Quilotoa Crater Lake

Quilotoa is one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen in my life. It's home to a large number of indigenous artists and farmers that live in this remote part of Ecuador. While getting there is not easy, its absolutely a must place to visit. Our tour started with Mauro

(our guide) picking us up at our hostel. Gustavo (a Brazilian traveler) was already in the car waiting to also see Quilotoa. Gustavo and Mauro were great people to spend the day hiking to this amazing crater lake. On our way, Mauro told us the story of how the Quilotoa Crater Lake was formed. Legend tells us this volcano was named after a princess from the region. The volcano lay silent for about 14,000 years. Then about 800 years ago, a catastrophic, violent volcanic eruption formed Quilotoa Lake. This eruption was so cataclysmic it sent up massive clouds of volcanic ash that spread throughout the northern Andes mountain range. Now, centuries later, the mountain sides are filled with vegetation from wild plants to farms, and subsequently, the caldera filled with water to create the stunning Quilotoa crater lake. Quilotoa is still considered an active volcano yet dormant. Although we did see bubbles emerging from the lake so you have to wonder...There are several villages around Quilotoa (Quilotoa is the name of the city as well as lake) which Mauro took us to see. These villages are all in a big loop around the lake so you must pass them in order to get to the top of the lake. The scenery is stunning – high, jagged peaks, sierra vegetation, its just amazing. It's also very quiet and peaceful which is a stark contrast to being in Quito, and that is precisely why I wanted to go there.

Once we arrived at the rim of the crater lake, we hiked down (about a half an hour) to the base of the lake, the hike down was easy in comparison to the one going up. We had the option to jump in the lake or take a kayak out, but it was cold, however the views were so stunning that you can't stop staring, its mesmerizing. So we spend our time walking around and scouting the area and going along other paths that circle the lake. You can smell the sulphur in the water but its not overbearing. There is also a lot of clay/mud around the water which I later found out that clay is great for your skin. After some time we decided to make our way up the lake. That proved to be more of a challenge than Cotopaxi was. It look us over an hour to reach the top, and while there are donkeys and horses that you can rent to take you to the top, I felt that was cheating me out of the experience. It was a hike that was well-worth every single step, but definitely not for the faint of heart. I think that in this hike alone I lost the extra weight I wanted to :)

After an amazing (but hard) hike, we had a local Ecuadorian dinner at one of the nearby hostels. Ecuador has some of the most amazing food I've ever had. They are big on carbs but with so much climbing and walking you have to do everywhere you go, its almost ungodly to not have carbs. I was sad when our dinner was over as we had to start getting ready to head back to Quito, the company with Mauro and Gustavo was awesome, but it just all seemed to go by too fast. Mauro went above and beyond to stop at every spot we asked and was more than willing to answer all the questions we had. Quilotoa has a loop that can be hiked in 3 days that initially I wanted to do, but due to time restrains we had to settle for the one day hike, but it was okay because we shared this experience with great people that were just as excited as we were to be in such a special place.

Mauro, Gustavo, Scott and I after a marvelous hike