Lake Cuicocha, El Condor Parque and Otavalo

We went to Lake Cuicocha in the morning - named after the guinea pig (national dish here) due to the two islands in the middle of the lake which was thought to resemble this mighty (?) animal.  It was again a crater lake - just under 3000m.  The lake is around 145m deep and in one place there are small bubbles coming from the volcano underneath - this keeps the temperature of the water around 14 degrees, much warmer than the lake of yesterday (around 4-5 degrees).  Wonderful views of the surrounding area also as the weather was much better today.

We were dropped in Otavalo town - drama:we needed to get a new battery charger as the universal charger we brought with us doesn't want to charge the camera batteries anymore which is a big problem. We were able to get one for Robs camera (the most important as its the underwater camera!).  No camera shops as such to be found, just the odd shop selling the odd charger!  We had lunch in town and then went to the Condor park just outside of town which is run by a Dutch guy (who we did not see), sponsored by the Dutch government.  They have a pair of condors here, the chances of seeing one in the wild now being very remote - the best count I have heard for Ecuador was around 44 birds left in the wild here.

We returned later to the town and visited every shop possible looking for a charger that would accommodate my Nikon (large) battery, without luck. We found a lovely small restaurant for dinner in town.