Travel blog: Otavalo and the Amazon

Rhian Nicholson has swapped the bright lights of London for a three-month journey across South America from the Pacific to the Atlantic coast. Here is her second blog entry:

Shopaholics beware - Otavalo's markets make it far too easy to blow a week's budget on alpaca blankets, beaded jewellery, brightly-coloured woven bags and a thousand other locally made goods even when you know there's no way you can fit anymore into your long-suffering rucksack.

Otavalo is a simple three-hour bus trip from Quito so you have plenty of time to run through your essential bargaining phrases before hitting the stalls.

Opening with a friendly smile and a good old "Hola! Son muy bonitas. ¿Cuanto cuesta?" the conversations quickly degenerates into a bizarre pantomime of sweeping hand gestures and exaggerated facial expressions with the odd word of Spanish thrown in for good measure.

Two minutes later the asking price has been discounted by a third and there's just about enough time to wipe the sweat off your brow before moving onto the next stall...

But once you reach bartering breaking point, it's time to go cold turkey - and you can't get much further removed from the joys of consumerism than in the mighty Amazon jungle.

Around eight hours drive from Otavalo, La Punta is a tiny jumping off point where the chickens are most definitely free-range and hot running water is a mere pipe dream.

Stinking of extra-strength yet highly ineffective insect repellent and keeping a close eye out for one of the many poisonous spiders that call the jungle home, it was time to clamber into a motorised dug-out canoe and gawp at the towering trees and dangling creepers lining the banks of the Rio Napo.

And there on a small island in the middle of the river was the jungle lodge to be called home for the next three nights.

Luxury it certainly wasn't with cold showers providing a bracing start to the day and torches or even candles if you got really desperate to guide you back to your wooden hut at night.

But still how often do you fall asleep to a chorus of chirping insects in the forest and then awake to find a family of bugs have feasted on you during the night?!

Wandering through the rainforest (a mixture of primary and secondary as oil was recently found in the area and the trees have since been in for the chop) was pretty amazing.

Bugs scuttled along the forest floor while birds squawked their hearts out in the trees and a mind-boggling array of plants - some of which are used by local tribes for everything through from sunburn relief to baldness cures - sprouted in every direction.

Clambering up steep muddy slopes led to fantastic birdseye views over the treetops. Likewise, wading through one of the tributaries following into the Rio Napo gave glimpses of Mother Nature in all her glory - even though walking along the slippery rock-strewn riverbeds made simultaneously walking and admiring the scenery nigh on impossible.

A better way to soak up the sights, sounds and smells of jungle life was simply to bob along the Rio Napo letting the current sweep you downstream and hoping that those three anacondas that reportedly escaped from the local animal sanctuary were nowhere in the near vicinity.

And of course no visit to the jungle would be complete without sampling the local firewater known as Chicha - a foul tasting concoction made from Yuca and necked by the villagers throughout the day - and a visit to a witch doctor.

Sitting cross-legged on the floor, a small wizened guy in a feather headdress and grass skirt spits alcohol of some variety around your face and then bashes your head with a bunch of dried leaves while chanting in what could have been Quechua or just gibberish to release the negative energy from your body.

It scores highly for entertainment and was definitely more interesting than a trip to the local chemist but cleansing? Hmmm.

Rhian Nicholson