Loja, Ecuador by Kev and Mel

Our last stop in Ecuador! Loja!
To get there, we took a bus from Cuenca. It is normally a 4-hour bus drive. But there were protests and some roads got blocked. They are protesting the decision of the government to lift the fuel subsidy. Life seems to be already hard for some people here in Ecuador and I can understand that paying more for petrol, will make it extra hard for them. I don’t know the whole story, but it seems again, that a government is trying to please big company and not the people who live normal lives.
Anyway, for us, it meant that instead of spending 4 hours in a bus, we did just over 10! The bus had to take the long way around! We had enough of the bus by the evening!
This week has been a bit off for me. I think the fatigue of organising where we stay, what we do, making sure the kids are doing enough schoolwork, where do we eat, keeping up with the blogs… is getting to me a little bit much. I love traveling, but it does require a lot of planning and it sometimes can get a little bit much. After nine months of it, this week I was a bit off.
We still did a fair few things but we also had several rest days doing not much. I’m not going to do a day to day recount of it, just tell you the things to see in Loja.
By the way Loja is in the very south of Ecuador and is known as the music capital of Ecuador.
There is a music museum to visit, which we did. We were expecting musical instruments, but it was mainly about the history of music in Loja, which was written in Spanish, so we didn’t got much of it.
This city has several churches obviously. We visited a couple. There are still a lot of murals everywhere. But there is also a lot of colours: different buildings with different colours. It makes the place very lively.
We visited the botanical garden which is supposed to be the oldest one in Ecuador. It was a bit disappointing: it is old and could do with a bit of TLC. It was still nice seeing plants and Emma was happy as there were a few bonsais. She really wants to have a bonsai when we come back home… great! I mean ‘Yeah!”
We visited the ‘Puerto de la cuidad’ which is the gate of the city. This is a pretty recent monument inspired by medieval fortress, which feature inside, art from local artists and a small archaeological museum.
There are also a few arts galleries to visit around and we found some art we really liked. Apparently, it was a 5.5 earthquake, 90 kms away.
We went to a big park which has a lot of play equipment. It was also a bit old and could do with some TLC too! The kids had fun and swung, climb, run and got silly. There were paddle boats and a big plastic ball you could get in and got on the water with it, so obviously the kids did that.
We also visited a wind farm. It has a tourist centre with a lot of explanations about how they built the wind turbines and how they work. It was in Spanish but thanks to Kev’s app we spend some time and did the translation. It was interesting and prompted a wordschooling lesson about electricity. It is always better to learn on the go!
At some point, we felt a small earthquake. Well small... still the biggest we have ever felt! It was a bit scary! We were inside our apartment, and the furniture wobbled a bit. It didn't last very long, but still!
We also find a local brewery of course, where we had to try all their beers (in small amount) and played a few board games in the mean times.
My favourite thing we did was a free concert in a church by the Loja symphonic orchestra. With them was Daniel Castro, a brilliant vibraphone player. He did 2 pieces, and it was mesmerising! The music was amazing. They covered a few ‘classic’ classical pieces but also what I think, was a lot more south America classical music. It was with a faster beat and a musicality a lot more Latino. The concert lasted one hour, and it was a fantastic hour. I could have listen to them a lot longer!
And also on Saturday night, we were looking for live music in a pub or something. We found a few things online and wanted to check them out. Turned out, no pub with music was found, BUT: we stumbled upon a free festival out in the open: beer stalls everywhere and a stage with rock and metal music being played!!! We spent some time right in front of the stage soaking the music and enjoying a few craft beers. It was awesome!
That is pretty much it for Loja (we did a few things at the end!). There is a little bit less to do than in Cuenca, but it is still a nice city to visit, and it gave us time to rest a bit, catch up on things we had to do and reset for the next adventure: Peru!!!!
See you there!
Mel

19.10.2025. We got up early and headed to the depot. Tickets were organised and a 9am departure estimated. We grabbed a couple things for the ride, not knowing if we were going to stop for lunch or not. The person behind the counter told us, we think, that the trip would take 8hrs, putting us in Loja at around 5pm. That'll do I suppose. It is normally a 4 hr trip, but since the local government has dropped a diesel subsidy recently, raising the price from $1.80 per gallon to $2.80 per gallon, there's been quite a few protests. Some of these protests block the highways. While I can understand their reason to protest, the price has risen by almost a third, it's a pain in the arse for us. We did stop for food eventually, at around 4pm. Mel and the kids ate, I had their leftovers. Wasn't that hungry as I had a bag of chips on the bus, ya know, at around lunchtime. Oh I wish we had gotten to Loja by 5pm, that would have been great. We arrived at the bus depot a little after 7. I have to admit that we saw some fantastic scenery on the way, but bloody hell I'm over this bus. A short taxi ride, because we couldn't be arsed walking, and we were at our stay. We got let in and went upstairs. Then I declared “free time”!. Do whatever you want for 30mins to unwind, then off to bed! Goodnight!
I'm not gonna do a day by day here, couldn't be arsed. We visited some museums and cathedrals. There's lots of cathedrals here, surprise surprise. We watched some locals practising traditional dances in a public space, that was kinda nice. We ate some good food. I cooked some semi-decent food in an ill-equipped apartment. One frying pan, seriously wtf! We went and organised our next bus tickets. These tickets are to cross the border into Peru. It's overnight and will probably be nothing short of horrific, but I guess we'll see. We went to a church and watched an orchestra and a soloist. Some of the most amazing music I have ever heard. I'm sure there will be a video, check out the solo guy. With only a couple days left in Ecuador, we are planning on just enjoying it, as it ends in just a few days.
Bring on Peru!
KevRead more