Pano: Bill & Flora's Point

At Royal Gorge XC.  

I can sure get used to the routine of getting up in the morning, walking 2 min to the groomed trails, and slip slidin' for 5 mi to start the day... doesn't happen all the time, maybe 50% of the time due to conditions, but sure is fun.  

Desert Run

That was probably my favorite pow lap during my week at Sunrise hut.  

Ecuador! - Part 3: Otavalo

OK... gotta get these up before I forget all the details... 

After Quito we decided to head up north to Otavalo, a town known for it's market and waterfalls.  We only had a little more than 24 hours in Otavalo, so we were constantly on the move.  Kinda felt like we were on some adventure race, but I thought that was perfect.  As soon as we settled into the AirBnB we hiked up to one of the waterfalls... Cascada Taxopamba.  Not sure if we got lucky or if it's not that popular in the shoulder season, but we were the only ones there.  Then on our hike out we caught a taxi cab to take us up to the Condor park and El Lechero (a mystical tree).  

Part 1

Part 2

More pics and gphotos

Google Maps Timeline

bus capacity... no chicken buses in Ecuador

mmmm

more volcanos

on our way to one of the waterfalls in Otavalo

Had some fun GoPro footage here... but alas.. Cascada Taxabamba

farms aka Fincas...

We caught a cab ride from the waterfall to the other side of town.  Kim didn't even notice the cute daugher riding shotgun..

We stopped by the eagle sanctuary... which was AWESOME.  Highly recommended...

Owl...

From here we decided to check out the Lechero... the mystical tree... 

which wasn't that special.  But there's lots of nice views near there.  

From here we decided to bushwack back to town.  OK... I decided to bushwack... Kimbo was quite hesitant.  But on the map it was less than a mile.  

And we found some nice "roads"

And not so nice roads... ok we were just walking through farms at this point.  

PeakFinder to the rescue!  Imbabura!

We walked through a few farms, and the dog here didn't attack us, but they followed us a while.  We ran into mormon missionaries who helped us get rid of the dogs.  They were quite nice, and naive.  

Went on a morning run the next day.  

To check out the other waterfall.  

Some nice trails... 

YES!!! How hipster is this?

post run hydration!

Watched some volly at the city plaza... 

I guess they really like their "Ecuavoley" down here. 

Animal market... what Otavalo is known for.  

And the other market... 

at the Terminal getting ready to head to the Jungle...

Gotta admit, I thought Ski Ballet was awesome!  Actually, I still think it's awesome... way to bring 'er back!  I remember watching recorded tapes from the 1992 olympics of the Ski Ballet competition over and over... 

Kayak to the troll...

Went out on my plastic surfski that I got a few months back to get a better look at the bay bridge troll.

I think there's 2.  

  There's a smaller white guy you can see on the bike path... and the big dude is on the pillar.  You can see him on that western side...at the top of the pillar from below.  I haven't seen him from the bike path, but now I know where to look.