July 2
Otavalo
Otavalo is a small town with a population of approximately 90,000, but hosts one of the largest textile markets in South America every Saturday. It was over two hours on the main road from Quito.
Although we missed the morning live animal sale (thankfully), instead enjoying a view of a local lake and listening to local indigenous music, we certainly made it to the market while it was plenty busy.
The market was a familiar twisting and turning labyrinth of stalls, where sellers acted as members of a team to provide change (although more often a sales technique to have none) and monitor potential sales. Some sellers appeared to have several stalls far away from one another. The maze made it difficult to find the way back to a previous favourite, which was probably a detriment to the seller.
There were so many amazing things to buy, We had to remember that there is only so much room in our packs to take things home. Ecuador is famous for its hand woven alpaca blankets, scarves, sweaters, indigenous jewellery and indigenous music.
We had an authentic lunch at a local restaurant, a two course meal with soup (we saw sellers at the market eating the same soup!) and a slice of beef under an egg. We even ventured into some cut up tomatoes.
After lunch we more efficiently made our way around and bought a belt, two blankets, a tablecloth and a runner for our buffet. We got a chess set, juggling balls and some trinkets.
Despite the crowded many streets around the market, within the market itself there were several tourists and some locals. But it really wasn’t very crowded and never intimidating. This was most unique aspect of the market: although everyone wanted to make a sale, the selling was never aggressive or intimidating.
The toy tops the boys bought, after seeing a few local boys having a blast in the market, kept them busy outside for over an hour once we returned home to Quito.
Tomorrow we have to get up at 5:30 to catch a plane to the Galapagos.