Galapagos Natural Life

One Day Tour

Cotopaxi Tour

Cotopaxi National Park was founded on August 11th 1975. And it is one of the most important protected areas in Ecuador. Also, it is the second touristic place most visited.
It is located between the provinces of Cotopaxi, Napo, and Pichincha, 1.5 or 2 hours from Quito.  It has an extension of 33.393 hectares. The temperature is between 0º - 15ºC. It has an altitude of 5897meters at the top.

It is considerated like the highest active volcano in the world. In native language Cotopaxi means “Cuello de luna “/ Neck of the moon). The form of Cotopaxi Volcano is like a perfect cone. And, it is covered by glacier over the 4800meters.  
The landscape of the park is volcanic around it exist “lahares”, depot of ash.

You might visit the Interpretation Center (Mariscal Sucre). After that, we are going to walk since the parking lot to the refuge (José Rivas). For approximately 40minutes (it depends of your fitness). For arriving to the glacier we have to walk for approximately 20minutes. Then we come back to the parking lot, to take the bikes to go down hill until the Limpiopungo Lake.

Quilotoa Lake Tour

Quilotoa Lake is located on the crater of the same name. It is 165Km from Quito about 3.5hours approximately, It is in the Cotopaxi province. It is inside of the “Los Ilinizas” Ecological Reserve. The border of the crater is a 3610meters above sea level and the lake is a 2270meters above sea level. Since the border to the bottom (lake) exist 1340m. In Kichwa (a native language) Quilotoa comes from two words and means. “kiru” is tooth “diente”,  and  “Toa” is queen “Reina”.

The water color depends of the sky, if it does not have clouds, the color is green – turquoise. The water has minerals and you might smell them, it is nor recommendable for drinking. The temperature of the water varies between 16 °C and - 1°C / 60°f and 30°f. The depth of the lake is 240m approximately. The form of the lake is nearly elliptical. The diameter of the lake is 3km approximately.

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Photos: Galapagos Natural Life / Fabricio Cuasapaz