Hotel Las Americas Guayaquil

... had nothing to worry about; the bus terminal was light, airy, large &#8211; just like our shopping malls, the taxi cheap and efficient, the hotel welcoming.<br><br>Guayaquil is such a different place &#8211; clean, well laid out, no belching buses, a wide tree-lined promenade by the river &#8211; Rio Gayas - warm and a delight to walk around. To describe the difference between the 2 cities in one word &#8211; pride &#8211; Guayaquil wants to be the capital, is clearly investing heavily ...

... coming metropolis.<br><br>From the wonderful walkway along the river to the renovated slum that sat atop Guayaquil´s highest point, this city was one surprise after another.<br><br>We walked the city for a few days taking in the sights, chatting to the locals and feasting on the many culinary delights that Guayaquil ...

... as and maybe even more outrageous as those I have seen in the States. I will try to put up pictures soon on photobucket.com. I love seeing people being openly proud and joyous about their sexuality everywhere and seeing it in happen in such a conservative country made me that much happier. While my gringa friends thought some of the crowd would be angry or offensive, I saw no animosity all day. In my ...

MEMORIES AND REFLECTIONS OF MY MISSION TRIP TO ECUADOR<br><br>It was our fourth day building homes in the squalid suburbs of Guayaquil, Ecuador, and as I helped unload the prefabricated, bamboo walls from our delivery truck, I saw him walking slowly across the street. His build, earnest and kind spirit and his fatherly protection of the little boy clinging to his hand reminded me of my brother. I soon learned that his name was Erwin ...

... arrived at the steps of the (also much safer than before and renovated) hill of Santa Ana. This is a really beautiful and colorful neighborhood set on a hill, with all of the steps numbered, and I'm pretty sure there are more than 400, maybe even closer to 500, steps. I arrived to the top nice and sweaty, after hopping up most of the steps, and taking looots more pictures (my battery ended up dying before the end of the day hehe) on the way up ...

¡¡¡¡Llegamos a Guayas, Guayaquil!!!! Sólo después de ocho horas de viaje, terriblemente mamonas. Pero bueno, llegamos por la mañana a eso de las 7am. La terminal de Guayaquil es increiblemente hermosa, mucho mas de lo que yo esperaba. Es bastante raro que la terminal de Guayaquil sea tan bonita y tan moderna cuando la de Quito, que es la capital, es casi identica a una galería. Conseguimos una couchsurfer, aqui en Guayaquil, se ...

... hostal calles Swiss Point, very nice and yes the owners are from Switzerland. The houuse we rented in Guyaquil is ok but like all land lords they are a pain in the a!#. Its nice to have so much free space though after being cramped in so many hotels and hostals. Lisseth has a kitchen to bake my favorite deserts and stuff like that. When we return to lima we rented an 3 bedroom 2.5 bath apartment so "mucho espacio otra vez".

Lima... I've always found major cities are a bit of a waste of time when travelling. Unless you have the time to spend weeks or months in them, and really get to know them, they usually offer little. Maybe there is a building worth visiting for its architectural merit, or maybe an exceptional museum or art gallery, but mostly they are all the same. Lima is probably no exception. Basically, there was only one thing ...

... along the river front, where half of the city population was celebrating Guayaquil Foundation Day! We missed the fireworks, but everyone was happy and in a good mood. After a big sleep, we hit the travel agents on Saturday to try and organise a trip to the Galapagos. Douglas at Centro Viagar was really helpful, and gave us a few options. His best option was a $1700 trip including airfaires on the Santa Cruz, a luxury cruiser with 90 passengers and a ...

... all? To catch a cheap deal to The Galápagos. After some checking around I quickly came to the conclusion that I would be better off getting a flight and setting things up when I arrived. Unfortunately, no seats are available until Thursday and I dread the thought of staying in this hellhole for that long. <br><br>¿Fortunately? that problem was solved for me. After grabbing a bite I decided ...