Otavalo and Baños

When we got back from the Galapagos, we intended to go into the Amazon for a few days. However, we returned at the exact same time as Carnaval, so all of the tour agencies were closed.

Instead, we decided to move on to our next stop, a small town called Otavalo. Otavalo is known for its enormous Saturday market, but since it was in the middle of the week and it was Carnaval, almost everything was closed.

The market

We then moved on to Baños, a small town about three hours south of Quito, known for its thermal baths. Most of the time in Baños was spent relaxing, and the second night we took a "Chiva" (a sort of mini-bus with no doors) up one of the nearby mountains to see a view of the city. It was quite scary, but definitely an interesting experience.

The waterfall

Our Chiva

Today we´re off to Riobamba, a little more than an hour to the south. On Sunday we hope to take the train to the Devil´s Nose, which is supposed to have amazing views of all of the surrounding volcanoes and mountains.