A two hour bus journey from Quito leads to the town of Otavalo, famous for this Saturday markets. There’s a lot more than just the markets that make this town great, there are no less than four volcanoes surrounding the area, three lakes and several small villages. It takes some hiking to get around (or…

The TeleferiQo is an amazing cable car that takes you up 2.5km along the volcano Pichincham, making it one of the highest in the world. The summit is another 3 hour hike that I decided wasn’t the brightness idea to attempt. Even at this height the altitude was taking some getting used to, and I’m…

Because I’m such a giant baby when it comes to getting stabbed with needles, the option for the Typhoid vaccine in pill form was a blessing. I was already sacrificing my arms with Hep A/B and Yellow Fever jabs, so it was a little hard to pass up an oral vaccine that lasts two years…

As fate would have it, I’m in Quito at the time it’s going nuts wrapping up the year for being the Cultural Capital of America for 2011. It’s been non stop entertainment, and even now at 9pm there’s a swarm of people marching the down street outside the hostel banging drums and generally being noisy!…

The one thing you read about arriving in Quito is give yourself a couple of days to acclimatise. The city sits 2850m above sea level, and yep do you notice it. Mainly it’s just being short of breath, but after 5 days of being here it’s no so much a problem anymore.  That there to…