Good news. After a painful early wake up and our goodbyes to the grandparents, we had a good flight via Miami to Quito. All backpacks made it in one piece. Flights connected and were on time.
Quito, formally San Francisco de Quito, is the capital city of Ecuador, and at an elevation of 9,350 feet (2850m), it is the highest official capital city in the world (though La Paz, Bolivia seems to claim this as well).
It derives its name from the Quitus, who inhabited the region even before the Incas, way before the Spanish came.
Pickup awaited us at the terminal, and we got to our hotel 60 min after arrival. We met up with our contact Jorge, and made appointment for evening tour.
We had a quick (very late) lunch in a local restaurant, lots of taco’s, corn chips, rice and beers.
A bit light headed because of the altitude we saw the sited of the city at night. Spanish, colonial, and many churches. At the Calle de la Ronda we tried some local foods and local drinks.
The last stop was at La Vírgen del Panecillo. She is a huge ‘winged virgin mary’, is made out of aluminium and stands on a large hill on top. Evidently one should not walk the hill as it is gang controlled and thus dangerous.
Back at the hotel we crashed, and Leendert predicted he was going to do some ‘extreme sleeping’.
Very interesting information about Quito, thanks! Extreme sleeping…. bahahaha. I think I have some of that planned as well and we didn’t even fly to another continent!
Lieve vanhetRietjes,
Leuk om de eerste verhalen te lezen. Wij wilden jullie nog even heel veel plezier toewensen. Geniet van elkaar, de wereld en de prachtige natuur en mensen die je allemaal tegen gaat komen 🙂
MJMC
Doen we. Vandaag naar het tweede Galapagos eiland, en de eerste waar we ons vrijwilligerswerk gaan doen.
Warme groeten
De familie
Hi!!! I hope you have a great time where ever you go!!!! Alicia I liked your story!
Hello Backpackers! You must have arrived on Galapagos today. Ooohhhhhh, sooooo jealous. Vienna has typical October/November grey skies. Boring Sunday. Highlights of our week were Friday afternoon concert by the Wienersaengerknaben, schnitzel at Plachutta with Belgian friends, stopmotion strip movie making at Zoom kindermuseum for Hannah and Daniel. Rest of the time…work…missing you, lieve buren.
Onderweg naar ins tweede Galapagos eiland. Ik verwacht slechte verbinding aldaar. Zijn in doede doen.
Tot spoedig
AvtR
Bonjour Tara!
Je suis trop joyeuse que tu a écrit. Tu pourra donner a tout le mond a l’ecole noter site? Se serai superbe sit tu pourrai aussi les dire de nous donner des commentaires.
Hope Leendert managed to do some “extreme sleeping”….that’s one extreme event his uncle may be interested in doing also! Lots of love from Texas (just back from the shooting range and the George W. Bush presidential library). Love reading the updates.