Butterfly Farms, Presidential Assaults, and Really Big Markets.

We decided to get a little break from the busy city and head out to a small town in the cloud forest a few hours outside of Quito. We went to Mindo with few expectations as it does not show up in Lonely Planet, although it came highly recommended from some friendly New Yorkers we met in Old Town. Mindo is a town that consists of one main street and a few butterfly observatories. We found a little tienda with tourist info and asked for a good hostel. A nice girl kindly pointed us back up the hill we came in on and towards a hostel. To our surprise this was no bunk-bed, shared bathroom, noisy hostel. This turned out to be a set of private cabins on someone's property. This was by far the nicest place we had stayed yet. A nice old woman cooked us breakfast upon arrival and sent us on our way to the mariposario (butterfly observatory). However, this outing would not be as easy as she led us to believe. We ran into another issue with the ATM, and neither of us were able to pull out money. We had no choice but to get back on a bus, go to a neighboring town, pull out money, and return a few hours later. THEN we headed to the mariposario, which turned out to be really interesting. We were shown all the stages of a caterpillar's life, and were then let into a huge garden where a bunch of butterfly species lived. Some of them were as big as my head and they had really cool fake eyes on them to scare away things that would otherwise want to eat them. After getting our fill of butterflies we went over to another part of the property that was home to a few dozen hummingbirds. We watched them while we chilled in some hammocks. Then we returned to the hostel for a while until dinner. On our way back down to the main street we discovered that 6 hostels had been robbed, and there were many upset gringos. We were suddenly very appreciative that our hostel was out in the boonies. Anyhow, we ate a terrible dinner and watched as President Correa threw a fit about something going on back in Quito. We were quickly informed that he had been sprayed with tear gas from his own police force who was currently on strike. We watched as the army battled with the cops in amazement. We heard that about 8 people died as a result of riots and random violence. We finished up our terrible food and hiked back to the hostel.

The next day we woke up to the annoying sound of tropical birds and ate breakfast with the old woman. We then walked into town and booked a canopy tour. It was 13 bucks to do 13 different zip lines through the forest canopy. Our guides Alex and Fabian were pretty cool. They showed us a few different ways to fly through the canopy, all of which we are sure would not be legal in the US due to safety precautions, but all in all it was a really fun and really beautiful day. After deciding that we had had too much relaxation, we got on a bus back to Quito, hoping not to run into any road blocks or angry mobs of protesters. Once we arrived to the bus terminal, we shared a cab with an Australian couple to a hostel called the Secret Garden.http://www.secretgardenquito.com/index2.html . This hostel turned out to have one of the best views in the entire city, as well as free coffee and water. It had a 180 degree view of all the cathedrals, churches, the Plaza Grande (where all the drama went down the day before), the Virgin on the hill, and even the hospital where President Correa was being treated for his police-inflicted injuries. One of the coolest hostels we have stayed at so far. That night we went back out in New Town to a bar called Haiana? or Hauaiana? or something like that. It has the cheapest drinks in town and came highly recommended by Jamie Slade. We were surprised to see that the police were patrolling the streets despite a presidential mandate that stated that they have no power. This was reinforced by the public's action towards said police. One cop tried to enter the bar we were at only to find an angry mob of men who were ready to physically express their feelings towards the police. One officer in particular was greeted with right hook and a strong kick to the face by a very large man. At that point we decided to leave that bar and retreat to our safe little hostel.

The next day we went to the Otavalo Market with some friends we met in the steam bath in Banos. They were a nice Australian couple named Zoe and Ewen. We had breakfast with them and took the two hour journey to the "biggest market in Latin America," according to our friend Jamie. At any rate, after surviving the terrifying two hour taxi ride, we arrived at our destination. It turns out that the market was a seriously huge maze of artisan goods and local food. We spent about two hours there walking around, sampling local food, and buying little souvenirs. After we felt all marketed-out we got back in the taxi, evaded death once again, and made it to the Mitad del Mundo (Equator). We took some dorky pictures there (of which will never appear on this blog or anywhere else because some jerk stole our camera on a bus ride) and then returned back to Quito.