In the highlands of Ecuador

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Ola,

We are in Quito now. We flew out of Bogota, again, and it was painless once more. Aero Republica and El Dorado airport have treated us fairly well so far this trip!

We arrived in Quito and there modern airport but Peter and Val both got differing entry stamps so it is going to be interesting to see if either of them have any problems exiting the country. We´ll keep you posted on that front.

We got into town late and went to bed around midnight so we didn´t see much before the morning. Peter woke up first, because some lovely Germans decided that it was necessary to rustle incessantly at 630am! He went up stairs and was instantly blown away by the view over the city. From the rooftop terrace, one can see the entire UNESCO World Heritage Old Town, EL Panecillo and even the Teleferiqo up the side of the mountain.

Val and Peter headed into the New Town for most of the day because they had to figure out bus transportation so they could get to Peru. After sorting it out, they headed to the Capilla del Hombre which is a home to the paintings of Ecuadorian artist Guayasamin. It was very dark, and cubist in form, but it shed light on the suffering of humans. Particularly striking was a portrait of Pinochet with fangs for teeth, blood everywhere and hanging from a noose. Despite the subject matter, there were people taking wedding photos there as well.

The next day, we wandered around the old town, which is a UNESCO world Heritage site. There are many churches in town, and they are mostly free so we went into a couple including Santo Domingo, La Iglesia de San Francisco and el Catedral. Santo Domingo was probably the most interesting because of its Mudejar roof, the name for Moorish style archtecture outside Granada, Spain, and the Catedral was also very pretty. However, many of the churches were either Baroque or almost Rococco, so they were very heavy on the ornamentation and not as appealling to either Val or Peter. The Plaza Grande is quite pretty though. It is full of trees, and is flanked by the Catedral as well as the Palacio del Gobierno. There are also many ornate Arte Nouveau buildings around town. However, Val and Peter were not particularly impressed by the Old Town as a whole because the preservation of the buildings throughout the city were far to intermittant.

On our last day in Quito, since we had time to kill, we walked. And walked. And walked. We got t the bus station where we bought tickets from Quito to Guayaquil as well as from Guayaquil to Lima. On the way back, we walked passed "Vancouver" street, and that was kind of cool because there were no other Canadian Street names. Take that Toronto! We cut through a park that had a playground in it and there were a couple of grownups on the swings. A groundskeeper saw them and promptly told them to get off. When he did, one of them pouted and hung his head while pointing to his friend who was still playing on the swings, almost as if to say "but he gets to play on the swings". It was childlike and very entertaining. The pedestrian signs here are interesting too. They have a guy walking, his legs are moving, and a countdown as one is permitted to cross the street. However, when time is running short to cross, the walking man on the sign starts running!

That night, we got on the night bus to Guayquil. We boarded the bus without issue and had seats right at the front so Peter got some leg room. The problem was that there was no curtain in front of the seats so Peter and Val had a clear view of the winding turns, rain, fog, passing on blind corners, driving in on-coming lanes, psychadelically lit busses and general distain for life, people and general well-being that out bus driver seemed to have.

Despite being certain that death was at every bend in the road, we arrived in Guayquil alive. We had to kill some time there before we got on our Ormeño bus for the , 1918 km or 24 hour bus ride

Things we learned in Ecuador
-Apparently, Val´s new name is ¨The Lazy Mrs.¨, at least according to Dominic, one of the staff at the hostel
-Ecuadorian spanish is much easier to understand than Colombian spanish
-Don't sit at the front of the bus unless you truly want to experience the horror that is the bus driving skill of an Ecuadorian at night!

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