Hola Amigos!
Yesterday we had decided to go to Otavalo just for the day so we could see the market. At breakfast we hummed and hawwed agian about whether we should take the hostel tour up or take the bus. See on the tour, we don't have to do anything, but it costs $25 a person, but on the bus it costs only $2 a person. We decided to remain with our original plan and take the bus. We grabbed a cab to the bus station. They must be cracking down on having too many people in one vehicle, becuase the cabbie didn't want to take all 5 of us. So we had to pay a little extra, then we were off. He dropped us off just outside the station, and we thought he was jipping us off by not going into the station, but the bus right in front of us was going to Otavalo, so we got on, and 5 minutes later we were on our way. The road was mountainous, and the tv was showing the shopping channel, which didn't have any good deals. About two hours later we arrived in Otavalo. We walked about four blocks and then bam, there we were in full on market. There was a large square filled completely with stalls and stalls spreading out on the streets leading to the square for several blocks in most directions. The main square was filled with tourist stalls, with the side streets having the local needs. The tourist stalls were filled with sweaters, weavings, wood stuff, etc, etc, the standard. The stall owners were polite and not really pushy at all. Sara and myself headed out, and picked up a number of things. The bargining was not aggressive either, it was pretty easy to get what you wanted, at a realitively good price. After a couple of hours it started to rain, which put a dampner on things, as many of the stalls cover there stuff up. We were getting hungry by this point and headed to a pizza place. I was still scared of pizza after food posioning in Tena, and so ordered the pasta, what a mistake as the pizza the others got was great. Sara says better than great, it was phenomenal, as it was cooked in a wood fired oven. The place was dutch owned, but they didn't skimp on flavor.
After lunch it continued to rain, but we strolled through the plaza again on the way to the bus depot. About 30 percent of the stalls were already packed up as 3pm. The buses to Quito were all lined up, and as soon as one was full, the next one started loading. We got on the second bus, and only waited 5-7 minutes for it to fill up. I napped on and off for the two hours back to Quito.
After reading for a while we went back to the place we had eaten at the night before for dinner. Red Hot Chilly Peppers, a Mexican place that served the best fajitas. You got the tortilla shells all warm with a plate of rice, guacamole, beans, and cheese, as well as a shizzlingly hot plate of beer and onions. It was very good. I had chocolate ice cream for dessert, everyone else was full, but they all were drooling over it.
Today we slept in. It was very nice to sleep in. After a late breakfast we started walking towards Old Town Quito. In the park on the way there was quite a number of vendors selling similar stuff to that which we saw yesterday in Otavalo. We found one original stall selling some nice silver jewelery, which Sara enjoyed, and purchased. Just as we got to the Grand Plaza we heard music which sounded live drifting out of a building. We entered to explore. In the inner courtyard there was a live band playing some good latin american music. We are not sure if they were from Ecuador or another country. After they played a couple of songs some dancers came out. It was very colorful and entertaining. I think from the sign they were performing part of a latin american opera. After the first set of dancing was complete, Sara got pulled up on stage to dance. She was out 'hipped' by the 10 year old dancer showing her the moves. But she held her own, and did get the moves down in the end. She ended up losing the fan voted favorite to an old Ecuadorian woman, but she placed 2/5. Sara: I think i didnt get first because Elders come first! The elder also seemed to already know the dance. Then the band came out for another set. We bought their CD. After that there was another round of dancing with some scary masked guys. It was very entertaining, we were all very happy we stumbled in on the performance.
After it was done we went into a shop and found for the first time in Ecuador, chocolate. Organic Ecuadorian chocolate, 75% coco at that. What a great find for Easter. We very much so enjoyed it.
We went back to lunch at the place we seem to always eat lunch at while in Old Quito. We finally got the soup that we wanted, and it was all that we had thought it was going to be, and maybe a little more. Probably my favorite soup so far, and that is saying alot. Sara enjoyed the cheese and potato empanada, I was getting full, and thought it was so so.
We were on a culture kick after seeing the great performance in the morning, so we were very excited to find a theater across the street from the restruant that had a performance on that afternoon. We bought our tickets at the flower shop (very cheap flowers here, a dozen roses for $1.90, if we lived here Sara would get more flowers) and went into the old theatre which was massive, but had fire damage. The upstairs had been badly damaged and the roof over the seating area was replaced. There was probably 20 people to watch the show, in a 250 person theatre. It was a clown comedy with street type acts. Juggling with errors, unicycle, and to finish off a ribbon act where they hang from the ceiling. It was all in spanish, and the actors were young and made mistakes. The performances were not as skilled as those you see in the street performance festivals in North America over the summer. However I didn't mind it. The best was the female clown who looked and acted very much like our good friend Jen Pebbles. Jen I think that we have found your Spanish speaking sister, because sometime I thought it may have been you up there. During the performance it poured outside, which made quite a drumming on the new metal roof, so much so that you couldn't hear the performance.
After the show had ended it was 4:30pm, so we jumped on the trolley and headed back to our hotel. Just after I started writing this a group of 30 young Quebec students arrived at the hotel. They are very loud. It will be interesting how much sleep we get tonight. Tomorrow in the evening we head home. I'm not sure if we are going to spend more time in Old Quito tomorrow or head to a tourist attraction on the Equator. Either way, I am having trouble thinking will all this loud french around me, so until later. Happy Easter.
Tyson and Sara
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