The Secret Garden Quito

Today we got into Quito. We touched down and at the end of the runway we saw a plane that had over shot the runway and was now a little ways down a hill...welcome to Ecuador! We are staying at the secret garden. Itīs really cute and the view is amazing. It was a nice and sunny day and we got to walk around in t-shirts. We went to am amazing church. You could climb to the top of one of the steeples and to the top of the bell tower. The views were incredible. You had to climb up these rickety l...

Hola from Quito, Ecuador! I am staying in the area of Quito known as "the old town." Brightly painted buildings line the old town's narrow streets- churches, chapels and monasteries abound throughout. During the day the noise and activity is tremendous as the streets are full of constant commotion- Street vendors can be heard from blocks away as they announce their products to the countless pedestrians that fill the colonial styled streets. Somehow their calls are heard above the honking of h...

All righty roo... I have been walking all the live long day and am much too tired to write a journal entry... I am sooooo tired that my finger tips are sore! :) Enjoy the pics for now!

So I figured out how to sort the pictures so that they show up in the correct order... but as I said before... this little girl is much too LAZY to do much... so sorting, correcting and redoing the prior pics is TOTALLY OUT OF THE QUESTION! :) Anywho... here are some more pictures. Just a quick note: I went to two amazing art museums today- Oswaldo Guayasamin was born in Quito, Ecuador on July 6, 1919 (51 years later my sis was born... Happy Birthday Jennifer!) His work is outstanding- comple...

I will be leaving once again for Cotopaxi! I am quite excited although I hear that the weather has been a bit fierce over the past two nights with loads of rain and some hail. The roads are going to be a bit muddy and I wonder how that will affect our drive time. The last 45 minutes of road is unpaved... although the vast majority is cobbled which makes the drive fairly easy- just a wee bit bumpy. The last couple of miles isn't even cobbled which makes the drive slllooooooooooow and a bit pre...

Not many people can say they have celebrated a birthday climbing the highest active volcano in the world! For the weekend I came up to Cotopaxi National Park, spending my first two nights in a remote cottage called The Secret Garden, located just outside of the national park. This hostel is the perfect getaway place, surrounded by volcanoes and mountains and pastures. They have ducks and rabbits and two dogs (Daisy a wiener dog and Lassie a rescued street mutt) and chickens and roosters and f...

It was 2:30am, and I found myself standing outside of my sister's apartment, waiting for the shuttle to SFO airport, with no way to go back inside. After about 30 excruciating minutes of waiting, the shuttle finally arrived, and off I went. Two flights later, with a layover in Atlanta, I landed in Quito, and saw the most beautiful sight -- there at the very end of the luggage claim was my precious backpack. I took a cab through the rainy night to my hostel, "The Secret Garden," rated one of t...

It was hard saying goodbye to the Secret Garden hostel, which was the surest sign that I had to leave ASAP. I had met too many people there who had only planned to stay for two days and ended up staying for weeks, even months. It was so comfortable, with breakfast and dinner (and beer) and great company every day, that one tended to lose all sense of time (and expense, since you basically run a tab for everything and donīt part with a penny until you check out). Anyway, I knew I needed to kic...

Greetings from the southern hemisphere! We arrived yesterday evening after a 12 hour flight from Madrid. It felt like 112 hours! There was very little food on board and they closed duty free without even telling us it was open in the first place! If you know Kevin, you know we needed food. Poor chap! We were "picked up" at the airport (the rep took $10 and gave the taxi $5, scandalous) and brought to our first hostel, "the secret garden". It is absolutely gorgeous! It is located in the old to...

We arrived at Quito almost at midnight, tired and exhausted of the long flights. Went to stay in a pre orderd Hostel called secret garden and stayed there for two days, we left it because price was relatively high, but the place had the most amazing view from the terrace o the top floor where they serve a great breakfast and dinner + beer in the evening, was really fun. Quito itself is not that interesting, so we did not stay here for too long.