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Published: November 25th 2008
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We had not initially planned to go to Ecuador, pretty much because we knew nothing about it but now that we´ve been there and done that, we´re delighted we did!
We flew into the country´s capital, Quito from Honduras and were keen to begin experiencing what South America had to offer. Quito´s setting is fantastic and we couldn´t have picked a better hostel to view it from. We were situated in a huge building on the edge of a hill in the "Old Town" and the terrace restaurant and bar looked out onto all the major sights in Quito. Every morning we got up to an "all you can eat" breakfast and a stunning view. Not too shabby!
The centre of Quito is divided into two main parts - the Old Town is full of city´s history and the New Town is focused on tourists and is full of bars and restaurants. We spent nearly all of our time seeing what the former had to offer. The first morning we did a mini tour of the Old Town and we began in the town´s history museum. This was interesting but our Spanish is still limited and where there were
The view from the Secret Garden rooftop
An amazing view as we ate out breakfast every morning English translations they were questionable at best so we didn´t get all we could have out it. From here we went to the monastery of San Francisco. It is the city´s largest colonial structure and its oldest church. I tagged along with a tour group and Vicki had her own wander around. Her tour lasted 10 minutes, mine was 2 hours. I was fortunate enough to have in my group a somewhat vocal senior American couple, full of the joys of Spring. Every time she had a question the American lady would raise her hand and say, making sure everyone could hear, "Question!" and she certainly had a lot of them. We were shown all sorts of religious art and I thought it was great
Next stop...guitar shop! I felt I had gone without for long enough and as luck would have it we passed a music shop. After careful deliberation, much discussion and a few songs we decided to get a delightful little number and case for 45 USD. It has already been used for a drunken sing song and we expect more in the not too distant future
Having enjoyed a shandy or two the previous
Rooftop View
In the distance you can see the Basilica del voto nacional night we then set off for the day to Otovalo market. A few hours north of Quito, this is one of the most famous markets in South America and having been there we can see why. It is full to the hilt with traditionally dressed indigenous people selling hand made crafts ranging from clothes to homeware. I know that sounds like an ad for the place but we both really enjoyed it. There were ponchos, rugs and all sorts of clothes hanging everywhere and the colours were incredibly vibrant. Also the fact that it´s all made locally is encouraging because you know that the money spent is going back into the community. I´m not sure, however, this was Victoria´s motivation to buy so much and practically bankrupt us...she just likes to shop. We got there around midday and by 3pm we didn´t have two pennies to rub together so we got the next bus back to Quito with our tail between our legs. I must say though, I really enjoyed all the haggling. It´s like a sport over there. They say one price, you halve it and then you meet somewhere in the middle. I also started to incorporate mind
Ah it´s a lovely statue
Conor at one of the old towns many squares games which also added to the fun. Vicki would express some serious interest in an item and I´d ask the price and then having offered and being refused a much lower price I´d tell Vicki to put it down much to her dismay and we´d walk off. 2 out of 5 times the person would chase us with the goods and we´d have a deal. I like those odds! On one ocassion we were haggling with a 7 year old and we agreed on a price for a dress. We returned later on to buy it and the girl had been joined by her mother. The girl once again said the price we agreed and her mother couldn´t believe it. All in all it was a good day and Vicki came out of it smiling...I got a hat and gloves!
That evening we took full advantage of an "all you can drink" offer at the hostel and then hit the tiles
The following day, our last in Quito, we took a cable car up the flanks of a volcano called Volcan Pichincha. The views over the city and neighbouring towns were spectacular and being up at 4100m we
really felt the pinch in our lungs. That still couldn´t stop us from taking the trek a little further up the mountain to a point where we could dress up in the local attire and get our pictures taken with baby llamas. It´s just what´s done. Luckily the llamas didn´t spit on us, as is their usual style, but if they had I wouldn´t have been afraid to resort to similar tactics. When in Rome...or in this case when up a mountain...spit on a llama
That morning we hit the road to Cotopaxi with another Irish couple and a Swiss lad named Sander...nice fella
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