QUITO!!

We arrived in Quito after a short bus ride from Banos, still high on the relaxation from our steam bath experience. We checked into El Cafecito hostel in New Town (Mariscal) and got a dorm room with two other travelers, from Australia and Israel. We were surprised by the rainy cold, seemingly Oregonian weather, so we decided to skip the comida tipica and go out for Vietnamese PHO. After dinner we went out for some drinks and immediately realized why the locals call the Mariscal "Gringolandia". The Mariscal is a 10 X 10 block area of bars, restaurants, and hostels, totally geared towards the backpacking crowd. Although, we were surprised to see many of the locals out enjoying the bars as well.

The following day we woke up, grabbed breakfast at a place called The Magic Bean and took a taxi to Old Town. We were dropped off in the central plaza, right outside Ecuador's White House. We then toured a church, which contained a lot of colonial, religious art. It was kind of cool, but we have found that tours aren't really our thing. Food on the other hand never gets boring. After getting the tour out of the way we indulged in some Ecuadorian cuisine at the local market. Julia had an empanada and soup, while I had the Seco de Chivo (goat stew), which was amazing! We've found that eating at the local markets has cut our food bill in half. You get the same, if not more food for half the price. We did some more walking around and walked up some questionable stairs and ladders of a gothic cathedral. Then we went back to the hostel hung out for a while, before going out for food and drinks in New Town. We found that finding cheap drinks was easier said than done, but we prevailed in a good recommendation from Jamie and dollar beers at the hookah bars. We wandered back to the hostel and planned our trip to Mindo.