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Published: July 11th 2010
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Well, as all good things go ... they have to come to an end. And that is the case for us here in Ecuador. After leaving Otavalo we made our way back to Quito where we would spend the last 2 days of our trip taking in the things that we had not yet seen. We arrived to our original hotel around 5:00. Just in time to get settled in for the last few days and then make our way to a restaurant for dinner. The food here has been quite good and hearty. Ecuador has many different ways to make stews and soups as the weather tends to be a little chilly by the time the sun goes down. We went for dinner and I had seco de chivo (goat stew) and Steph had more of her Ecuadorian fav ... empanadas!
The next day we made our way to new town. As you have seen if you have been looking at our blog entries prior to this .... Quito is quite long. It is actually 77 km from one side of the city to the other. And much longer if you count the neighboring cities. Old town, where we
spent the majority of our time our first few days here is to the south and new town is to the north. New town was very nice. It was very modern and had very nice neighborhoods. This we think would be the nicest place to live. The first place we went was Parque La Carolina which was the largest park in all of Quito. We saw some people playing soccer and volleyball and enjoying the nice day. Then we went to the parks botanical garden. Steph of course was in her glory walking around and seeing all of the plants and flowers. I actually enjoyed it too as there was a neat exhibition of carnivirous plants. We tried to feed them but they did not take to our help.
After the botanical garden we went to a viviarium where we could see (in glass cages) snakes, toads, frogs and small crocodiles. There were some interesting snakes including 2 of which that have the ability to kill a human. Glad those were in cages. We also saw poisionus frog that natives in the amazon will put on the tips of their blow darts. Again, glad we never ran into them
in our amazon hikes!
After the park we went to a museum of Oswaldo Guyasamin who is possibly the most famous artist in Ecuador and certainly one of the most recognized in all of Latin America. They had a museum made of his house ... he was not there ... he died in 1999. His works were amazing. He represented human emotion in many different ways. He was one of the first to represent the pain and suffering of the indiginous people here in Latin America. He also had a multiple painting sequence of hands that represented, from his point of view, the suffering of people from Mexico all the way to Argentina. He traveled a lot to gather ideas from people. As you can see much of his art is cubisim.
Our final day in Quito we started off by saying adios to our buena amiga Val at 4:30 am. Her flight left @ 6:30 am so she had to get up and going. Meanwhile Steph and I got to enjoy one last day in Quito as our flight did not leave until 11:30 pm. Amazingly, Val, Steph and I would leave the same day but she
would get back to WI 5 hours before we leave. So after enjoying our great breakfast provided by our hostal we made our way to old town again. It was Saturday so in parque El Ejido there was a big open air market similar to what we saw in Otavalo. After that we made our way to the next park en route to old town. We rented a canoe and got to paddle around in the water ... well I should correct that ... Steph said the oars were too heavy so she watched as I struggled to stear the canoe from the front. It looked like Steph was having a good time in the back though. After our canoe ride we went across the street and got an awesome lunch. Possibly my favorite food yet and I found it on the last day. Talk about a value meal .... for 2.50 you can get a "fritada completa." This includes 4 pieces of pork cooked in amazing array of spices (fritada), a cob of sweet corn on steriods (choclo), 2 mini potatoes patties fried and stuffed with cheese (llapingacho), a fried plaintain (maduro), cooked hominy, cooked popcorn that looks like
peanuts (maiz tostado). Too bad I found this place on our last day here but I know right where I am going when we return.
So after lunch we looked to the west and it looked like it was getting a bit dark ... we were trying to decide to chance it and take in old town once agian. We were optimistic and we were hoping that the weather would continue to be like it was all day ... pretty much the best that we had in Quito so far ... 85 and sunny. Well we were wrong ... within about 10 min it went from sunny and 85 to dark skies, down pour and hail. It was crazy, there literally was hail that covered the streets and made it white. Luckily we ducked into a nearby bookstore. There we spend the next hour and a half (seriously) as the man working the bookstore told us all of his recomendations of Quito and other places to visit. We could not break his heart by telling him that we were leaving for the states in about 4 hours. But we got a ton of cultural information as we watched the
rain come straight down.
Quito is a great town and it is sad to leave the beautiful country of Ecuador but we have had an amazing experience here and made many more memories with some wonderful friends! Gracias Ecuador!
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