Quito

ABOUT QUITO:
Quito is the capital of Ecuador, nestled in a hollow in the mountains in between the volcanos Cayambe, Pichincha, and Cotopaxi - at 2,850m above sea level, it is the world's highest official capital city. Founded in 1534 by a group of settlers led by Sebastián de Benalcázar, the town slowly grew throughout the Spanish colonial era and after the region's independence from Spain in 1822.

The colonial old town is a maze of steep, cobbled streets with intricately carved, overhanging balconies, and some of the best examples of Spanish colonial art and churches anywhere in the Americas - along with Kraków, Quito was the first ever World Cultural Heritage Sites declared by UNESCO in 1978. The modern area of the town is lively and has some fantastic restaurants and bars. Quito's mix of European and Indian cultures make this a fascinating city, and you will come across stalls displaying Indian textiles, colourful wall hangings, jewellery, pottery, and woodcarvings. Quito has some incredible museums, galleries, and parks in the city, and some excellent adventure activities and mountain treks nearby for those with extra time in the area.

Today was another early start, with the plan to be at the border by 6:30 am, when it opens, because of the current Venezuelan crisis. We arrived to find lots of Venezuelan’s already there, UNICEF marquees, etc. Thankfully, they have recently introduced a three line system to help speed up the border, one line for Venezuelan’s with a passport, one for Venezuelan without a passport (in an attempt to stop Venezuelans from leaving the country, they have stopped issuing passports), and a third line for everyone else, who the process first. Even with that, we were still at the border for 1 ½ hours.

On our way, we stopped at the Middle of the World, at the Equator, where I made some new “friends” with an Italian couple and learned a new word. We walked up the monument where this couple had already been taking hundreds of photos and after patiently waiting they finally finished and went to the side, so we moved up to start to take our photo, to which he decided to stand in front of us, with a menacing look on his face. I asked him to move out of the way, and when he wouldn’t, I moved up next to him so I could take the photo without him in the way. All of us took a small handful of photos and then moved to the side to which they immediately jumped back in to

hog the photo area. I’m not normally the confrontational type, but given how rude and inconsiderate these two were being I thought I would return the favour and move back and stand in the background over their phots for maybe 10 seconds and then moved back out. I was going to leave it at that then they decided to give me the finger and call me a “stronzo”, which Sibylle told me directly translates as an arsehole, but is their worst insult, like our C word. To which I decided to move back into the background of their photos giving them the finger. Everyone on our tour loved it, and so did many of the other people watching, with two people coming over to shake my hand. After a few minutes, I moved on to enjoy the remainder of the exhibit, which various science experiments regarding magnets, gravity etc. Afterwards, my new friends stormed up to me again trying to be intimidating, but it didn’t work cause I could tell they were all talk and started yelling at me again calling “an arrogant baboon”, to which I replied by laughing and jumping around like a baboon, to

which everyone burst out laughing. I found the entire thing hysterical, given how much they were in the wrong but how they were making out to be such the victim!

We all regrouped at the agreed time, and our tour guide told us that the massive attraction had been built at the wrong location and GPS had calculated the right position to be c200 meters down the road. We then went to the Intinan museum, which was the location of the real equator. I preferred this location to the actual monument, this place had the history of the local tribe, the local animals and experiments such as watching the water drain on the equator, and on both sides of the equator and it actually does flow in different directions. I balanced an egg on a nail, but it was also a very windy day, and it blew off before I could get a picture.

Tonight was the end of my first tour, and we had our farewell dinner at a Mexican restaurant, afterwards most of us went out for drinks. We first went to a pub that Jazz had previously been to, we arrived and they were serving 2 for 1 cocktails. I had one round before they closed and we on the street looking for a place to go when a guy approached us saying he has a place to go. We apprehensively followed him and eventually, led to a block of flats and escorted up some stairs to a flat that once inside had been converted into a club. We were told we had to be quiet, but they were playing music quite loudly??? The next day I had the worst hangover I’ve ever had in my life, I put it down to the higher altitude because I didn’t drink even to deserve that level of pain!

My next tour was with Intrepid and had a meeting at 2 pm. We have 1 Kiwi guy, 1 Swiss girl, 1 Hong Kong guy, 1 Aussie couple who will come all the way to Rio with me, 2 German ladies, 1 girl from Sydney, an older Aussie couple and a group of four Aussies travelling together: 2 sisters, a best friend and her brother. We had a brief walking tour of the old city of Quito, finishing with dinner at a local restaurant.

When walking back to the hotel, we came across a traditional Ecuadorean wedding and we waited until they left to watch the procession.