Ecuador: Quito & Cotopaxi Volcano on film

When my boyfriend Jason and I were in Ecuador in spring of 2019, we spent the majority of our two week trip in the Galapagos Islands. We didn’t want to go home without experiencing a little of mainland Ecuador, so we tried to make the most of our three days in Quito before flying home.

We spent our first night in Quito settling in, and grabbed dinner at a highly rated Indian restaurant. Our Airbnb was in a quiet neighborhood without much else to walk to.

The next morning we caught a bus to take us 2 hours away to Otavalo to visit the largest outdoor market of its kind in Ecuador, (and apparently all of South America). I really love brightly colored Andean textiles, and I hoped to buy something directly from local artisans.

We spent our second day exploring the city of Quito. Quito is at seriously high altitude, the city of 2 million people sits at 2,850 m (9,350 ft). It was a pretty big adjustment after being at sea level in the Galapagos, so we kept the first day on the mellow side. We walked from our Airbnb to the Teleférico gondola station, so that we could sit back and ride the gondola even HIGHER–to a lung busting altitude of 3,945 m (12,943 ft)!! I’m not sure that I’d even been at that high of altitude before taking that ride, so I felt a little nervous about how well I’d be able to breathe after flying from sea level less than 48 hours before! Cusco was cloudy on this Easter morning, and as we ascended the Teleférico, we ascended fully into the clouds, and the views disappeared.

Photos shot on Leica M6

Jason and a llama at the top of the Teleférico

DOWNTOWN QUITO

The Basilica (church) del Voto Nacional.

CONDOR SANCTUARY

COTOPAXI BIKE TOUR

We got a tip from a fellow passenger on our Galapagos cruise that we should do a bike tour of the Cotopaxi volcano from Quito. There’s a tour company called “Biking Dutchman”, who’ll pick you up form your hotel in Quito, drive you 3 hours away to ride a mountain bike down the 19,347′ volcano, then take you back to Quito–all in one day. And somehow you don’t even have to be an experienced mountain biker to do it. So of course we went for it!

On the morning of the last full day of our trip, we were picked up by our guide Jorge, and were surprised to find that the two other bikers in our group were also from California. After 3 hours of awesome scenery and hearing all sorts of interesting facts about the region, including about Jorge’s mountaineering skills (he’s a serious mountaineer who has summited some seriously tall volcanic peaks in Ecuador!). I felt like I was in experienced hands for the day’s bike adventure.

Drone shot from 15,500’ up Cotopaxi. The top of the volcano was hidden in the clouds, but an incredible location to capture nonetheless!

Drone capture in the opposite direction, looking out to the valley below.

We were driven as far up Cotopaxi volcano as the road goes (about 15,500’'), and from there we were to just bomb down the switchbacked road we had just driven up. My bike was a little bit… um… janky, so I never really trusted the bike enough to want to go full speed on the downhill. Even so, it was a blast! Once down at the bottom, the hard work began… biking through the valley of gently rolling hills—at an altitude of 12,000’! The day was crisp and cloudy, but the valley was lush, green, and felt like biking through a level of Super Mario Bros. All in all, a great experience and workout—and good alternative to summiting Cotopaxi for less fit (lol).