Quito was an unexpected pleasant surprise, as initially we wondered how we would fill the time there before our next adventure. As it turned out, we needed a rest and a chance to catch up on sleep, as well as to adjust to the altitude change. Quito is at an altitude of 2,850 m (9,350 feet) and as soon as we got to our hotel room I crashed. Skipped lunch, got up for dinner and then more sleep. Our hotel was in the old city, on an interesting street. We had a 3 hour walking tour organized for our second day there so had to get going by 9am. Warned our guide we would be slow but managed to get a good orientation and learn about the city as we walked through famous squares and visited significant churches. Fortunately we drove up to Panecillo Mirador, the largest aluminum monument in the world, which sits atop of a famous hill and has great views of Quito. We were too tired to go in but enjoyed the view. We had the same guide who collected us from the airport, did the walking tour, took us to Cotopaxi and then back to the airport; so he was our ontap source for all questions. This included my toilet question – do we put the loo paper in the bin for all toilets in Ecuador? The answer was a very definite “yes” as the sewer systems are not built to take toilet paper. In many toilets you also have to get the paper from a central dispenser before you go into the cubicle – worth catching on to that one early. Doing lots of observing to learn the local customs.

After a rest and lunch we ventured out on our own to do more exploring, buy snacks (incl artisan chocolate) and get ice cream at a place that had been recommended.  After tasting many flavors and having the whole shop help in translating for us, I got blackberry and Dick got ‘dog poop’ ice cream.  Helen was worried that we were taken advantage of but our guide confirmed it was a popular flavor (and I don’t mean the blackberry!).  Probably walked about 5 k’s that day so needed another rest til 9pm before a quick dinner in the hotel.  Being gluten free is not easy but the staff at our hotel were so nice and made us special pan de yuca (small bread rolls made from cassava and cheese and served hot – delicious).

As normally happens on holiday, Dick’s glasses broke again (the first time was on the canoe on the Napo River and we found the screw and the engineer fixed them; but maybe not so well), so we had a reason to find an optician.  Went to a modern mall and we could have been anywhere in the world.  The food court was full of American chains and there were lots of US clothing retailers there. The shop looked like OPSM in Sydney and they fixed his glasses.  Our taxi driver very effectively used Google Translate to converse with us. The other purpose of this outing was to go up the cable car – Telefetico, to see the views and to gauge how we coped with an altitude of 4050 m (13,300 feet) above sea level.  We even managd to walk around a bit at the top and enjoy great views of Quito and the Andes mountains surrounding the city. On the way down in the cable car we met a local family who drove us back to our hotel.  That was so nice of them and it gave us a chance to talk to locals.

Our next jaunt was to Cotopaxi National Park(NP), the second most visited NP in Ecuador after Galapagos, and home to the Cotopaxi Volcano (5897m/19,350 feet high), about 2 hours drive from Quito.  In spite of some trepidation about the altitude, we opted to try the hike up Cotopaxi.  The road up the mountain was rough, narrow and zigzagged all the way to the carpark at 4600 m altitude (15,100 feet).  By this time we were chewing our coca leaves furiously, a local cure for altitude sickness. We rugged up and started the climb to the Refuge (4800 m, 15,750 feet).  It was supposed to take an hour but we were slow and needed to stop lots so after half an hour we turned back. Both of us felt good that we got that far, and happy to turn back especially as we both had very tingly fingers on the drive down the mountain.  We also visited a lagoon in the NP that is disappearing due to climate change and we met our Swiss friends from the Amazon cruise in the NP.

Our time in Quito finished with a 4:15am pickup for our flight to Galapagos.  We quite enjoyed the city and our hotel who sent us off with a breakfast box which included hot pan de yuca.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After years of thinking about it and months of actual planning, we are off to South America for another adventure.  In fact we are almost doing 6 separate holidays joined together, so the blog posts will aim to reflect our key destinations: Amazonia, Galapagos, Macchu Picchu, Lake Titittaca, Iguazu Falls and Patagonia.

After reasonable flights to Lima [via Auckland and Santiago], we overnighted in Lima and then flew to Quito where we rested in the Airport Wyndham Hotel before flying over the Andes to Coca to begin our Amazonia adventure.  Two hours in a motorized canoe up the Napo River took us to the Manatee, our riverboat for the four day cruise in Ecuadorian Amazon.  The Manatee Amazon Explorer is a new upmarket boat (1 yr old) built to hold 30 guests.  Fortunately for us, we are only 6 guests with 17 crew; so we are being very well looked after.  As soon as we arrived we were served a very nice 3-course lunch; and that has set a high meal standard that was maintained throughout the cruise. We are learning a lot about Amazonian Ecuador, the Napo basin and the Napo River which flows from the Andes into the Amazon River and into the Atlantic (1150 km long). This area is a biodiversity hotspot with high diversity (191 mammals, 650 birds, 630 fish, and 180 amphibians/reptiles).  With 9 different cultural groups it is also rich in cultural diversity & includes two groups not contacted by the rest of the world.  Our trip included a visit to a family who live in a thatched roof, open-walled house on stilts on the river.  It was an interesting visit as our guide obviously shares a mutual respect with them so we did not feel uncomfortable sitting in their house and learning about their lifestyle. The river is like a highway and motorboats are parked outside of properties as there are no roads here.  This ‘highway’ floods regularly and is constantly changing as new sand bars turn into islands and large flooding erodes huge chunks of land along the river or washes away whole islands.

Interesting to learn about the living culture and how the local indigenous people with their subsistence life style can survive without money as their food is supplied by nature (hunting, fishing and agriculture). They also mostly now grow cash crops and use the money to buy gasoline for the motorized canoes, some clothes etc.

It feels like we are spending most of our time in the motorized canoe bombing along the river seeing the flora and fauna, as well as hiking though the rainforest.  Our excursions have included: night spotting (magnificient sky but no animals), an early morning (6:30am) wildlife spotting trip, an afternoon in Yasuni NP learning about fertile Black Water Rivers and seeing lots of birds and pink dolphins (who were bluish grey as they only go pink when they are angry or excited), a visit to a local family where we saw the tiny Pygmy Marmoset monkeys and a wooli monkey, and a visit to monkey island (where we didn’t see any monkeys).  We also visited clay licks in Yasuni NP (a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve) where we saw two scarlet macaws along with another 30+ people. The noise from over 20 cameras clicking probably scared them away.  The birds need to eat this clay daily to neutralize the toxins in the seeds they eat.

Another excursion had us walking through a palm swamp to an observation tower 51 m high, which gave us an amazing view over the top of the canopy and some great bird shots via the guide’s telescope.

Our farewell dinner was hosted by the captain and served al fresco on the top deck.  We enjoyed our fellow passengers (Ramona and Toby from Switzerland and Jenice and Michael from England) and spent most evenings chatting together. The return to Coca was another 2 hours in the motorized canoe with three stops on the way; to drop off crew members at their homes and to pick up two huge hands of plantains from the boat driver’s wife for delivery to their kids studying in Coca.

Reflecting on the cruise – I enjoyed seeing lots of birds (29 types tracked in our bird list), 8 different mammals and reptiles (favorites were the monkeys), 6 insects and anthropods, 20 useful plants and 1 toad (all recorded in our listing) but my highlight was learning about the living culture and seeing how the local people live, as well as getting a sense of how nature, especially the Napo River governs life in the Napo basin via flooding, dry seasons, and changing landforms; as well as being the transport highway for the region. Some impacts from the oil companies are evident as well as some pollution/environmental issues but overall it is a healthy river that sustains the Amazonia region and I enjoyed getting some insights into that life.