Ecuador: Quito and around

[posted by Kizzy]

Our flight to Ecuador was without problems. We flew into Lima, Peru and from there we took the flight to Quito. We were a bit surprised at the number of security checks that we, like the other passengers, had to undergo. But other than that no surprises.

We arrived to Quito around midnight, we had already organised an airport transfer to our hotel and everything went as planned. Outside the city felt a bit colder then Costa Rica. The driver who picked us up, Guillermo, became a trusted friend in Quito and a good source of information. We hired his services a few more times because we enjoyed his company and he was always fair in his prices.

For the next 5 days we stayed at hostalCasa Kanela, in the tourist district of La Mariscal. It is advised that you stay a minimum of 5 days in Quito before setting off anywhere to get acclimatised to the high altitude. It was a good place to rest, the street was quite and we felt safe. The stay included breakfast, which was quite rich and included a selection of fruits. Here we also experienced something that would re-occur at various points in our travel, the electricity went down a couple of times. 

Casa Kanela - front view

Casa Kanela - street view

The caretaker was an interesting fella, we couldn't make head nor tail of him. I thought he was under the influence of alcohol most times, Col just thought he wasn't quite there. He would often wonder off in the middle of a conversation, and turn his back on us whilst still finishing a sentence, often pacing himself back and forth around the living room. Most tourists here were Spanish speaking, and we felt that had we been Spanish we might have got a bit more attention from the reception, they didn't willingly share information about what we could do. We always had to ask. It had been customary to us, in most places we went, that the hosts would always voluntarily offer information.

We both felt affected by the altitude and decided to go easy until we felt better. Adding to this feeling of unwellness, we were both under a bit of a psychological strain. Quito is said to be a dangerous city, even local people will not spare enough words to tell you about the city's 'dangerous' reputation. Everywhere we went, there was always somebody too happy to share their stories.

Col and I also had some disagreements about how best to approach this, mostly me wanting to feel that I could go without looking over my shoulder and Col reasonably reminding me that here we could not afford to do so.

La Mariscal, where we stayed, is said to be less dangerous than the old town, and effectively we did see a lot of policemen everywhere. Even our hostal had a private guard that looked over the place from 7pm onwards. Personally, I can't say how much of it is a hype, you do hear the stories and you do see the reinforced security. And unfortunately our first days in Quito were overclouded with this constant suspicion about everything and everyone. I'm happy to say that we do not add to the many with stories to tell, ours was a safe stay.

On our first day we went to the OldTown for a visit. The transport system is straightforward if you know where you are going. They have three main operators: Ecovia, Trolley bus and Metro. The general advice is that once in a bus or trolley you always hold your bag in front of you, pickpocketing seems to be an art here, and they are really smart about how they do it. So never let your guard down. 

We took the Ecovia bus to the park Simon Bolivar and from there we walked to the Basilica del Voto Nacional, perched on a hill it gives great views of the town. 

Walking up to La Basilica

Inside the Basilica

Basilica - side view

The first thing we noticed is how close we felt to the sky, as if we could almost touch it. The city lies in a valley, on the slopes of the Pichincha volcano in the midst of the impressive Andes and most times you are either walking up or down the hilly streets. Quito is old, and you can tell by the many colonial buildings that still illustrate its narrow cobalt streets and squares. Most of them housing commercial trade on the lower floors. The old meets the new. 

Old town - Panecillo

Old town - San Francisco Square - see how close the clouds look

Old town - a view from the Basilica

Another distinct feature, is its people, beautifully dressed in the typical costumes of the area. The women stand out most because of the colours of their carefully crafted ensembles, all handmade by them. Hats, hats everywhere, another reminder of the Spaniards and at times Western influence in this culture. Ecuadorians generally dress smartly, and tend to frown upon 'frumpy' dressing. It seems good manner that you shake hands when you meet someone. According to our guide, you do have to ask permission to people to take their photos. So not strangely, we do not have many photos of the locals.

Quitenos in Otavalo

From the Basilica we went down the street Gabriel Garcia Moreno, also know as Calle de Las Siete Cruces. Which, covers most of the old town. There's so much to see in terms of museums and churches. There's almost a tale to every building built and most locals would happily share these stories with you. We have a few that we can now share too. 

Here we had our first meal, an 'almuerzo' (set meal of soup, main course, dessert and juice) of $2.00 per person. Col could not believe these prices. The soups are really nice or as we would now say 'muy ricas'. And it's good value for money. Like Col would say, here you can't really justify spending $30 on a meal for two. If you do, it better be damn good.

An almuerzo menu

People in Ecuador don't give away their smiles lightly, but when they finally do you feel like the world's happiest person.

We moved on to see some of the churches and visit some of the famed squares. In the Plaza de San Francisco there was an exhibition that touched me. It was a selection of photographs taken from an archive showing the influence of black people (i.e. the slaves brought to South America during colonial time) in the history of Ecuador. The different roles they took in Ecuadorian society and how they helped to shape the county into what it is today. You do not see many black people around. But in Ecuador, I feel that race is not an issue, at least not the way we define it in Europe or America. Col and I received compliments on occasion for being together, and caring smiles at the thought of how beautiful our children would be. It's funny. 

The graffiti on the streets here, is maybe some of the most interesting we have ever seen. Very surrealist in inspiration. There is some real talent on display here. And almost every white wall is covered with it. 

One of the things we don't like here is the exhaust fumes coming from the cars, the buses are the worst offenders. Every time a bus goes by it leaves a very dark cloud of smoke behind it. Not pretty. You can imagine the traffic on those narrow streets and how much of the fumes you would inhale at any point in time. 

We generally had dinner around 6.30pm and tried to be back by no later than 9pm. As we heard the streets take a different life from their on. Back to La Mariscal we had our first meal in a local restaurant, very close to our hostal. A bit overpriced and we didn't really enjoy our meal. 

The following day, we decided to visit some of the tour operators in La Mariscal and get some suggestions as to how we'd go about exploring Ecuador. We did get some great ideas from the general chat and our conclusion was that it was far too expensive to sign up for these tours with the guides. You will get from the guide books that is safer to do the treks with the guides, but we also wondered how much of it was a general agreement between these places to make more money out of tourists. Yes, our suspicious city nature was in full mode here.

King-Kong? - An art installation in La Mariscal

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View of the mountains - La Mariscal

Graffiti - La Mariscal

The local tourism office is not as helpful as you might expect. Must be the culture, you have maybe 2 to three people in there, but they don't seem very versed in how to engage people and show them things to do around town. You will get pointed to the flyers and many leaflets and from there work it out.

There' also plenty to do around Quito, and we were more drawn to the activities around town. We visited the popular artesanaria market of Otavalo. It's about 2 hours journey and we had to change buses twice.

Taking the buses it's also a big part of experiencing life in Ecuador. The bus driver is always accompanied by an assistant who's job is to ensure that all seats in the bus are taken, and to collect the payment for the journey. This chap is very active at all times, going out of the bus several times shouting the destination of the bus and luring people in. Also, during the many stops the bus does, different street vendors will come in selling their product and getting off at the next stop. Every now and then you get a street singer coming in, singing and then collecting donations, or someone who was hit by bad luck and will tell his/her story and ask for some donations to help get himself back on his feet. During all this, they always apologise for disturbing your journey and ask for a minute of your time. Occasionally, if you are lucky, on long journeys you will get a bus where there are movies showing, like we were lucky enough on our journey to Otavalo to watch Arnold Scwarzenegger's 'Commando', if not you best assured to at least have music playing during the journey.

A Saint statue in the bus

 Otavalo is a town mostly famed for its markets. As we moved around we realised that there were different sections, you have the meat market, the vegetables market, the side where they sell what is termed as 'American' clothes, but generally meaning Western fashion and the Artesanaria, where tourists will flock to haggle for some of the beautifully hand made goods.

a colourful hat

We did not spend much time here, our aim was not to buy, solely to see and we did not want to waste these good people's time. We then took a taxi to nearby Peguche, where we had our first trek and enjoyed Las Cascatas de Peguche (waterfalls). This truly seemed a family affair, and we watched as many locals bathed in the waters of the waterfall, huge families with grandmother and grandfather most times.

There were other interesting features nearby Otavalo, and we realised at this point that having a car could be useful to move more freely from A to B. Having said that, taxis are a good alternative to a private car, they are not very expensive. But it's wearisome, to always be on your guard, and try to be reassured that you're in a 'legal' taxi and that you're being given a 'fair' deal.

Graffiti in Otavalo

Installation at the entrance of Otavalo

Peguche at a distance

Whilst in Quito, we also visited 'Mitaddel Mondo' – famous for the being recognised as the 'middle of the world'. It's interesting because where they agreed to be the Equator line, they turned the area around into a shopping complex that you pay to get into.

We took the cheesy and recommended photos, but we were a bit disappointed with the complex. It's a very big space with not much more to do, other than shopping. There are also some museums of somewhat questionable interest.

Samples of Oswaldo Guayasamin exhibition

It wasn't very busy, it seems that the tourist season had just ended. Whilst here we spotted this trendy bus and what looked like football players. There was a bit of commotion with armed police about, and we asked at a local business what was the noise all about and they told us that that was the Costa Rican football team. We saw some of them rushing to get to the bus with some gift bags. Shy as we were, we only took a photo of the bus as it took off with all those famous players. Football is serious business here, and I'm sure that if we'd taken a photo with one of the players that surely we would have made some more friends.

The bus with the team inside - we swear!

From here we took a guided trek with Calamartours to the crater of the Volcano Pululahua. Without a doubt the highlight of this trip. The volcano had its last eruption 6 years ago, and on its crater a community of 150 people settled there. Our guide said that the volcano is still active but these people don't seem to care much about it. It is said that they are very healthy, it is suggested that it's the life style they have and the air of the mountain, the only hospital in there was shut down for lack of patients. You can spend a night there, through government facilities at $3.00 or at $15.00 per night in the hostal. After 3pm the whole of the crater is covered in clouds.

The clouds coming in

The town of Nublin - on the crater

The trek up the mountain people do on a daily basis

Looking down

Our guide, Filipe

Just outside the Mitad del Mondo complex there's an interesting museum, Museo Inti Nan,  which claims to house the real middle of the world mark and some interesting experiments that vouch for that. Many Quitenos will be quick to say that for them Mitad del Mondo is the whole valley and not just the line as registered by scientists and technology.

The real middle of the world line

One of the couples's we met during our hikes in Canada, Camila and Mark, put us in touch with a local friend of theirs: Pablo Polit, a professor of I.T in Quito. We made contact a few days before our departure from Quito, and he couldn't have been more friendly. He felt like an old friend that you hadn't seen in a long time and you just got reacquainted.

with Pablo

Our time in Quito drew to a close with a dinner with Pablo. Pablo took us to see the old town by night, truly beautiful. Something we would have not done otherwise because we were advised not to go to the old town at night. Pablo drove us to this view point where you could see the town as it lit up, all the churches, the Virgin Angel at Panecillo. It was precious, and from here you get to see Quito as a narrow strech of land between the hills of the magestic mountains and volcanoes.

You notice the town growing, going further uphill and stretching all the way from north (La Mariscal) to South (Old Town). After this we were taken in a horse ride to the main squares and churches as Pablo illustrated our views with tales from the past.

Quito by night

La Virgen de Quito - El Panecillo hill

A tour of the city by horse and carriage - Thank you Pablo!

We had dinner at the 'Hasta la Vuelta, Señor' (I'll be back) restaurant in Palazio Arzobispal where we were introduced to some local traditions: the drinking of Canelazo ( an alcoholic sugar cane drink) and we ate some empanadas de morocho. The restaurant owes its name to a one of the many Quitenos tales, the story is that a young priest went out nighty to drink and carouse, and would climb over a crucifix each time he went out, until Jesus talked to him, which led to his renouncing his nightly parties and becoming more devoted! - click here to read the full legend.

Illustration of the tale 'Hasta la Vista Senor'

Our time with Pablo was short but he really touched our hearts in the way that he accommodated and looked after us during this time. The following day we would leave to Banos.

Last views of Quito

 Please click here for the Picasa photos


Final thoughts
Being in Quito was definitely an emotional trip as we tried to balance our own common sense with the general advice. It does not take away from the visual rainbow of people, architecture, food and landscape you find upon arriving here.

For me personally, it was an awakening. A general awareness about the world around me, people and safety that I tried to ignore whilst living in Europe. It's not pleasant to be suspicious of almost everybody but I suppose it is important to recognise that some of these dangers exist. There's no point in creating situations that can easily be avoided..