A Volcano, A Market and An Old Town

After all of the excitement of Banos, Tyler and I left on Thursday night and headed to Latacunga; a town located relatively close to the Volcano Cotopaxi which we were hoping to trek up the following day. Upon arrival at our hostel we managed to booked a tour to the North side. The Kiwi working at the hostel continued the South American trend of trying to convince us that we were woefully unprepared and would be unable to complete the tour. As it turns out the warnings were completely unnecessary and our canvas shoes and single pair of socks were more than adequate for the trek up the Volcano.

Getting ready to head up...

Although the walk to the Glacier was only an increase in altitude of 500m, the fact that we were already at 4500m meant that it took the best part of an hour to reach the snow line. Whilst we both wanted to trek all the way to the crater, it was a two day hike that we simply didn't have time for. On the way up there was some pretty incredible scenery, particularly of the trenches that were formed by previous lava flows. Apparently if the Volcano explodes it can reach as far as Quito that is over 100km away (it is due to erupt in the near future so I was slightly disappointed that we didn't get to see any action on the day!!

The Rocky Road Ahead

A Previous Path of Destruction

Losing My Glacier Virginity

The Summit

Overall the trip to Cotopaxi was definitely worth it and if I ever return I will try and reach the crater which is just under 6000m above sea level. The day trip finished at around 2pm so Tyler and I decided to try and make it to Otavalo that afternoon so that we could attack the markets early the next morning. After some very efficient travelling and some slight confusion as to whether we had missed the town we arrived in Otavalo at around 8pm. For dinner we snacked on some Ecuadorian street food that may have come back to bite me the following evening however we were fully primed for a day of shopping at one of South America's biggest markets.

On Saturday we woke up at 6am and headed to the animal markets which was quite an experience...



Before



And After



Looking down on the action



Being Rather 'Cuy'

After all of the excitement at the animal markets we headed back into town to the clothes markets where just about every South American style and material was available to purchase. Tyler did his fair share in supporting the local economy however I only bought one pair of socks...South American fashion isn't really my cup of tea!

Interesting choice of colours

Our 'day' at the markets lasted two and a half hours so we were on the bus to Quito just after 9am. We arrived in Quito at around midday and after checking into our hostel we headed out for a bit of sightseeing in the Old Town.

The Basilica



My Favourite Type of Sightseeing...20X Zoom



On Saturday night we headed out to La Mariscal District in Quito's New Town which was a bit of a disappointment however I decided that due to the lack of distractions in Quito I would do a 5 day (20 hour) Spanish Course in the hope that my Spanish will improve over the remainder of the trip. The lessons were $7 an hour and throughout the week we managed to cover numerous tenses that I will have to put into practice over the coming weeks...watch out ladies!!

Happy To Be Finished

I left Quito on Friday afternoon with Michael (An Irish Guy) and spent the weekend in Cali, Colombia. On Saturday we headed to a Salsa Bar which was rather depressing...I think I will have to get a few lessons in the near future. Apart from that nothing particularly interesting happened here except I managed to hear probably one of my favourite travel quotes of all time:

Michael: "Hey mate, do you know what the exchange rate to the pound is?"

Dan (Englishman in our room): "No sorry have no idea, I just take the money from the ATM. You only live once!!"

So far on my trip I have heard YOLO used on numerous occasions but I never imagined that it would be used in the context of refusing to check a foreign exchange rate. I originally thought that similar to us, Dan may have just arrived in Colombia and could therefore be excused however it turns out that he has been here for 3 months...let's just hope for everyone's sake that his life and travels take a slightly more exciting turn than defying social norms through foreign currency exchange.

Anyway tonight I'm heading off to Bogota to meet up with Doug whom I will be travelling with for the next 12 weeks...no doubt some exciting times lay ahead and hopefully he will provide plenty of material for my future posts!