Advertisement
Published: November 27th 2015
Well, here we go again. Another catch up update, this time from my time in Quito in Ecuador. Slowly but surely I am catching up….
Banos was a great little place to visit even if it was a bit of a tourist trap. But the landscapes and the atmosphere of the town was nice and I can only recommend to visit the place if you are in the area. But everything has to come to an end and so I caught a bus to Quito, the capital of Ecuador.
After I arrived in Quito I took a taxi to the hostel area (every city and town has an area where most of the hostels are concentrated) and soon found a nice place. As it was Sunday most of the restaurants were closed and it was a bit of a challenge to find a place to have a snack. I planned my next 4 days in Quito, but that was turned upside down with a post on Facebook that I was in Quito. As I have a bit of a following and some people want to meet me in person so I have met several people in the places I
visited and I always had a great time and was lucky to get some local knowledge and tours. So I always try to connect with people via Facebook to catch up. So soon after I let the FB community know that I am in town I received a message if it would be possible to catch up. No problem….. But more to that later.
Now I have been in Quito before in 1982 and I have to say that it was an amazing city and it still is. Quito is the second highest city in South America and is located at the foot of the volcano Pichincha that is over 4700 meters high. Its old centre is a great place to hang out and wonder around. The charm lies in the cobbled streets that are steep and connects the different plazas, churches and museums. I was extremely lucky with the weather and took full advantage of it, walking the streets, visiting the museums, churches and plazas. And just sitting in cafes and do what I like to do most – people watching. And it is amazing to just sit there and see the world go by.
One of
the many places to see in Quito are the churches as they are very impressive. Impressive because of the wood carvings and the gold that is displayed in them. The most impressive church is by far the San Francisco church and when you visit it you are just overwhelmed with the opulence of the place. But it also makes you question the institution of the catholic church and the hypocrisy of it; here you are in a pretty poor country where people starve and suffer over the last few centuries and at the same time the catholic church horded gold and silver like there is no tomorrow. As a matter of fact I was so appalled by this the last time I visited Quito that I actually left the institution called church. Not that it made a big difference. I am totally aware why the priests decked out the churches in gold and that was to impress the natives with their riches. Also the Incas thought that gold represented the sun and they worshiped the sun. They saw no monetary value in the metal, unlike the Spanish. Anyway, that’s another story.
Close to Quito is a large monument that
marks what? Yes you guessed right – the Equator. It’s not difficult to get there and takes about an hour with the bus. Once you get there you pay an entry fee and you can walk around the area and jump from north to south as often as you like. And no, I didn’t do the experience in what directions the water flows down the drain. But still a pretty cool place.
One of the highlights in Quito was meeting up with my FB friends and I cannot thank them enough for taking the time and show me this wonderful city. I can tell you that I saw places that normal tourists wouldn’t see and many many beers were downed at countless bars around town. When they asked me if I would like to give a speech about my favourite topics, politics, I jumped on the chance and within 3 days they organised the event in a nice old building. Invites went out and even if they only had 3 days over 30 people attended. I gave a speech in English and one of my new friends was translating it into Spanish which was a first for me. In
the audience there were about 5 people that could be described as left wing anarchists and while they were a bit confused at the beginning of my presentation, they asked some interesting questions at the end and talked to me after the official part. But it was good fun and I made new friends during the night. Now that I gave lectures and speeches in Europe, Asia, Australia, North America and South America I guess I can say that I am an international speaker. Now that’s something for the CV.
Anyway, my time came to an end in this part of the world. And my three months enforced exile from Brazil was over. I had a ticket booked back to Brasilia and after 3 month on the road I was to be reunited with Carla. And we had to organise our trip back to Australia as I was offered my old job back. So I thanked my new friends in Quito for everything they had done for me and took my plane back to Brasilia where I spend another 6 weeks. And Carla made sure that we had a great time before taking off back to good old Sydney.
But that’s for another update that I will write soon. So stay tuned…..
Thank you again for reading this report to the end and as usual I appreciate it if you like the photos and leave comments. And wherever you are and whatever you do please enjoy life, do something crazy and outside the box but most of all don’t be negative and depressed and think that you are a victim all the time. There are always people in this world that have it worse than you….
Advertisement
Tot: 0.09s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 13; qc: 27; dbt: 0.0654s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Silvia
non-member comment
It was awesome to have you here. Next time come with Carla and you can stay in our new aparment. Kisses!