Arriving in Quito

Back on the truck, we continued our drive to Quito.  The mountain scenery all around us was truly spectacular, as was the extent of the sprawling capital as we hit the city’s outskirts!

Quito, Ecuador's capital, sits high in the Andean foothills at an altitude of 2,850m. Constructed on the foundations of an ancient Incan city, it’s known for its well-preserved colonial centre, rich with 16th and 17th century churches and other structures blending European, Moorish and indigenous styles. These include the cathedral, in the Plaza Grande square, and the ultra-ornate Compañia de Jesús Jesuit church.

The city has a population of 3 million out of a total of 20 million in the country as a whole.

Today is the last day of a five-day holiday, so we drove through quiet streets to the truck park on the edge of the city. Here, we offloaded our bags because the truck couldn't get any closer to where we were staying and took a number of taxis into the historic centre.

Our hostel is The Secret Garden. First impressions were very good. We had upgraded to a private room, which we were very happy with. We dumped our bags and went up to the rooftop bar and restaurant to take in the stunning views across the old town. We ordered some food - lasagne for me and chicken fillet for Mark. It was extremely good and very reasonably priced at 50% off the prices given on the menu as we are staying in the hostel. It was just $13 for the two of us. We were going to cook for ourselves while we are here, but I don't think we'll bother!

We were soon joined by many others from the group, including Denise, a friend of Gill's who is joining the trip here. We chatted to her for a while. She has done a lot of overlanding, so we'll enjoy swapping stories with her.

After a while, we left the others enjoying their afternoon drinks and went to sort out our laundry and decide what we are going to do with our two free days in Quito. We were thwarted somewhat because there was a power outage - the washing will have to wait until tomorrow. We spent the rest of the day sitting in a quieter area on the roof doing posts until it got too cold and we retired inside.Read more