Quito, Ecuador

We have been in Quito now for six days and it has been great to stay put for a while! Quito is a beautiful city surrounded by mountains. It has quite a high altitude (almost 3000m I think) so took a couple of days to get used to it.











The town is long and narrow and has a ´new´bit (where all the hotels and restaurants and newer shops are) and the old colonial part which is a UNESCO world heritage site. We are staying in the old town which is a lovely place to wander about and enjoy the atmosphere.








The streets are narrow and as the city is amongst mountains there are quite a lot of hills to climb. The streets are also very noisy with cars, buses, taxis which all honk their horns or play tunes to make you get out of their way. There are lots of street sellers with various fruit and vegetables which look like they´ve come from their own land as they don´t have vast quantities.





If you´re very lucky they sing rather than shout their wares, like the rose, milk and strawberry sellers in Oliver!

There are many many churches in Quito of which we´ve managed to visit one or two... the best being the Church of the Vow where for $2 you can have the priviledge of climbing the bell towers.

There is a basic wooden plank and some rickety old ladders with no barriers and no one around to see if you fall! Amazing views from the top though.

Tomorrow we are heading into the jungle to stay in a jungle lodge for a few days. The place is only accessible by boat down the Rio Napo and the money raised goes to support the indigenous community who live there. Don´t worry we won´t be roughing it - they have cabins and solar powered electricity and hot showers apparently! The lodge is by a lake where black caimans live (crocodile type things) and you can swim there at certain times of the day when the caimans aren´t around... though I might give that a miss!