Puyo

During the colonial period, the route between Baños and the mission of Canelos crossed this stretch of foothill forest, and travellers, missionaries and traders rested here. The present town was founded on 12 May 1899 by the Dominican missionary Álvaro Valladares and nine Indigenous men from Canelos, who were looking for a resting place on that route. They built three large huts, set up a wooden cross, celebrated Mass and dedicated the place to Our Lady of the Rosary of Pompeii, still part of the town's full name. For its first years it was an Indigenous village, used by mestizo traders as a stop between Baños and Canelos.

The Pastaza canton was created in 1911, and Puyo later became its seat. The town grew quickly until the Ambato earthquake of 1949 reduced it to rubble. It recovered fast: improvements to the Baños–Puyo road brought settlers from Tungurahua and Chimborazo, and for a time Puyo was the largest and most prosperous town in the Ecuadorian Amazon, until the oil boom built up Nueva Loja further north. In 1959 it became the capital of the new province of Pastaza.

Today it remains the commercial and administrative centre of Pastaza, at the end of the road that links the coast and the central highlands with the Amazon. It was the fastest-growing city in Ecuador in 2006, and in recent decades it has turned increasingly to tourism.

Puyo is seen as a cultural centre for the whole Ecuadorian Amazon, because Pastaza's forests are home to seven Indigenous nationalities: the Amazonian Kichwa, Andoa, Sápara, Waorani, Achuar, Shiwiar and Shuar. The Ñucanchi Allpa centre brings several of them together to sell crafts, cook and dance, and a monument on the malecón honours the women of all seven. Many visitors come for community-based tourism run by the communities themselves.

The town keeps many customs and traditions of its own, in its festivals, food, crafts, painting and Amazonian mythology. Carnival before Lent is the big celebration, with neighbourhood parties and water fights, and the Day of the Ecuadorian Amazon on 12 February and the chonta-palm festival are also important. Crafts sold in the town include pieces made of balsa wood, and melcochas, chewy sweets made from sugarcane, are a local treat.

Football is the main sport. Clubs such as Pastaza Sporting Club play at the Estadio Víctor Hugo Georgis, which holds about 4,000 spectators and also hosts concerts. The Universidad Estatal Amazónica, founded in 2002, is based in the town, which has a growing nightlife.

About 33,000 people lived in the city at the 2022 census, making it the third-largest city of the Ecuadorian Amazon after Nueva Loja and Coca, and more than 60,000 live in the wider urban area. As the provincial capital it holds the government offices of Pastaza and many banks and businesses.

The economy is based on trade, tourism and farming. Timber and agriculture, including fish farming and poultry, are the main productive industries, and most people earn their living in formal and informal commerce and small businesses. Small aircraft leave daily from the nearby airfield at Shell for airstrips in the forest, the link between the town and many of Pastaza's remote communities.

The day starts early with the markets — the Mariscal and the Mercado de los Plátanos, where set lunches are served upstairs — and is punctuated by downpours, which arrive almost daily. Schools follow the highland calendar, from September to July. The town keeps spreading southwards into new barrios with gravel streets, and at weekends university students fill the bars of Barrio Obrero.

Puyo's cooking mixes Amazonian traditions with the food brought by settlers from other regions. The town's own dish is ceviche volquetero, served in the restaurants of Barrio Obrero and beside the riverside mirador. Set lunches of soup and a main course are the everyday meal, and the cheapest are served on the upper floors of the central markets.

Along the main highway near the bus terminal, eateries serve almost exclusively Amazonian dishes. Maito is the most famous: fish such as tilapia, carachama or cachama wrapped in leaves and cooked over the fire. Chontacuros, the larvae of the palm weevil, are grilled on skewers, and seco de guanta is a stew made with the forest rodent called guanta. River fish are central to the diet, and the paiche, one of the largest freshwater fish in the world, stands out among them.

The drinks are part of daily hospitality in the Amazon: chicha de yuca, made from cassava and in its traditional form chewed before fermenting; chicha de chonta, from the fruit of the peach palm; and guayusa, a caffeinated leaf brewed like tea. Melcochas, sugarcane sweets, are sold in the town.