The high Andes to the Cloud Forest in Ecuador (2026)
Posted: November 11, 2026
My first trip to Ecuador was in the summer of 1987. I left Minneapolis with $8,000 in my pocket and boarded a one-way free courier flight to Quito. My “plan” was to learn Spanish after some course work and then tour around South America for 6 months or so; celebrating learning a new language at the end by going to the Carnival in Rio de Janeiro in February 1988.
Best laid plans and all that. Fate had something entirely different in store for me. I arrived in Quito and settled into a 2-star hotel in the old town. Within a day I was enrolled in a one-on-one Spanish course. This was ok for a few days, but I quickly became bored and restless so I decided to just hit the road and try and learn Spanish by immersion through travel.
A day later I rented a small truck and drove north from Quito towards a small town called Otavalo that I heard had an impressive indigenous market and was surrounded by volcanoes and volcanic lakes perfect for hiking. Leaving Quito early on a Saturday morning I made the drive north along the winding Pan American Highway watching the mountains come to life in the early morning sun, it is stunning. Pulling into Otavalo around 9 AM I parked the truck and wandered toward the Center of town and the Plaza de Ponchos. Soft waves of Andean pan pipe music provided a constant backdrop to the streets. The air smelled of roasting corn and vegetables. The streets were full of small in stature but powerfully built handsome indigenous people, the women draped in thick ultra dark blue wool dresses with colorful embroidered blouses, and the men wore bleached white pants often with a rich dark blue poncho and wool fedora. Despite the dense crowds I was impressed by how quiet it was, you could hear everything clearly, there was a respectful silence in an otherwise busy market, business was being carried out in a polite reserved manner. It felt naturally easy on my system.
The colourful textiles were stacked and hung everywhere. I pulled a heavy hand-knit wool sweater off a pile, and holding it up in front of a mirror I could feel its warmth. Then a voice from the side said softly, “ten dollars.” And I replied, “not bad.”
Here’s where I jump ahead for the sake of this blog. After wandering Ponchos Plaza for three or four hours I had accumulated roughly 60 sweaters in 3 or 4 different locations in the market. The problem was that I couldn’t remember where the first vendor was some hours later when I thought I should stop and collect myself. And everything looked the same. It was a maze by design. It didn’t matter, before long the kind Otavalena lady who I had bought my first stack of sweaters from found me and led me back to their stall, then asked if I needed help carrying my sweaters to my hotel.
Thus began a wonderful relationship with Otavalo Ecuador and the people who make it. As well as my new career as an importer.
For the next ten winters I would spend a couple of months each winter based in the Ali Shungu Hotel buying sweaters, hats, gloves, bags, bread dough Christmas ornaments, leather items, all sorts of clothing and handicrafts.
It would take time to produce what was fast becoming large orders so I’d take time to travel around Imbabura province where Otavalo resides. Volcanic lake hikes, ridges where I’d watch the clouds literally roll back when they reached from cloud forest to the high altitude Andes. The “Ceja Andina,” or “Andean Eyebrow” they call it. Lunch of fresh trout in old haciendas and local festivals. And the beautiful thing is it’s all sort of wrapped up in the best Andean indigenous music produced. Check out Charijayac for example.
Ecuador is roughly the size of Arizona, yet it’s incredible diversity - spanning different climate zones from primary rainforest to 20,000’ volcanos, to cloud forest to fertile coastal plains to beautiful stretches of sparsely populated beach, all with their own accompanying wildlife & fauna make this place, in my estimation, one of the most beautiful & most diverse places on earth.
After Otavalo I fell in love with two other places in Ecuador. Alandaluz on the coast and a lodge in the cloud forest called El Monte. This past February 2026 I discovered, sadly, that Alandaluz had been shuttered, but El Monte was better than ever. Have a look for yourselves.
With that I’ve decided to add a 10 day tour of Ecuador called “Andes to the Cloud Forest” to the roster of Tours for Travelers.