Days 1 - 3 in Ecuador

Mom and dad stayed at our house, and they had to drive up Christmas Eve because of the prediction of snow. Matthew and I left for Atlanta on Christmas Day in a flurry. We arrived in Atlanta with no snow! I called mom and she said there was already 5 inches at our house! We go through security with no problems. Our flight was for 1:00pm, so we had time to eat some lunch. Matthew and I were seated on the exit row, which has a lot of leg room! We make it to Miami for a four hour layover. There was nothing to do there except belly up to the bar which was conveniently located right next to our gate. :)

We were on a BIG plane to Guayaquil which arrived at 12:45pm. We got into our hotel around 1:15am and slept in a big, comfy bed. The next morning we went back to the airport to get our rental car. It was...um... special. A little Nissan with the sideview mirror that was about to fall off! Plus one or two of the tires were a little flat. We drove to a gas station with the Hertz guy and filled them up.

Off we went to Cuenca! Here is the map I had to help navigate.

It took a little more than 3 hours to drive up over the Cajas Mountains, which were beautiful despite the fog. Matthew could barely make out the road in some places because of the fog, and the roads were very curvy. We took a wrong road getting into Cuenca, so we ended up taking the long way into town. I saw a Christmas parade with people dressed as the 3 wise men, and children dressed at Santa Claus. This is the outside of our hotel.

The city had several beautiful churches.


These were the Cajas Mountains for our drive back. It wasn't as foggy, but there were some places.

Our stay in Cuenca was pretty low key. There wasn't a whole lot to do except walk around and marvel at the architecture. Since it was the day after Christmas AND a Sunday, there were no bars open. Our room was very quaint with lots of closet space. A/C and heat were not needed in this area. The temperature was upper 40's at night and in the low 70's by day. Breakfast was typical: coffee or tea, fruit, bread with butter and jam, and scrambled eggs.

Monday, we walked to an art museum called Museo del Banco. It was nice, but there weren't any descriptions or dates on anything. I spied a Bird Zoo at the bottom of the hill, so we checked it out.
We found a little restaurant for lunch. He didn't take our order but served us a typical almuerzo (lunch): Some odd hominy/corn snack, soup, then a slice of beef with rice and salad (cabbage and carrots with lemon vinaigrette).

The city of Cuenca was sleepy, but I think most people stay there to spend the day hiking in the Cajas. Monday night we met a couple visiting their daughter who was studying in Ecuador. They were pretty interesting, and we stayed up talking.

Tuesday morning, Matthew tried to crank the car, but the battery was dead! He found a taxi driver who helped him jump it. We were starting to wonder about the trustworthiness of this vehicle. I was ready for the beach!!!!!

We drove back through the Cajas and back through Guayaquil. That was interesting! There aren't really any lines on the road, and if there are, no one uses them. 3 lanes could become 5, for example. I didn't take any pictures because I was navigating us through downtown Guayaquil. Luckily it was a grid, and Matthew managed to get take a right and a left to be parallel with the crazy main road. They name roads after dates, and we were looking for Nueve de Octobre (9th of October). We found it at last, and it led us to the Coastal Highway. It was three+ hours from Cuenca to Guayaquil, and another 3.5 hours to the beach. Matthew did a great job driving. I was ready for four days of sun and relaxing!