Guamote

 I knew that quinoa came in small plastic bags and sometimes boxes, but it turns out that it also grows
in fields. From what I understand, Ecuador doesn’t exactly have a big organized quinoa industry, but there is a lot of it growing in small-scale farms. We drove by a lot of them today and this is what it looks like.

Ecuador has hundreds of small indigenous communities. They have limited resources and survive with small home-based business or micro-farming. Because they don’t have easy access to a lot of what they need, they rely on local marketplaces to meet and trade. One of the biggest indigenous markets in Ecuador is the Guamote market, which takes place every Thursday. And today is Thursday, so . . . why not swing by?

The group I’m driving around with has as part of its mission the goal of helping the indigenous communities in Ecuador, so we’ve spent a lot of time in small, rural towns. Our afternoon plan was to have lunch in the tiny town of Ozogoche (pop. around 200) at Margarita’s place. But first the Guamote market.

This place is like controlled chaos without the control. You can buy light bulbs, ducks, drain cleaners, guinea pigs, Adidas and sugar cane along with other necessities of life. 

When we went to the fruit vendors, our tour leader asked us to point to whatever looked interesting and we bought up about 15 pounds of Ecuadorian fruit like, oh I don’t know, Tuna, Guanabana, Chirimoya, Granadilla, Taxo and Sapote. We had way too much to eat, but the plan was to leave anything we didn’t eat at Margarita’s because it’s hard for her to get to the market.

Then off to Margarita’s, pictured here. It took about an hour down a dusty, rutted road, and my review
on Trip Advisor will definitely mention that the outhouse to the left of the restaurant could use a deep clean, but otherwise this was a terrific experience. To be serious for a moment, just a few years ago this place was a woven hut. But because groups now stop by once in a while for the $5.00 lunch (cooked to order by Margarita) it’s now a concrete building with a roof.

There is so much back story and side trips to this, which I would write if I had more energy and if I thought anyone else was interested, but instead I’ll just say that we had a great lunch and, as always, we finished up with a hike, this time to a glacial lagoon, and called it a day.