OTAVALO

Now Otavalo is our kind of place! Away from the maddness of the big cityof Quito. Took the bus from Quito and thought it would be about 1 1/2 hr. trip but got the milk run bus instead of the "rapido" so it took an extra hour to go about 50 miles. We even got to watch on old John Travolta movie on the way, all in spanish of course. The scenery was beautiful, tons of huge green houses full of roses. We are staying in a very cool place, Hotel Otavalo. It´s an old colonial building that has been restored with great interior courtyard and our room is the only one with a view of the volcano....primo room for $34 a night. Place is imaculate and very well kept up. We have taken lots of pictures but don´t have internet available so will send some when we can use our computer (we are at an internet cafe now). We had a four course lunch at our hotel today for $3 each consisting of fresh watermelon juice, hearty cabbage meatball soup, a kind of flank steak loco moco, rice, home fries, broc/cauli/pear veggie and homemade grape jello for dessert. We should have split it but had no idea how much food there would be.

We cruised the famous Otavalo native market this afternoon along with the food market. Got some great pictures of the various vendors, you´ll love the pictures. Food has been great with alot of different flavors, everything is fresh and made from scratch with lots of fresh herbs. The local indeginious people are visually striking with high cheek bones, radiant dark skin and shinny black hair. They are a very gentle people by disposition. Sorry, we´ll have to send pictures later when we can use our computer.

We are off north to Cotacachi for acouple of days.

Chow!