Ecuador Things to Do Tips by swesn

Plaza de Ponchos is the huge famous square in Otavalo. Famous for being a gigantic artesania market.

The Saturday Market is renowned here in Otavalo. Besides artesanias, there is a livestock market somewhere around town, thereby making the atmosphere very busy with locals streaming in from nearby towns.

However, the artesania market is there on the square everyday to cater to the tourists. Every morning, these Otavalenos will carry HUGE sacks of woollies on their backs and start laying them out patiently. By about 6pm, they again make the tedious task of folding everything back into the sacks and plodding home.

There is indeed a huge variety, from woollie bags, to sweaters, to scarves, to carpets, to hats, to gloves, etc... I guarantee that you will definitely walk away with a handful of plastic bags of shopping, even if you had psyched yourself beforehand 'Thou shall not purchase anything'.

I understand that they not only sell their own Otavaleno's weavings and sewings, they also bring in goods from Peru and Bolivia. Very resourceful. In fact, the Otavalenos must be the most business-savvy of all indigenous tribes around.

If you arrive on other days besides Saturday, unless you have really good reason to, I do not think it is necessary to stay til then. The artesania market on all the other days are sufficient to assuage your woollies needs. The quality and variety are indeed mind-boggling. In fact, on other days, with things being a little slow, you just might get better bargains.

Besides the square, you will find many shops all over the town centre selling similar woollies stacked from floor to ceiling. Gosh, a humongous number of Otavalenos (or those from other tribes) sure was working very hard to churn these quantities out.

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Lago de San Pablo is so-so. The nicer lake I believe is Laguna Cuicocha. To go there, you need to hire a taxi (rather expensive) and this is more economical if you are in a group.

If you are alone and have a day to spare, you can try this little day-trip to Lago de San Pablo.

Take the local bus to San Pablo. It is right at the east end of the lake. Once at the town, ask around for a path that leads to the lake. It is generall heading west back towards Otavalo.

You will be walking along the old road running through the north of the lake that was used before the Pan American Highway was built along the south of the lake. Soon, you can see the lake in the distance.

At the next tiny village, Aragua, there is a semi-path that leads right to the lake. Well, it looks like a normal lake, with many Otavaleños doing their laundry along the river leading to it. Apparently, Lago de San Pablo is stated as the largest lake in Ecuador or something.

Along the way, to be honest, I felt a little nervous at first, having read that the guidebook said not to walk alone due to armed robberies but as nothing bad had happened recently, just be brave. Oftentimes, the locals were staring at me really hard and many vehicles which passed by gave me little beeps on their horns. I always wondered what that was for.

In general, I guess the locals are just curious and mildly harmless. Just enjoy the country-side, the little houses and farms along the road, the cows, pigs, dogs and even a dead mouse or two… and of course, the misty view of Volcano Imbabura nearby.

And there are many lovely smells to enjoy. Eucalyptus trees!! They are found along the sides of the mountains and at one point, right by the old road. This is also your only chance for a pee-break as you can try and hide behind the trees, for the rest of the way, you are really quite exposed along the road or in front of someone's yard. Sometimes, I can also smell the aroma of 'palo santo' which are holy sticks that guys use to burn for religious practices.

[to be continued]

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[continue from Lago de San Pablo]

After about 2 hours, the old road turn off left but a stony path continues straight on. Take the stony path and soon, you will hear the sound of waterfall down in the forest to your left. Keep walking along the stony path until you reach the bottom to a small town (Peguche) where there is a more obvious path into the woods to your left. This should be within half an hour.

Following the path, you will finally arrive at Cascada de Peguche - a waterfall. Again, this is nothing to write home about but hey, you have arrived so bask at the pretty little waterfall for a moment.

Following the path (not retracing your steps, but another path that continues on), you will walk through more pleasant woods and get to a side-road for vehicles where you can wait and catch a minibus back to Otavalo easily.

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Imbabura Volcano is the towering volcano you see as you walk along Lago de San Pablo.

The slopes of and areas around Imbabura are very fertile. You can observe many farms growing maize, sugarcane, and beans.

Standing at 4,630m, it is nearly always enshrouded in clouds. If you are those who come to Ecuador to climb every volcano, you certain can do this one. There are apparently 2 different routes. One is not difficult and people of no formal mountain-climbing experience can achieve it, provided he/she is in good physical health. The other needs rock-climbing experience, where helmet, harness, ropes are needed. It is also possible to walk around the open crater.

I can offer no tips except to engage a trusted travel agency to guide you up there and be very prepared for the cold.

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El Panecillo means 'little piece of bread' in Spanish.

This refers to the little hill in the southern end of colonial Quito. Quito is a long city (like a sausage) of about 35km in length and 5km wide. From the top of the hill, facing north, you will see the New City of Quito stretching ahead. This is the 'richer' part of Quito. Facing south, you will see the 'poorer' section of Quito.

At its peak, there is a monument of a Madonna with Wings, also known as 'Virgen de Quito' (Quito's Madonna). From several narrow alleyways of colonial Quito, you can capture a pretty image of this unique and iconic virgin.

I was driven here at midnight by my hosts. Frankly, colonial Quito at midnight is frightfully eerie as not a single shop is opened and nearly all the streets are empty of cars. But my friends were determined to show me a night-view of Quito and we endeavoured to find the way up the little hill. We found the way heading DOWN, not UP, so... would you believe it, my friend REVERSED his car up all the way (so that we would be facing the 'right' direction, if you know what I mean).

At the top, there are some fancy restaurants and security guards (poor guys, freezing in the cold). This area was notorious for crimes, and I guess this is Quito's city council's way of increasing police control to tackle this issue.

Frankly, the view of twinkling Quito, both north and south, was worth it. Very strategic location and not too far or difficult to go. Go prepared for the cold as although I call it a 'little hill', the peak is about 3,000m above sea level. This is because Quito is quite high in altitude, being named the 'second highest capital in the world'.

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Directions: small hill in the center of the city

Quito's colonial Old Town is quite pretty and charming, with many undulating, narrow, cobble-stoned alleyways and cul-de-sacs. Sometimes, above you, are stone archways, some lanes are so narrow the pedestrian path is enough for only 1 skinny person to crab-walk through.

Years ago, colonial Quito was very very very dangerous. It was dirty and crowded and petty crimes and armed robberies were rife.

Around 2000 or earlier, the government pumped in a lot of money to clean the whole place up. They relocated the street-stalls to some 'centro comercial'. They repaved the pedestrian walkways. They literally cleared the rubbish off the street. There was increased police patrol.

However, it does not mean that one can throw caution to the wind now. My friends still preferred not to carry any bags, putting all they need in their pockets and well, they had to keep touching themselves all the time just to be sure.

Also, Quito used to be painted entirely white due to a *probably misguided* notion that the white limestone of the paint is a disinfectant against the smallpox epidemic in 1756. In the late 1980s, after a survey where the Quitenos apparently complained about the city being 'too white', some art historians poked about and scraped some of the white paint off and discovered the true colours of the original buildings.

In an effort to restore the town to pre-smallpox-epidemic glory, the buildings are now repainted in all shades of pastels. Lovely!!

The other interesting thing the city council did was to add special lightings to the most important buildings like the churches of San Francisco, La Merced, Santo Domingo and the Basilica, making the whole place truly enchanting at night. There are some fancy blue lights coming out of the plaza in front of La Merced and the lights shining upon the Basilica changes colour all the time. This must be an attempt to prettify the city to the whole world after Quito won the right to host Miss Universe 2004.

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Colonial Quito has several large plazas, and frankly, a few of them look as impressive as any main plaza of most colonial towns.

But the MAIN plaza of these impressive ones is Plaza de la Independencia, with gardens, benches, and fountains.

The main Cathedral, dating from 16th century, naturally faces the plaza.

To the west, is the Palacio de Gobierno (Government Palace). This is where the president resides and when I was there, there was a row of barricades in front and a troop of armed female guards clad in serious army-fatigues and holding shields. This is usually where protesters and demonstrations are held. This is also where poor villagers (who are paid a couple of dollars of lunch money) gather and follow some organisers to 'support' the president when the situation calls for it. They add 'mass'.

In the past 10 years, quite a handful of Ecuador's presidents had been ousted from their seats.

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Another fantastic plaza is the Plaza de San Francisco where the San Francisco Church, Monastery and Museum is located.

In the interior, while there may be some parts covered up by restoration, you will still be awed by the rich style that is known 'Baroque School of Quito'. This style apparently is a fusion of Spanish, Italian, Moorish, Flemish and indigenous art. It truly looked very old indeed, with creaky wooden floorings and magnificent frescoes.

Construction of this church and monastery took 100 years to finish. However, I heard an interesting story associated with this. Well, I hope I got the church and story right. If I am wrong, perhaps, a Quiteno can very kindly correct me.

The legend has it that the guy who was supposed to construct this church, squandered all the money on drinking. On the last day before the deadline, he made a pact with the Devil. If the Devil could construct the entire church in one day, the Devil could have the guy's soul. Well, the Devil constructed the church but just as the deadline was up, he missed out on one stone... how and why, I do not know. So, the Devil could NOT have the guy's soul and the guy still got the church (nearly). Apparently, there IS indeed one stone missing somewhere behind the church.

The Plaza de San Francisco was built over an Inca temple, as discovered recently by archaeologists. This is the reason why the church appears higher than other structures around Quito.

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The other impressive plaza is Plaza de Santo Domingo.

Personally, this is a good place to start exploring the colonial Quito because the Trole (Quito's tram system) from the New City stops right at the square and this is nearly the last stop before it heads out of the city-centre. So, it is good to have a cursory view of the city-centre from the Trole first and then, hop off here and start meandering back to La Basilica on foot.

If you are a church person, why not pop into the church and monastery of Santo Domingo which has rich wood-carvings and an interesting chapel next to the main altar.

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Other churches of note include:

- La Compania, which has the most ornate and riotously sculptured exterior and interior.

- La Merced, which has Quito's oldest clock and on 23 September, they celebrate the festival of the Virgen de La Merced. I presumed this is celebrated every year. More about the celebrations later in Local Customs.

- La Basilica, this still-under-construction church is located 7 blocks northeast of Plaza de la Independencia. It was apparently modelled after Notre-Dame de Paris, so you will see the usual gargoyles, stained-glass windows, bronze doors, etc... I went during a service and boy, was there a massive crowd going in and coming out. I squeezed in and the entire hall was packed with devotees solemnly holding candles and singing 'hallelujah'. It was an impressive experience.

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