A short little taste of Ecuador

Naturally, people you meet along the way will all share their experiences traveling, and inevitably you start to get expectations of a place. We met several people who didn't love Ecuador, and one girl who said the people in Quito were downright rude and unfriendly.  Our experience was quite the opposite, we loved it and left feeling that we wished we could have spent more time there. We only ended up going to Ecuador because it was so much cheaper for us to fly to El Salvador from Quito than Lima...and it being that we were already in Northern Peru it was nearly equidistant to take us up to Quito than back down to Lima.

When our bus crossed the border the vegetation instantly transformed, into banana plantations as far as the eye could see. For hours, endless banana farms. It was absolutely crazy. These monocultures will be the death of the earth.

Quito is a lush, green, tidy city with tons of public green space and fantastic public transit - extremely livable. The city is divided into Old Town and New Town.  New town is an easily navigated grid, whereas historical Old Town is a little more confusing.  Old town is a little sketchy for tourists, not in danger that could cause them any physical harm but rather a thriving and skilled pickpocket community.

City park on Saturday

We chose a hostel in the touristy New Town zone called La Mariscal for it's proximity to the bus station and airport. The hostel was a huge, sprawling old house, musty, funky and very cozy. Despite it being in a rather loud nightclub neighborhood we slept well there, it was a good place to be.

On Saturday we walked to one of the many large city parks to visit the botanical gardens and an interactive dinosaur museum. The day was overcast, mild and rainy, and it was refreshing after the intense heat of northern Peru.  The botanical gardens was a bit small, but beautifully designed and laid out and it was really pleasant. The interactive dinosaur museum was less an educational museum than a display of very cool animatronic dinosaurs. They made noises and moved through space and we were quite impressed by them, and watching the kids around us react to them was totally worth the visit.

Sunday was a nice sunny day and we set out to explore.  Most people take transit to get from La Mariscal to Old Town but we did it on foot as there was a few things we wanted to check out en route. I'm so glad we opted to walk it, because it made me really love Quito.  Without exaggeration, Quito has more public parks than any city I have visited. The powers that be in Quito have made it a very livable place for families. The parks are immaculate, free of litter or dog poop, with excellent modern playgrounds. The public trash cans are divided recycling garbages.  It being that it was Sunday the parks were jam packed with happy families and awesome food vendors. You can eat a great lunch in a city park -barbecue vendors sold tasty skewers of meat for 50 cents, there was fruit and juice vendors of course and grilled corn.

It took us nearly two hours to walk to Old Town, and it was beautiful with its typical colonial architecture and big fancy cathedrals, but it was really passing through the three huge, busy parks with all those happy people that made us feel amazing. In one of them there was a huge craft fair that sets up every weekend, and it had such a nice community feeling.

Something else that really impressed us is that every Sunday a major thoroughfare is closed to traffic for weekly cycling. It's called Ciclopaseo organized by a group called Ciclopolis, and it started as an initiative to get people active...there are bikes available for rent, and tourists can rent them too. There's water stations every few blocks, and outdoor aerobics classes in the parks.  As it was Sunday we got to see it, about
40 000 people participate! What a cool event. 

So we were only in Ecuador for three days, and it was only Quito, but it was a really nice time and made us want to go back some day and get to know the country better. On Monday afternoon we flew to San Salvador, El Salvador.

50 cents? Yes please!!!

nom nom nom!!

Quito Old Town