to head to the food market, which begins about five blocks away from the Plaza de Ponchos and continues for several blocks in various directions.

One very small part of the food market.

I took this from the start of the food market. The line of people almost looked like a pilgrimage of some kind.

At one edge of the amorphous market there’s a building – perhaps a central food market on weekdays? – inside of which are various food stalls, most of which specialized in whole, roasted pigs.

The stall in the food market where I had roast pork.

I plunked myself down on a bench and ordered what everyone else there was ordering: roasted pork, crispy pork skin, yellow potato patties, and steamed white maize.

I'd call this a snack. It was good!

It was excellent, and I could have had another plate but I wanted to save room for more food later. The cost of my dish, including a drink, was $3.50.

At around one o’clock I decided to get a taxi to a town called Cotacachi, which has been famous for hundreds of years for its leather works. The main street, 9 de Octubre, is lined for blocks with stores selling designer leather jackets, tote bags, purses, wallets, shoes and boots, belts, and so forth. Apparently there are serious deals to be made on these items, but since I’m not looking to load myself down further, I just walked around the streets to see what there was.

A quiet sidestreet in Cotacachi.

An interesting mural that I saw in Cotacachi.

Church in Cotacachi.

Cotacachi is a quiet town – UNESCO has called it a “city of peace” – and there doesn’t seem to be a lot to do other than shop. Before heading back I entered a cafe and ordered a malted milkshake at a café.

Cafe in Cotacachi.

I didn’t really know what I was ordering, but I should have known by the word malteado. For eighty cents, it wasn’t bad.

My big, unhealthy portion of sugar for the day.

I came back to Oltavado about an hour later and wandered a little more through the market. Since it was after two, I decided I should have a small lunch, so I found a tented area on the Plaza de Ponchos that made fried freshwater tilapia (from Laguna San Pablo) and ordered a plate.

Fried tilapia stand in Plaza de Ponchos.

Interestingly, people there ate their fried fish with their fingers, which is messy work. But I managed pretty well, and also downed some yucca that they added to my plate. For $2, I could eat this every day.

Yes, there's a plastic spoon there, but it was like rubber. Much easier just to use your fingers.

After that I went home and slept for about an hour and a half. I don’t feel like I need to slow down – I don’t feel like I’m doing all that much besides walking – but with all the Spanish I’m speaking (or trying to speak) I find that I get tired a lot quicker than I normally would.

I wasn’t sure that I wanted to go back into town for dinner, but one look at my hotel restaurant’s menu, which is neither Ecuadorian nor particularly cheap, and I decided to go to a seafood restaurant that I’d seen several times near the Plaza de Ponchos. Not surprisingly, it was closed – as most things seem to be when I decide to visit them. Since I had good luck with the huma and quimbolito at a food stand last night, I decided to go back. This time a stand selling meat and potato skewers caught my eye.

Looks can be deceiving, unfortunately.

One skewer only cost $1.25, so I opted for one and then walked toward a bench in the plaza and sat down. It took me one bite to realize that I might be in trouble with this food, yet I soldiered on as much as possible to eat this meaty mix. The texture and flavor were both really foul to me, but luckily there were tons of dogs running around the plaza and one came up to me with his nose working in overdrive. We shared my food. I was pleased to have the dog’s company and we talked and shared some laughs and had a good time together. Another dog eventually attacked him – playfully, as dogs will – and he quickly forgot I existed.

I went home, wondering if I’d get sick later tonight, and ordered another salad at the hotel restaurant.

Ecuador, Day 4

Today I traveled to Otavalo, a town of roughly 50,000 people, of whom more than 50% are indigenous persons. There are two extinct volcanoes nearby – Volcán Imbabura and Volcán Cotacachi – and, with a third mountain in the vicinity, they dominate the landscape. Otavalo is perhaps most famous for its weekend market, which the Indians in Otavalo have been holding since before pre-Incan times. Commercially, though, Otavalo is perhaps better known for producing some of the world’s best quality roses. Two dozen here cost a dollar – next time you buy some, ask your florist where they came from. There’s a good chance they’ll say Ecuador.

Otavalo is only a two-hour bus ride from Quito, however I had horrible problems this morning getting on one. First, I scarfed down a quick breakfast at my hotel and said goodbye to two travelers there who were also from Oahu, then I hit the pavement and started looking for a taxi.



One of the hotel employees ran out to find me and insisted on getting me a taxi, perhaps so he could explain where to take me. However, the taxi driver took me to the wrong station, and the employees there weren’t the least bit helpful about setting me straight. I ended up finding the right station eventually, but the ticket-seller there, who obviously wanted to be anywhere BUT there, told me there was only one bus to Otavalo and it left at 3 p.m. Looking at the clock behind her I saw I had 6 1/2 hours. I asked her where else I could catch a bus to Otavalo but she just shrugged and pointed at a chair where I could sit and wait. I paid $2 for the ticket and decided to get another taxi back to my hotel. However, none of the taxis would agree to use their meter and tried to charge me two or three times what I paid to get there in the first place. Finally I flagged down a driver who automatically used a meter, and after questioning him about my options I asked how much he’d charge to take me there directly. It took me a few minutes to agree, but in the end I decided to pay him $50 for the trip. I basically reasoned that by taxi I’d get there by 10:30 a.m., whereas the 3 p.m. bus would get me into Otavalo at around 5:30. That’s a seven-hour difference, and I figured that my time is worth $7/hour. The trip was great. The driver explained a great number of things we passed on the way to Otavalo.

Upon checking in to my hotel, the first place I decided to go was the Parque Condor (entrance fee $3.25), a Dutch-run foundation that takes in injured birds and helps them recuperate. I was a little late for the free condor flight demonstration, but as you’ll see in one of the photos below I got a demonstration anyway – straight from the bird.



The drive to the park is spectacular, as you climb a steep hill called Pucara Alto, which is populated by local Indians, offering expansive views of the green, rolling valley.



I was amazed by the variety of birds of prey and owls that they keep.




Not surprisingly, the condors were the big draw, although there were only four that I saw there. The weirdest bird I saw was a harpy eagle.



It had the body of an eagle but the face of an owl and the ears of a cat. That’s one bird I wouldn’t want to meet in a dark alley.

Following the Parque Condor I headed for El Lechero, a famous tree in Otavalo – and apparently the only one of its kind in the town – that the Indians believe has special healing powers and treat as being sacred.



It’s perched on a mound atop a hill, with the valley sprawling in every direction around it, and Ecuador’s largest lake, Laguna San Pablo, stretching out on one side. There are many farm plots around, and one sees fields of maize, potatoes, tomatoes, and quinoa growing all over the place. It’s a beautiful spot.





By the time I got back to town I decided to have lunch. After circling the Plaza de Ponchos a couple times, I ventured down Sucre Street and was lured into Restaurante Mi Otavalito by a roasted pig’s head to the side of the entrance.



I was given a menu as soon as I sat down, and I quickly realized that I didn’t know any of the selections on it. I asked what a few items were, and when I pointed to “Llopingocho de Otavalo” ($5) and the waitress rattled off a long explanation of various things it came with, I knew I found what I wanted.



I started off with crème de hongos ($1.80), which is a cream of mushroom soup. Not much to it – it was warm and creamy, and the mushrooms were predictably scant.



However, when my entrée came out I was amazed. I had no idea what was before me, but it sure looked and smelled good.



The dish came with stewed beef, two fried eggs, steamed white maize, a fried plantain, sliced avocado, a small salad, and two pulverized yellow potato patties. I had to ask what the meat, maize, and potatoes patties were, everything was so new to me. This was an exotic meal, for sure, and it was absolutely fantastic.

Mi Otavalito can be found at Calle Sucre 11-19 y Morales. Tel: 920-176. Hours: 8 a.m. – 11 p.m. daily.

As if that weren’t enough, on my way back toward Plaza de Ponchos I came across Shenandoah Pie Shop.



I’m such a sucker for pies, or anything sweet, so I went inside and ordered a cup of coffee and a piece of homemade blackberry pie with ice cream.



I had no idea how much pie and ice cream I was actually going to get – Ecuadorians definitely love their sweets – but I was pretty happy. The pie was unbelievably good. The crust was maybe the best I’ve ever had, and the blackberry innards were moist and fruity and sweet. Combined with those two scoops of vanilla ice cream, this was a serious treat, and one that I really didn’t deserve. But oh well. I’m hardly complaining! Altogether my dessert and coffee were well under $3 (I don’t remember the exact price), which is a great deal considering how much you get and how darned good it is.



Shenandoah Pie Shop is right on the Plaza de Ponchos: Calle Salinas (y Modesto Jaramillo) 5-15. Hours: 7:30 a.m. – 9 p.m. daily.

Although I was about to explode by this point, I still had to pass a number of Indian vendors to get back to my hotel, and I was drawn in fairly quickly by two women who were selling ponchos, scarves, throws, and blankets.



Although I had no intention of buying anything before coming here, and I’d promised myself prior to coming to South America that I wouldn’t weigh myself down with souvenirs, I couldn’t help myself. These women were selling high quality baby alpaca scarves for $5 – that a pre-bargain price! The baby alpaca blankets, which were sizeable, were $22 or $23. So what could I do? I bought two blankets after feebly bargaining them down to $20 each.



In the U.S., these blankets would have probably cost me six times that, at least. I have no idea what I’m going to do with them now, or how I’ll get them home. But no matter. I’ll deal with that when the time comes.

After a short rest I wandered through Otavalo and took some random photographs. I’ll put some of them below and try to add captions later.










By the time I finished wandering, the sun had gone down and I decided I should have dinner – though I can’t say I was particularly hungry. At the Plaza de Ponchos vendors were setting up tents in which they were cooking all kinds of stews, hot drinks, and exotic looking snacks.



I ended up taking a seat at a stand where a woman was cooking humas and something called quimbolitos.



The humas, as I wrote in a previous post, is basically pulverized maize steamed in a maize husk. Again, it tasted something like corn bread, but the quimbolito, with an airier texture than the humas, was sweet.



I also ordered hot milk sweetened with sugar and – the Otavalo answer to bobolo – containing something that was like cooked rice. Good stuff! And the damage to my wallet was a mere $1.25.

After I returned to my hotel I decided that I really needed a salad. My body wasn’t telling me this, but I knew that I would do well with some greens, which are hard to come by in a lot of the restaurants and virtually unseen in street stands.



The salad with a glass of red wine cost me $8.10. The range in food prices here and in Peru has been amazing. But since it’s a hotel restaurant – and a good one, apparently – the price isn’t surprising.