Category: Uncategorized
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The Festival Of Fruit & Flowers
We spent Valentine’s Day, February 14th, figuring out how to get to Ambato from Mindo. We left early in the morning on the 14th, but just missed the direct bus out of the Mindo town center. We had to get a taxi up to the highway (which some local woman hitched on to, but we,…
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The Many Birds of Mindo
We left Quito on the 8th February to go to Mindo which is described as a bird-watcher’s paradise. We heard the best place to get a bus from Quito’s many and confusing bus stations was from La Ofelia terminal, and we didn’t have to wait long. The journey was fairly easy, although the road suffers…
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Mercado De Otavaleños
The evening of February 6th Colin came with me to the bus station and helped me get my ticket and on the bus to the city of Otavalo. I was on the bus around 4:00 PM and arrived in Otavalo around 7:00 PM. During the bus ride I passed numerous volcanoes, including one called Imbabaura…
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Quito: The Middle Of The World
First impressions of Quito were not good. The traffic, pollution, and the up and downs of the roads at the high altitude all added up to an uncomfortable experience. Our hostel was located near the old town of the city, the colonial area. However, the transport system was terrible, in terms of a lack of…
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Ambato’s Natural Science
On February 1st we caught a bus in the morning out of Banos, arriving in Ambato just 1 hour or so later. Since we had pretty much the entire day, we decided to head out straight away after checking into our hotel and filling upon some sandwiches. We were lucky and found a nice hotel…
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Whiteout In Banos
We drove the short journey through the jungle from Misahualli to Tena on the 29th January. Changing buses was a bit of a pain in the ass as the bus station in Tena was small and hopeless, but we managed it and continued on our way to the extremely touristy town of Banos. Well known…
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More Jungle At Misahualli
We decided not to stop at Tena in Ecuador, and instead changed buses there for a visit to the small town of Misahualli. We arrived on the 26th January and were quite shocked to see that the whole town was just a few blocks squared, with the main plaza completely dug up and under construction.…
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Puyo: A Nice Diversion
The Pastaza department is located in Eastern Ecuador and it’s capital, Puyo, is the administrative and political capital of the area, and is one of the country’s fastest growing cities. We found a simple hotel in Puyo’s busy and dirty center, and after a small investigation we headed out into the small city. We went…
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Head-Hunters Of The Amazon
On the evening of January 21st Colin and I arrived in Macas (originally called ‘Sevilla del Oro’ by the Spanish, but now named after the Macas Indians) in the Morona Santiago province, in the Upano Valley. The Upano Valley is famous for its agricultural product such as bananas and coffee. We were pretty exhausted, and…
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The Cañari Of Cuenca
We found a hostel in Cuenca on the 12th January 2015 called Hotel Check-Inn. The location was OK, as was the relative price, but other than that the place was a bit loud and annoying. The center of Cuenca is a good-looking UNESCO World Heritage colonial town, albeit just as polluted as other cities and…