Ecuador II

By tourist standards, we didn't see anything amazing in Cuenca. But that's not to say that the city was dull. Cuenca was a very charming city. I truly enjoyed it and really liked the way it felt small but developed and quaint but not too poor all at once. We spent time every day walking around the city, seeing it's many old churches and cathedrals, and sitting in its parks and squares. We saw the soccer stadium with double barbed wire fences to keep the fans separated.

We also took a bus to Cajas National Park. There we hiked through the mountains, went wading in a lake, and bushwhacked our way down mountainsides. And as we did nearly everywhere we went, we saw donkeys. They actually interrupted our picnic lunch. The park was at 13,000 ft (4166m, according to the sign,) so everyone had horrible headaches from the altitude.

On the way home we tried to stop at a little village famous for las truchas (trout) but the restaurants were all closed. So we hitchhiked home in the back of a pickup truck.