Queasy in Quito!
Ecuador | Quito
Quito, Ecuador’s capital and its second largest city, sits high in the mountains amid dramatic mist covered peaks. We were back at high altitude again, 2850m, but felt more or less normal despite climbing up a relatively steep hill to get to our hostel, Quito Cultural, right in the heart of the historic old town. This area is a Unesco World Heritage site and it’s easy to see why. Dotted with 17th century facades, pretty plazas and spectacular churches that mix Spanish, Moorish and indigenous elements; it’s quite beautiful. Read the rest of this post by clicking here…
Volcanoes and Virgins
Ecuador | Baños
We broke the long journey to Quito in the spa town of Baños (literally ‘Baths’), a small place nestled in a cloud-topped valley with steep green peaks rising on both sides. It had been a long journey, and being a Sunday evening very little in the town seemed to be open, so we scoffed a quick pizza, glugged a beer on the roof terrace at the hostel and had a quiet night! Read the rest of this post by clicking here…
Curry and Cathedrals
Ecuador | Cuenca
A $2 taxi dropped us near the Tomebamba River in Cuenca‘s historic centre – the Ecuadorian government dropped the old currency, the Sucre, in 2000. Cuenca is Ecuador’s third largest city and is pretty high, at 2530m. So it was off with the flip-flops and t-shirts and back on with the shoes and jumpers. We found a decent place to stay, La Cigale, which is a hostel cum bar/restaurant and we’d heard good things about it. Desperate to get a bit of fresh air in before it got dark we headed down to the river which is a picturesque spot with grassy banks and pretty bridges. The river is lined with some really attractive colonial buildings. In fact, the whole of Cuenca’s old town is full of beautifully restored buildings. Read the rest of this post by clicking here…
Iguanarama
Ecuador | GuayaquilWe only had one full day in Guayaquil, Ecuador’s biggest city, a balmy tropical place on the estuary of the Guayas river. Once a crime ridden port it’s been 
tarted up in an attempt to improve it’s reputation, and they haven’t done a bad job.
We started our exploring at Parque Bolivar, which, although it’s tiny, is home to dozens of huge Iguanas who roam around eyeing up people’s ice creams! Quite how they got there I don’t know, but the wheelbarrows full of lettuce provided by the council seem to help in keeping them there! There were also a few turtles roaming around, although we couldn’t get as up close and personal with them! We also went to the modern cathedral on the edge of the square to have a nose around – beginning to lose count of how many we’ve seen now! Read the rest of this post by clicking here…
Party Poopers
Peru | MáncoraWe arrived in Máncora having had the best night’s sleep on a bus ever. Good old Cruz del Sur! It felt a little bit like we’d ended up back in a South-East Asian beach town. Lots of wooden shacks and our old friend, the trusty tuk-tuk! Plus, it was boiling. Even at 9 in the morning! I was pleased!
We were staying at Loki, a hostel with a pool and a reputation for partying. There are a few Loki’s dotted around South America, mostly in Peru and Bolivia and all of them have the party reputation – which is why we’d avoided them previously. But we thought we should probably try one out and what better place than by the sea in a sleepy beach town?! We got a tuk tuk to the hostel and checked in. Our room wasn’t available until 1 so we spent the morning dipping in and out of the pool and snoozing on sun loungers. The Loki complex looked to have been a hotel in another life so there was a really good pool area, a restaurant/bar zone and a few hammocks dotted about for afternoon naps. Read the rest of this post by clicking here…
Lightning Lima
Peru | LimaAfter a couple of days relaxing amid the dunes, it was on to the Peruvian capital, Lima. We’d been warned it wasn’t particularly safe by several people we’d met along the way, as well as our guide book, so we decided to make our visit a short one! A poor populace and high unemployment make tourist muggings commonplace.
We decided to stay in the upmarket Miraflores district, a seafront area which was described by a woman we met in La Paz as Lima’s Beverly Hills! It’s also supposed to be the least dangerous area of the city, so it seemed like a good bet! Arriving mid-afternoon we spent the remaining daylight hours wandering the well-kept parks above the cliffs, eating ice cream and watching the energetic roller-bladers and paragliders. It all seemed quite American – I’ve never been to California, but Miraflores pretty well matches how i imagine it to be! Read the rest of this post by clicking here…
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