Day 3: February 16, 2026; Cotopaxi

Day 3: February 16, 2026; Cotopaxi I took a tour to Cotopaxi, which I highly recommend doing this as a tour, rather than on your own. I’m not even sure if you can get there on your own. It was also very convenient. I was picked up from my hotel, and then the minivan went to pick up the other passengers. Everybody was picked up by 8 and then we made our way to Cotopaxi National Park. There were about 18 people in the group. There were only four who were not from Latin America. One of them was an Italian who grew up in Panama, so he was fluent in Spanish. There were two Dutch guys, but they had family in Ecuador, and spoke fluent Spanish as well. i was the only person who needed English guide. However, most of the time, I knew what she was saying before she gave me the translation. My ear for Spanish is definitely improving. The big part of the trip was the tour up Cotopaxi, and I spend most of the morning freaking out about the hike. I did not know what it would be like, but I knew it was cone volcano, and it’s really high. They told us to dress warmly, and I brought the warmest clothes I had with me. I could tell by the way the other guests were dressed that I might not be ready for the cold temperature. I was excited about the ride to Cotopaxi. It’s about an hour south of Quito. It starts with the valleys and ridges that seems to be the normal terrain of Quito, but it becomes more of a mountain plateau as you get closer to National Park. We stop to buy cocoa leaves, candy, and tea along the way, and then slowly made our way to the volcano. We stopped 4 times along the way, which I was to help acclimate to the altitude One stop was just before entering the national park, which is where I put my lined pull over, another was at a lagoon before the drive up to the trail head. The lagoon was higher I’ve ever been in life. I think that was close to 14,000 feet. It was a dirt road, and it was steep switchbacks that went to the parking lot. I think the parking lot was 15,280 feet, which is way higher than I’ve ever been. It was cold, but not freezing, and was relatively calm for the altitude. There were two paths to take to mid-camp, which is right below the glacier. The first was longer parth that takes an hour to hike up 500 M. The second is call Broken Hearts, and goes straight up the hill. I think most of the people who plan to hike up to the top choose the long way. I used the cocoa leaves, and walked up very slowly. They higher I walked, the steeper it got, and it was getting cloudier. The only reason to continue was pride. I wasn’t going to get a better view, and I wasn’t going to get to the top of the volcano. I also knew that we were walking down steep trail to get down, and I was scared that my knees couldn’t handle the descent. At some point I realized that the risk of going higher outwieghed the benefits. I was getting tired, my legs were tired, and i was cold. It is not a good combination, and a bad step can ruin the rest of my trip. It was never my goal to climb the volcano anyway. The drawback is that i returned to the car park an hour and a half before the rest of the group (who made it to the top) got back to the bus. I felt a little wimpy, but I don’t regret my decision. FTR- the walk down the more gentle trail was still very difficult for my knees. They were hurting, and I made a couple missteps, I could have easily gotten hurt on the walk down. I know this is strange to say, but I enjoyed the ride back. The road from volcano is fascinating (when I’m not driving). The idea of driving a minibus down a steep dirt road is scary, but then I realized that was the drivers job. He does that drive 100s of times a year, and he knew what he was doing. The final part was the drive to Quito during rush hour (although this is a 4-day weekend in Quito), and I love looking how the people who live in Quito really live. The day ended with a meal at an Ecuadorean restaurant, which I went to for one reason: try guinea pig. I don’t think it’s that popular here, but it is eaten.I never got a good explanation of what it tasted like. I heard pork, and everything can taste like chicken. It tastes like guinea pig. It’s is toothier and sweeter than chicken. It doesn’t taste like pork either. It has a slight gamey flavor. I liked it, but I probably won’t try it again. There is a lot of stuff I like a lot better.