Cuenca

Cuenca is Ecuador’s 3^rd largest city but feels significantly smaller than numbers 1 & 2, Guayaquil and Quito. Like many of the old cities I’ve visited in Latin America, Cuenca’s center has maintained a colonial air, which is to say that the buildings and city planning imposed when the Spanish “founded” the city in the mid-16^th century still define the downtown area. Cuenca was settled long before the Spanish arrived, of course, by an advanced indigenous population called the Cañari and then briefly by the Incas. This combination of impressive colonial architecture and indigenous ruins earns Cuenca status as a UNESCO World Heritage Trust site and made for an impressive visit.

If your goal is to appreciate these wonders and the other little delights Cuenca has to offer (which ours was), it’s best to simply walk around the city center for a few days (which we did).

A few highlights:

Possibly the best flower market I’ve ever been to. Though small, the square that is home to the magnificent market is bursting at the seams with activity—the chaotic chorus of conversations between flower buyers and sellers, the explosion of a rainbow that includes every shade of every color imaginable, the unique and powerful perfume created by the competing flower varieties—and all but overwhelmed my senses.

An awesome ethnographic museum situated next to some of the Incan ruins of the city. The 2nd floor of this museum, packed full of visual and audio artifacts, celebrates the impressively diverse array people that call this small country home, from the ever-diminishing indigenous populations of the eastern Amazon region to the Afro-Ecuadorians that make up the northern coast.

The tiny studio of an excellent Cuencan painter, which we popped into just to take a peek and ended up getting a quite thorough tour of (including descriptions of virtually all the paintings). We weren’t in the market for art of this kind (namely, expensive), which we would have told our loquacious guide at the beginning had we been able to get a word in, but it was a pleasure to spend a half hour admiring these beautiful works and hearing the stories behind them, nonetheless.

The Rio Tomebamba, a gently-rushing, boulder-strewn river that flows through Cuenca, whose grassy, tree-lined banks offered us an excellent spot for a picnic lunch and siesta.

Another impression, of a rather different nature, that I'm left with after 2 weeks in Ecuador:

Though Ecuador is quite obviously a developing country and impoverished on the whole, I’ve been struck everywhere we’ve gone by the lack of the kind of significant wealth gap that characterizes many of the other developing countries I’ve visited, especially those in Latin America. Though people certainly live in what we’d consider low-income conditions, on the whole it seems that the vast majority of people live there together. We never saw the kinds of breathtaking disparities you’ll encounter in place like Santiago or Buenos Aires, with elegant gated communities situated just a few kilometers (or in some cases even closer) from villas miserias, or slums, whether within cities or between the cities and the rural areas.

In reality we saw very little of the country; a trip south from Quito to Vilcabamba through places like Quilotoa and Baños means traveling pretty much directly along traditionally tourist-beaten path. Additionally, any thoughts about going in search of great poverty in the cities were trumped by both transportation limitations and safety concerns. Thus, I come to this conclusion about a minimal wealth disparity (at least by Latin American standards) quite hesitantly, both because I’ve done no actual research on its validity and because I recognize that our mode of experiencing Ecuador—as tourists passing quickly through a narrow swath of the country—greatly limited what we saw.

However, it’s an impression I’m left with nonetheless, and one I would really like to have addressed by those of you who know more about Ecuador than I do. More than a few of you have lived here or at least studied the region, so whether it’s to challenge, correct, corroborate, or simply comment, please send your thoughts on this issue my way.

Baños

The town of Baños, our next stop our trek south along the Ecuadorian Andes, is most famous for its natural hot baths and its ample outlets for outdoor adventuring. It is also a gateway into the Ecuadorian jungle, so many folks pass through on their way to a rougher outdoor experience. Though Shepard and I passed on the jungle visit this time around, we did do some adventuring of our own while in Baños.

We spent one day “canyoning,” or waterfall rappelling, which, despite the gimmicky nature inherent to a guided outdoor activity in a tourist town, was quite fun. The day was warm and sunny, so the cold mountain water rushing over us felt great, and our spectacular surroundings—lush forestry and beautiful mountains—made the experience all the more refreshing.

We also spent a day biking between Baños and neighboring Puyo. In addition to a good workout, biking along the winding mountain road was a great way to take in the impressive landscape of mountains, canyons and waterfalls at a leisurely pace.

Besides these activities and a good deal more hiking, we took a few days to just hang in the quaint downtown area, enjoying everything from the interesting (if understated) architecture and beautiful folkloric music performances to ridiculously yummy local food and an awesome (affordable!) massage.

More than anything, we simply relaxed in Baños. Our hostel, Casa Verde, run by two Australians with the help (or disruption, rather), of their toddler son, may or may not have been my favorite part of the town… A bit outside the busy downtown area, Casa Verde is situated upon the rushing Rio Pastaza and its large, open rooms with ample windows afford great views of the river and surrounding mountains. A huge vegetable garden outside provided fresh fruit and veggies to accompany the homemade bread and granola of our breakfast each morning, and a clean, well-stocked kitchen offered us the quite welcomed opportunity to indulge in another traveling sacrifice, cooking! In fact, we were so relaxed, well-rested (and well-fed) at Casa Verde that we ended up staying two days longer than we’d originally planned to soak it all up.

After a few weeks of continual travel—trying to know new towns and cities each day and changing hostels every night or two—our slightly extended stay in Baños was a welcome respite. It also afforded us the chance to get to know the town a bit and even to make a few friends among the locals, things which, unfortunately, are often compromised in our form of travel.

Quilotoa Loop

From Quito we traveled south to the Quilatoa loop, a 200km loop through the central mountainous region that includes a number of tiny Andean towns and the magnificent Laguna Quilotoa. This ancient volcanic crater filled in with sparkling emerald water is a must-see when passing through Ecuador, though fortunately it’s a bit of a trip to get there (it sits at almost 13k ft!), which keeps the masses of tourists away. Actually, with the relative dearth of people around and the mist that rolls in each afternoon, Quilotoa manages maintains a rather mystical, untouched air.

Many travelers do the entire loop, hiking from village to village each day. Due to our limited time, however, (and to our mammoth packs) we opted to travel straight to one village about half-way around the loop, Chugchilán, and spend a few days on day hikes out from there.

One day we spent hours hiking uphill (or upmountain, rather) to a Quesería, or cheese factory and co-op, we’d heard a lot about in the town and from other travelers. I’m not sure what I was expecting, but it certainly wasn’t the 1.5 room building, 2-person staff we found when we finally arrived. We were not disappointed, however, as the people were kind and thorough on the 3-minute tour and the cheese probably the freshest I’ve ever tasted.

Another morning we caught a ride up to the Laguna Quilotoa and spent the day hiking back. After some time simply taking in the magnificence that is the Laguna, we began our hike around the rim and our eventual descent back to Chugchilán. The “directions” we’d been related tried desperately to be specific, though that turns out to be a difficult task when there is little actual path, zero trail markers, and few landmarks along the way. It’s not surprising, then, that we managed to take a few detours from the correct path, the consequences of which in one case meant hiking straight up what I’m convinced was a 120degree (at least) a produce field in the hail. In the end, however, some combination of our intuition and the encouragement of the small handful of people we met along the way got us back to our village safe and mostly sound, and the nasty cold I carried as a trophy the next several days was entirely worth it.

These days comprised some of my favorite in Ecuador for their simplicity: breathing fresh mountain air as I worked hard physically all day to the spectacular backdrop of the Andes, later sharing a warm meal with a new group of interesting adventurers each evening, and perhaps some cards or reading before falling into bed exhausted and fulfilled.

Quito, Ecuador

Please excuse my delay in writing! I sincerely apologize for keeping you waiting (I understand it was tough) and assure you that I will not to be so ungracious to you, my beloved reader, again. Though I’ve been in Argentina for a few weeks now, I know you’ve all been on the very edge of your seats for the last month waiting to hear about Ecuador. So, with hopes that reading about the wonders that make up this geographically small but amazing country will soften you, I begin again:

Full of energy after our adventure across Colombia’s Caribbean coast (and aware that I’d only experienced a small portion of the rich, diverse country I was leaving and that I will most certainly have to return one day), we flew from Cartagena to Quito in late February. After shaking the altitude-induced headaches and mild nausea (we traveled from sea level to over 9000ft in just a few hours!) I enjoyed the capital city of Quito immensely.

Our first stop in the city was El Museo Guayasamín and the artist’s Capilla del Hombre. The former is an impressive array of the work and collections of the man who was probably Ecuador’s most famous contemporary artist, Oswaldo Guayasamín, and the latter one of his final and most extraordinary works, a massive architectural feat that is in itself a museum for much of the rest of his work. The museum, housed on the compound that is Guayasamín’s former home, showcases many the artists’ own paintings, sculptures, and elaborate jewelry as well as his substantial collection of others’ work, from pre-Colombian artifacts to scores of religious paintings…An impressive and fulfilling museum experience, to say the least.

The museum’s impressiveness is quickly overshadowed, however, when one walks uphill a few blocks to the second Guayasamín monument, his home until his death in 1999 and the site of his Capilla del Hombre, or “Chapel of Man.” More than 10 years in planning and creation, the architecturally astounding Capilla del Hombre is without a doubt the crowning jewel of the artists’ long and prolific career. Besides a breathtaking home for many of his most famous works, it is also a tribute to the subject—humanity—of his study and work over those years. Guayasamín traveled all over the world in his lifetime and his works portray the wide array of subjects, issues and events he encountered. His works paint both the joys of humanity and the trials of innocents around the world, from the plight of the indigenous populations of his own country and the horrors of the dictatorships that plagued his region, to the agony of those affected by the atomic bomb and the sorrows of victims of slave trades across the globe. Interestingly, both his most tragic painting and his most hopeful one (according to our museum guide) depict a mother and child, the former a hollow mother who cries black tears for her child who has starved because of her dried-up breasts, and the latter a mother and child embracing. One of his most distinctive characteristics is the extraordinarily striking and expressive hands he paints, and also characteristic is the use of bright colors to offset tragic images painted in gray and brown.

Thinking about Guayasamín’s incredible talent and his vast influence and importance in Ecuador (we saw copies and recreations of his work and style all over the country), I’m struck by the realization that he’s virtually unknown to much of the rest of the world. I had never heard of him, which means very little, of course, but neither had Shepard nor any of the other non-Ecuadorian’s I’ve asked since (excepting my friends who studied in Quito and recommended I visit the museum… thank you Mary and Amit!). This reality is even more troubling when I think about the international nature and the diversity of his subjects because it brings into stark relief how educated he was about the rest of the world and how uneducated we all are about him. How is it that someone can be so talented, so locally influential, so experienced and knowledgeable about the worlds’ people, while those same people know nothing of him/her?

I left the Museo and the Capilla both feeling grateful that I’d been introduced to Guayasamín and lamenting the countless other geniuses around the world I’ll likely never encounter.

Beyond contemplating the myriad social injustices Guayasamín’s works raise and that of his anonymity around the world, Shepard and I spent our short time in Quito exploring the “Old Town,” the original part of the city. Full of character and steeped in history, this neighborhood is crawling with locals out for shopping and socializing at all hours of the day.

We were lucky enough to land in the city on a weekend, which meant we got to see some of the marvelous artisanal work of the Otavaleños (indigenous peoples from a market town north of the city) at the Saturday market in the park, to enjoy a Caribbean/Andean fusion concert over tapas in the Plaza del Teatro, to try out our dancing shoes at a local salsa club, and, best of all, to enjoy excellent people-watching all day and night. Whether wandering through the narrow, bustling streets among breathtaking colonial buildings and churches and haphazard old businesses and residences, nibbling on a variety of local specialties (empanadas verdes, or plantain and cheese empanadas, were my favorite) including ice cream from a 150-yr old heladería, or simply sitting and observing the hive of activity that is the Plaza Grande on a Saturday, I was one happy tourist in Quito.