small town travelin' chica

¡hola!
literally just got back from the weekend adventure in ovatalo and peguche. otavalo is this tiny little town that revolves around the market pretty much everyday. a group of 13 (HUGE awkward gringo group!) travled there saturday morning, after an exciting outing in gringolandia on friday night, and hit up the market. spenser, kristina and i decided to stay there overnight... so we split off from the tourist group early and staked out our hostel. it was a great little place... 10 bucks per night, including breakfast, with some hammocks and a sweet view. (the hammocks obviously sold me. duh.) oh. and the bed was about 5 bajillion times more comfortable than the plywood piece of trash i sleep on in quito. good.ness. bottom line: it was nice.

we hit up the market for awhile and i was definitely overwhelmed with vendors calling me 'amiga' and all of that nonsense to get me to buy things. but nothing cures a feeling of overwhelming-ness (totally not a word...) like a piece of pie. and what do you know? there just happened to be a pie place on the corner! so out of place in ecuador (basically if it looks like good food, it is probably out of place). the three of us indulged in pie for lunch (hey... it's better than street vendor food!) and forged our way back through the market.

after the market adventure we purused the lonely planet guide to see what to do... but otavalo is so small and the options are definitely limiting... so. we CLEARLY chose to go hike to the magic tree. yes, the magic tree. it supposedly has healing powers and fun things like that. and let's be honest, i could use some healing powers at this point in my journey. anyways. we started heading in the direction we thought was correct... and as per usual, we ended up in the incorrect place but saw some cool things on the way. we took a small cobblestoned road way up a hill and saw the way the locals live... it was neat and kind of shocking at the same time. i just can't believe the way some people live... and they were tilling the fields by hand at 6 pm on a saturday. it just never ceases to shock me. we finally made it to this ridge and just sat down and looked out over the town... i like being up high... it makes me feel much calmer as the hustle and bustle of the cities stresses me out... especially since i can't understand 98.73857% of what is said to me. but anyways. good views. good talks. and hopefully good pictures. we headed back down before dark and nearly got chewed to bits by some dogs (no worries. we escaped unscathed.)... and stumbled upon a festival for inti raymi, the sun god (now known as saint paul... i think?) there were some sweet costumes, cool dances and no gringos, so it was fun to kind of see real life there minus the tourists. i enjoyed watching it. after that, we headed back to the hostel and crashed in the hammocks for awhile. (seriously... nothing is better than a book, an iPod, a hammock and a view of a volcano from a roof. promise.)

the next day (today)... we were up and moving at 7:30... grabbed breakfast and hit the market for an hour or so. i got some cool things for people, which is always fun... and we (kind of) successfully bartered just a little bit. then we caught a bus to peguche, literally a small speck of a town in the middle of nowhere. we went threre to see this waterfall (una cascada)... which was free (bonus points!)... and really beautiful. then we hiked a bit and sat on a big tree spanning a small river downstream of the waterfall. it was pretty sweet. i'm liking the off the beaten path stuff the best so far. (american tourists are seriously the most annoying species alive. trust me.) we headed back into town, sampling empanadas, some strawberry cream thing, and helado (ice cream) along the way.

now we are back in quito... after a successful bus ride. complete with live rooster and lots of bizarre smells. (a bus ride here just would not be complete without bizarre smells.) and spenser and i are plotting how to successfully bag our dinner tonight and make peanut butter and banana sandwiches with fresh nanners from otavalo. (we also stocked up on bags at the market for special occasions such as this.)

bottom line: a good weekend trip. ecuador is really beautiful... even amidst the craziness. and although i have to ask myself 'where the hell am i?!' roughly 10-plus times everyday... i am slowly adjusting to life in south america. (slowly. and i would still kill someone for a big burger and REAL milk right now.) later skaters.