Beer and ice cream

The rest of our bus ride was uneventful, and not only because I managed to sleep through the second leg of our journey as well. (I’m now remembering how poorly I slept the night before because of the music that inexplicably blasted from some unknown loudspeaker in downtown Otavalo until well after midnight.)

But from what I did manage to see through the occassional cracked eyelid was stunning. We were descending from the 9,000 foot volcanic foothills of Quito to the lush, mountainous cloud forests along the western slopes of the Andes. At 4,500 feet elevation, the area would still qualify as high elevation in most other countries, but was markedly different than anything we had seen in Ecuador so far.

We seemed to be nearing the end of our journey around 3 pm. The bus conductor hopped off the bus for a quick minute as we passed through the cute little Main Street of what my cell phone map told me was Mindo (there was no announcement). Most of the people still on the bus at that point were clearly tourists. None of us knew what we were doing. While some people were getting off, several others were staying on. I didn’t think the bus went to any other cities after Mindo, but it’s not like these bus lines are know for their clarity or ease. Nearly everyone who takes the busses grew up riding them, and it’s obvious from the fare payment (the conductor just comes through with a basket, and everyone tosses in what they already know to be the price) to the departure times (when the driver says so) that these routes aren’t the main way visitors got from town to town. We took pride in choosing the more adventurous route (and in the saving of $150 over another private car ride), but also wanted to make sure we made it to our hostel that night. So I  decided to take my chances at what seemed to be the bus stop for Mindo. We quickly gathered our belongings, and we hopped off the bus with the few other tourists who clearly didn’t know what they were doing, either. We were barely able to convince the conductor to open the luggage compartment for us, and the driver was clearly not thrilled. He started rolling the bus forward as we were getting our bags out, and the conductor was in a full sprint by the time she hopped back on the bus. I guess that wasn’t the real stop. But we made it!

Not loving the vulnerability of lugging around more bags than people on a busy thoroughfare in a city I had never been to before, I quickly checked the map and shuffled everyone up a side street. But my caution was far more than what was necessary. After I realized that the first few people who approached us were genuinely curious about who the new visitors were (and not trying to size us up and steal our luggage), I relaxed enough to join the conversation. One person walking alongside us was visiting from Quito, another lived a block away, and they really were just saying hello. Apparently people still do that. How nice.

Our hostel ended up just being a few blocks away. It was a cute little family-run operation alongside a meandering river that ran through town. We had been spoiled by immediately becoming family with the owners of our last hostel, but the people who ran this hostel were plenty friendly in their own way. The desk clerk seemed a little frazzled when trying to find our reservation, but eventually led us to a room that would work very well. Not much in the way of a tour or introduction, but we got what we needed.

With our bus-terminal lunch leaving us wanting, our only real agenda item for that afternoon was finding a nice dinner. And boy, did we ever. On Alicia’s tip (weekend trips to Mindo are popular among the embassy staff), we found a Persian restaurant not far from where we got off the bus. Alicia told us it was easy to miss, but delicious. She was right on both accounts. It was a little 6-foot wide stall sandwiched between a basket shop and a panadería that was run by an Iranian refugee couple who somehow managed to settle in Mindo, Ecuador. What a strange and beautiful world we live in.

Aimee and I were already enthralled by the two (two!!) pages of vegetarian options. But beyond that, it was, by far, one of the most incredible meals we have ever eaten in this country or any other. Easily the best falafel I’ve ever had. And I’ve had a lot of falafel.

But, alas, the restaurant wasn’t perfect. It didn’t serve beer. And the 5,000 foot elevation drop brought a heat that we just weren’t prepared for. The kind of tropical heat that only a watered down, slightly chilled local beer can cut through. So we wandered the streets looking for a particular type of establishment that sold both beer and ice cream, and lied to our children that we were doing this for them.

I know. We’re so selfless.

Bus day!

We woke up early on Sunday to get a jump on our all-day bus adventure (and to have a handy excuse for skipping that week’s culto).

Mimi and Quinn spent no fewer than 30 minutes saying goodbye to Jose and Matilde, their Kitchwa grandparents that week. They were such lovely hosts. 

 

To that point, Jose offered to drive us to the bus station when it didn’t look like there’d be any taxis coming by. On our drive, I asked Jose how long he had been running the hostel. He told me that he started building it in 1975. And that’s not like when I say we are renovating our home when I really mean we’re hiring people who know what they’re doing to renovate our home. Jose himself was the one swinging the hammer back then.

His original intention was to use the massive estate as a home for all of his extended family. But like most construction projects down here, it advanced in fits and starts. When he earned some money, he bought some brinks. No money, no bricks. So by the time he completed the house 30 years later in 2005, his children had moved out to start their own families and his parents had passed away. (At that point in his story, I had to explain away my watery eyes as a sudden-onset banana allergy.) So he instead decided to open his home up to travelers. He’s been running the hostel ever since.

When we pulled up to the bus terminal, Jose pointed out the busses heading to Quito and sent us on our way with hugs and well wishes as if he were dropping off his own family. But as Jose pulled away to return to the hostel, our vibe suddenly switched from warm and fuzzy to sharp and observant. After all, we were in a busy South American bus terminal about to traverse over the Andes with two small children. We needed to bring our A game. I didn’t make things easier for ourselves by sending more suitcases than suitcase contents back with Alicia. So about a third of our possessions were stuffed into a couple of shopping bags and our dirty clothes sack. We were getting the full experience.

No more than 90% sure we were getting on the right bus, we loaded two of our bags (the two we could most live without) in the underside luggage compartment. The rest we carried with us to our seats. Once we were good and tucked in (and heard the driver yell out, “Last call, Quito!”), I realized that neither of our children had gone to the bathroom even once since waking up. This was not going to end well. There are no bathrooms on these busses, and every  South American bus driver I had ever encountered would sooner leave you on the side of the road than risk being late because of a bathroom break.

So I took one child under each arm and gave my best overwhelmed dad face to the driver while asking if they had time to go to the bathroom. “Bien rápido. Un minutito,” which loosely translates to, “If they have to poop, say goodbye to your bags and look for the next bus in an hour.”

I took him at his word and sprinted to the restroom with our kids. A wave of relief came over me when I felt enough small change in my pocket to pay the $0.15 fee to the attendant sitting outside of this and every other public bathroom we had encountered in the country ($0.20 if you want toilet paper). Although in all honesty, I would have gladly given her the $20 in my wallet.

Reminding my children through the open bathroom doors that we had to keep it quick, I nervously split my attention between them and the bus door. Still open. For now.

Mercifully, neither kid had a #2 sneak out on them, and we hopped back on the bus just as it was starting to roll away. Aimee had the hand sanitizer ready to go (no time to wash hands), and we patted ourselves on the back for successfully pulling off one of the more critical potty breaks of our parenting career.

The bus ride itself was delightful. We had long since discovered the time-warping power of audiobooks. So while Mimi and Quinn listened to the tales of magical forest creatures and trucks, respectively, Aimee and I marveled over the scenery and fell dead asleep, respectively.

I eventually woke up to the calls of “Cafe! Cafe!” from the hop-on, hop-off food vendors that these bus routes are known for. As nice as a coffee sounded, I couldn’t get my act together fast enough to fish a few coins out of my pocket. And if I’m honest, I didn’t want to be the next victim of questionable food choices. That hadn’t ever stopped me before (and how risky is boiled water and coffee grounds?), but when iron-stomached Aimee goes down, no one is safe.

We rolled up to the Northeast Quito bus terminal around lunchtime. Nearly every bus route in the northern half of Ecuador starts or ends in the city. But it’s a big city. So we needed to catch a cab across town to meet our bus for the second half of the journey. We saw a line of reputable-looking taxis waiting at the terminal when we got off the first bus, and I was feeling ready to give the Quito’s taxis another shot. And I’m glad I did. The driver was friendly, the pre-negotiated price was fair, and at least 50% of us had seatbelts available. Checked all the boxes.

We rolled up to the other bus terminal about 15 minutes later, and found the sign for the bus cooperative that runs to Mindo, our destination for the next few days.

I’m now realizing that I haven’t talked much about the cooperative system. Every neighborhood we visited throughout our trip, no matter how small, always had at least three pillars of the community: a financial cooperative, a transportation cooperative, and a small army of street-side produce vendors.

It’s pretty evident that all three of them feed off each other. The financial cooperatives function as micro-credit agencies that lend to the farmers, who bring their crops to town in the back of a pickup or bus from the transportation cooperatives. The cooperatives seem to be the product of government policy, foreign non-profit seed money, and grassroots ingenuity. I’m far from qualified to say with any certainty that the system works well. But it sure seems like it does. I see indigenous farmers walking into the financial cooperatives every morning to make a deposit and the 25 year old cooperativa drivers have meticulously maintained trucks that wouldn’t look out of place in the parking lot at an Arizona trailhead. Plus, I always know with absolute certainly that I’m never more than a half block away from a dozen mandarin oranges for a dollar. What’s not to love?

Where were we? Cooperatives. Bus terminal. That’s right. We knew the Flor del Valle cooperative ran busses to Mindo, but we didn’t have any idea about the schedule. I thought the busses ran every hour, but my information was outdated (as was often always the case in this post-COVID travel environment). After we watched several non-Mindo busses come and go from the Flor del Valle parking spot, Aimee talked with one of the cooperative employees who told her that there were only three Mindo-bound busses running each day. Oh boy.

I call this one “Surviving a 2 hour layover at a remote South American bus terminal on a hot afternoon with small children, too many bags, and not enough food.”

But we made it with our wits intact. The room temperature chocolate milk bottles and semi-stale cinnamon rolls from the bus terminal’s newsstand made a passable lunch for the kids. Aimee and I powered through on the miscellaneous nuts and energy bars we managed to scrounge from the bottoms of our backpacks. We’re on vacation. This is fun. We chose this.

How much for the alpaca?

Saturdays in Otavalo are market days. It's a scene. But since we had already been down there a few times (and didn’t need to encourage any more souvenir requests from our children), we opted to explore a few other sights around town. We would definitely be breaking our one-activity-per-day rule, but it was our last day in Otavalo and we wanted to make the most of it.

As we were getting ready to leave for the day, we were unable to find Mimi. But that was nothing new. She had become the little mayoress of Hostal Curinan, and was known to hang out in the office greeting new guests with Jose and Matilde. In fact, when we were looking for Mimi a few days earlier, I asked Jose if he had seen her. He replied matter of factly, “Mimi? She’s in the office. She’s always in the office.” And that’s exactly where we had found her this time, getting her hair braided by Matilde as the two of them chatted like schoolmates. Neither of them understanding each other’s language particularly well, nor seeming to mind. It's going to be hard to part these two when we leave tomorrow.

Our first stop was the local animal market (the same one that Lucia had tried to sell a pig at the week before). Whereas the main market is heavily geared towards tourists, the animal market was decidedly the opposite. I mean, what could a tourist possibly do with a possibly dead chicken or a very much alive alpaca?

Of course, that didn't stop Mimi from making a fairly convincing case to bring a rabbit home.

From there, we headed up (way up) to the foothills of the mountain range encircling Otavalo. The drive itself, while slightly nausea inducing, was nearly worth it on its own. It meandered through a hillside farming community and provided a stunning overlook of the nearby Lago San Pablo.

Our ultimate destination on that drive was an expansive nature preserve advertised as a Condor Park. It was, but that's selling it short. It's also a stunning cliffside overlook, a reasonably comprehensive aviary showcasing several local birds of prey, and also a window back into time. The park staff take rescued birds, large and small, and nurse them back to health as part of a traditional cultural practice with roots going back nearly 5,000 years. The birds are sent sailing over the city, always coming back. It’s completely under-sold, and was a very impressive operation.

Another family wandering around the park that day was from Eastern Oregon (originally Tanzania) with kids about the same age as ours. It was nice to chat with them a bit as our kids played together after the bird show (these kids know no strangers). Despite the parents appearing to be only a bit older than us, their work (something having to do with exotic snakes, they didn’t exactly go into detail) had allowed them to be within a year or so of retiring. They were in Ecuador that summer to scout it out as a potential destination. No one in the family spoke any Spanish yet, but they weren’t going to let that stop them. And we couldn’t blame them. There was a reason that nearly every foreigner we met in Otavalo had either retired there or was thinking about it. We were among the very few short-term visitors (although that was partly because the minimal but very visible drug violence in other parts of the country kept a lot of people away).

We swung by the main market on our way back. Quinn had his eye on a hand-carved wooden excavator he had seen a week earlier. We told him to think on it at the time, since we were going to keep non-wearable souvenirs to a minimum. He did, and to no one's surprise, he remained pretty focused on adding to his truck collection. But when we went back a few other times during the week, we hadn’t been able to find that artisan again. Quinn was sad, but surprisingly understanding for a 5 year old. So we figured we'd take another stab at it, and pass through for one last look when the market was in full swing. 

We ended up finding the artisan, but the excavator wasn’t out on his table anymore. Oh boy. Parenting. But Quinn demonstrated a reasonable amount of maturity, especially given his love for all things trucks. And in a positive reinforcement win for the ages, when the artisan heard us talking about how cool the excavator had been (as opposed to us having to stave off a meltdown), he told us that he had a finished one back at his workshop! After talking details with the artisan and then taking some much needed quiet time at the hostel, we returned again before dinner to reconnect boy and truck. It barely lasted 5 minutes before a big drop knocked off the wooden exhaust pipe, but Quinn didn’t care. He was in love.

Dinner that night was in a restaurant overlooking the market that we hadn’t seen earlier in the week. Quinn had actually discovered it when he noticed the first letters of his name mirrored those of the restaurant (Quinde, which I'm now realizing you can see in the top left corner of the photo above). It provided a stellar view over the market, and a charming end to our time in Otavalo.

Our taxi home that night was flagged by our children as they walked out of the restaurant. Mimi and Quinn, ever the small town kids, couldn’t get enough of just putting out their hand and having car stop for us. On more than one occasion, I had to apologetically wave off cabs overzealously flagged by our children when we were steps away from our destination. But by the end of the week, they were getting the hang of it.

I put my seatbelt on as we rolled away from the restaurant, pleasantly surprised that this cab had functioning ones for all of us. But just as we turned the corner and passed a police checkpoint, our driver reached over and released the buckle on mine. 

“There. That’s better.” He said. “Thanks for doing that.” This country is still clearly getting used to its traffic safety reforms. Our driver, making sure that our last night in Otavalo wasn’t too idyllic, presumed I had just put my seat on so he didn’t get a ticket. Nope. Mostly because I didn’t want to die. Tomato, tomato.

But perhaps the nicest part of the evening was that we had been out all afternoon, and Aimee didn’t have to abruptly excuse herself even once. She was finally turning the corner! Which was good, because we had a 5 hour bus ride the next day.

A day in the life

Aimee was still fighting off the last remnants of her stomach bug on Friday, so I took the kids into town to run some errands. ATMs compatible with international debit cards are relatively hard to come by in Ecuador (and are non-existent in the small town we were heading next), so we went to the main bank in town to get enough money for the next week or so. I gave the kids a quick lesson in travel safety when they ask-shouted in the middle of Otavalo’s busiest street, “HOW MUCH MONEY DID YOU GET, DAD?”

But thankfully Ecuador is a pretty safe place. Nothing came of it. And all fairness to our kids, they aren’t totally naive. They knew the town was safe enough, and could probably navigate it on their own at this point.

Walking around that morning brought to mind a moment from our last day in Cotacachi, when Lucia sent Samuel to the market for some eggs. Quinn wanted to tag along, and we knew that he’d be perfectly safe with the 10 year old. Kids are given more responsibility in environments like this, and with practice, live up to the expectations. 

Aimee and I definitely had to challenge ourselves to allow just the right amount of freedom for our kids to have their own growth opportunities that month. It wasn’t easy when we ourselves were out of our element, but it was definitely worth it.

Ok, I’ll figure out how to parent on my own time. We can get back to me having too much cash in my pocket. A new charango meant a new charango case.

This case says, “I went to South America this summer and I want you to know that.”

There weren’t a ton of options.

Since we were in no rush, we made a stop at our favorite cafe. It was Aimee and my favorite because they had fantastic coffee and a comfortable patio we could linger in while we figured out a plan for the day. It was the kids’ favorite because the juice glasses were the size of their heads.

A belly full of fruit sugars led to a particularly spirited round of Jenga.

It was a delightfully lazy morning, but we did have a few more errands to run. We needed some envelopes to go with the five handmade greeting cards we had bought in the market. So we went to a papeleria where I knew we’d be able to buy them individually. I absolutely love how stores are set up in this part of the world. Need a piece of rope? Go to the rope shop below the owner’s apartment. It’s between the wheelbarrow shop and the wire shop, just down the street from the nail and screw shop. But most charming of all, I needed some thread to fix a button on my pants. So I went to the thread shop, where I purchased a single sewing needed with a couple feet of thread already tied to it for all of $0.10. I almost felt bad taking the owners attention for such a small sale, but he didn’t seem to mind. With errands complete, we headed back to the hostel and were pleased to see Aimee functioning at no less than 80%.

That evening, Gloria, our neighbor from North Carolina, invited us, the Swiss/French resident, Jose, and Matilde to the common area of the hostel for some homemade brownies. But as she was baking them, her gas went out. Natural gas piping (or really any reliable plumbing for that matter) doesn’t exist in Ecuador, so everyone has small propane tanks attached to each of their appliances. Tank exchange trucks run through the city at all hours of the day, so a refill is never far away. In fact, the catchy, indigenous-flavored tune the trucks played to announce their proximity had become the soundtrack of our trip. All of us were humming it constantly.

After delaying our gathering first to 7pm and then to 8pm, she eventually just threw in the towel. Brownies weren’t in the cards for that night, so we met over some chips, tea, and whatever else anyone had laying around their room. It was great to get to know the other residents a bit better. We learned that Ernesto, the Swiss/French flute playing amateur pastor, kept coming back to Ecuador to escape the highly scheduled, routine-based daily life in Switzerland. That’s per his fully Swiss wife, who joins him for a coupe of weeks every summer and told Matilde that Ernesto comes down here because he loves that there are “no rules in Ecuador.” I think that’s a bit debatable, but I’m sure compared to Swiss life, Otavalo is a veritable Wild West.

Gloria had actually suffered a mild stroke earlier that year. But the health care in northern Ecuador is good enough (as was her love for the area) that she decided to stick with her plan of full time residence. The place was filled with a decidedly quirky batch of people (as are most hostels), and we loved every bit of it.

Where the cemetery is more fun than the park

Monday started off slow, at least to us. I had some work to do that day, so we didn't put much on the agenda. But apparently for every other person in Ecuador, the day started off with an earthquake. We had slept right through it. We wouldn’t have even known one occurred if Alicia hadn’t texted us to see how we were doing. We were completely fine, but apparently quite sleepy.

Amazingly, the earthquake was far enough from any population centers that, despite being quite jarring to anyone who was awake, it didn’t cause any injuries or significant property damage. Ecuador owes much of its unique topography to being the meeting point of several major fault lines (the rest to the volcanoes that those fault lines created). It has experienced some pretty serious earthquakes in the recent past, but thankfully, this wasn’t one of them.

Purely coincidentally, we had been planning on visiting the local cemetery that day. It wasn't because we were having any macabre thoughts from the earthquake, it was just the thing people did in Otavalo on Mondays. Seriously. Thursdays too, apparently. The local community (particularly the indigenous members) make a mini pilgrimage twice weekly to visit the graves of their ancestors and leave trinkets and food. It was like we were living through a scene from Coco. In fact, the whole place had a very festive vibe. There wasn’t a tear in the place. Everyone was friendly and welcoming. A few people stopped to chat with us, and seemed to genuinely appreciate having a few extra people at the party.

The only other event of note that day was when Aimee’s 2 hour timer from her lingering food poisoning went off just after lunch. So we decided to head back to the hostel. Quinn wanted another pickup truck ride, but I couldn’t subject Aimee to one of those in her current state. So I sent her and Mimi back in a regular car taxi, while he and I flagged down a truck and hopped in the back. Riding in the back of a pickup bed as often used for farm supplies as humans along the near-vertical road back to our hostel was about as delightful as it sounds. The only redeeming factor was the satisfaction I took in knowing how much money this $1.50 taxi ride was saving me over taking Quinn to Disneyland. This was his jam. Of course, Disneyland had seatbelts and paved roads, but where’s the fun in that?

The next day, we went into town to ask about the intercity busses. Aimee and I felt that the kids had earned their first South American bus experience. It's a rite of passage, and they've proved their merit. We'd be heading to another city in a couple of days, and this seemed like a fun way to do it. Plus it would save a healthy chunk of our travel budget over taking another private car ride.

Our plan was to send most of our bags back with Alicia and Isaias when they came to visit us later in the week for the 4th of July. The date is meaningless in Ecuador, but our embassy closes for US holidays. That meant Alicia would have the day off. With a lightened load, we didn’t feel like it would be too crazy to take a couple of kids on a four hour bus ride. Bag theft was a potential risk, but the busses otherwise had a pretty safe reputation. And Ecuador's busses looked more like the touring coaches we see tourists taking to the Grand Canyon than the retired school busses half filled with chickens that Aimee remembered from Nicaragua.

That afternoon, I went back to Jose’s taller. He was finishing up a beautiful little charango that was a bit smaller and much more durable than the one I bought before (it was constructed from a single piece of hardwood). So I justified buying it as a travel charango. At some point in my life, having a second, slightly tinier charango might make sense. Never hurts to be prepared.

The rest of the day was spent in and around our hostel. Jose and Matilde had told us when we checked in a few days ago that they host activities for the local children every Tuesday through Thursday afternoons (seriously, this place couldn’t get any cuter). By now, I had figured out that most of the additional programming at the hostel had a slightly religious tinge to it, but I wasn’t above sending my kids to Kichwa bible camp for a few hours of quiet for Aimee and a chance for me to figure out how to play one of the two charangos I now owned.

True to form, our kids snuck off within a few minutes to pick some of the blackberries that were abundant on the property (taking a few of their new local friends with them). And also true to form, they immediately returned as soon as the camp snacks were served. Praise Jesus.

Aimee felt well enough to go out for dinner again that evening. Our kids had already filled themselves up on the Body of Christ, but Aimee and I needed some real food. As we had learned the hard way, finding decent vegetarian food would be tricky. But we figured that one of the local Asian restaurants might have some promise. We had our eye on one that looked a bit nicer than the usual chifas we saw around town (a uniquely Andean take on Chinese fast food). It was. But when Quinn--already overstuffed on camp snacks--projectile vomited his California roll across the table, none of us really had much appetite for the rest of the meal. My hope (proven correct after he woke up ravenous the next day) was that he had just eaten more than his stomach could hold. We didn't need any other food borne illnesses in the family, and thankfully our luck seemed to be holding.

By Wednesday, most of my work responsibilities were behind me (and Aimee’s functional capacity was now at 3-4 hours per day). So we could venture out for a bigger excursion. One of the more popular sites around Otavalo is the Cascada (waterfall) de Pechuge. It was a lovely (and short) hike up to a stunning waterfall. Definitely our speed at that point in the trip. 

The tail end of the hike with through the on-site camping area, which included a pretty questionable park. Even Quinn (who was bombing down mountain bike trails at three years old) said at one point, “Dad, a lot things here are really dangerous.” I couldn’t have said it better myself, and thankfully we all escaped with limbs intact and free from tetanus. I still can't believe I let Mimi ride that zip line.

Thursday was the Fourth of July. No more meaningful in Ecuador than the third or the fifth, but it did mean that we got to see our friends again. They hadn’t been to Otavalo before, and it was nice to show them around for a change. We weren’t sure if they’d be able to make it, since there were some transportation industry protests planned for that day (the gasoline price had recently gone up), but they didn’t have any appreciable impact on the roads. The nice thing about Ecuadorean protests is that the relative security in the country (and still quite-low gas prices) take the edge of protests more than in places where conditions are a bit more dire (looking at you, Nicaragua).

We took our friends out to what looked to be (and absolutely was) the nicest restaurant in town. A whole page of vegetarian options! And we obviously needed to take them through Otavalo’s craft market before heading back for a lovely afternoon chatting at the hostel.

This town is fun. This town with wonderful friends makes me understand why at least two people at our hostel never moved out of their rooms. I was starting to think that there might be a third.