SIGHTSEEING IN QUITO

SUNDAY 19th JUNE

   The coach dropped us off somewhere in Quito at 5.00am.  Why not the bus station nobody knew.  If I'd been on my own I'd have been well and truly stuffed.  But Alex managed to locate a cab and direct it to the Secret Garden, wake up the night security guard to let us in and direct us to a bed for 2 hours kip until the management showed up.  We then checked in and had breakfast on the roof terrace that has a superb view of old Quito.

  After getting our room at about 11.00am we left our luggage there and set out on foot around the town.  It was a blazing hot day at a height of some 9213ft.  We went up close to the basilica and then headed for the centre.

  There in the town square on one side is the Presidential Palace, on another the Cathedral and on a third the Arch-Bishop's Palace.  In the town square, there was some dancing with girls in traditional costumes. We wandered round and then adjourned for a sandwich and a cup of coca tea in an outside terrace cafe. 

  

The cafe was just to the right of this picture.  We also bought postcards, in my case to send  to the grandchildren, and we then strolled on around the town.  Alex spotted a barber's and decided to have a trim and get rid of the beard.  Whilst all this was going on I had a little snooze in the barber's shop!  We took in the the national theatre and adjoining square in our travels.

The weather was slightly starting to cloud over, but we decided to go to the cable car station and ascend another 3000 or so feet to get an even better view of the town.  The only problem was finding an empty cab.  We stood at a set of traffic lights and hailed cabs left right and centre, but all to no avail.  A couple of cabs stopped but wanted $7 and Alex had been told that $3 was the going rate.  Eventually we got one, but Alex didn't negotiate the fee, he merely pointed out to the driver that his meter wasn't running.  He promptly turned it on!  The fare came to $2.50!  We got onto a cable car straight away, and I got a senior's discount without even having to show any evidence!  By the time we got to the top, it was freezing cold, and the clouds were starting to close in.  Alex who had carried around a fleece jacket all morning was in his element, I was freezing cold in just my shirt, even with the sleeves rolled down!

 I quickly took a few photos and promptly retired to the coffee shop and had a hot white coffee, whilst Alex wandered around looking for various other vantage points to take pictures from.  Even he had a quick expresso when he returned.  The queues were enormous for the downbound "teleferique", but seemingly as foreigners we were sent right to the front of the queue, that was a touch!  Virtually all the way down we were completely enveloped by cloud with no visibility whatsoever.  The upbound carriages were pretty empty!

By the time we reached the bottom it was tipping down with rain.  We walked along to a security guard who was chatting to another guy and Alex asked where we could get a taxi.  A lengthy conversation ensued.  "We have two options", Alex said, "One is to pay $5 for this guy to drive us back to the Secret Garden, or we can catch a bus..".  "We'll pay the $5", I quickly interrupted.  Our man duly drove us back, albeit his windscreen wipers didn't work, nor did his demisters.  To solve this problen he periodically wiped the screen with a red rag, and opened the front passenger window so that the rain nicely came in through it landing on my lap in the back seat!  He also drove extra slowly - which was no bad thing - but this elicited continual honking from other faster bound motorists.  Of course by now, both as pedestrians and taxi passengers we had realised that red traffic lights meant little if you were expecting the traffic to stop!  Anyway we got managed to get back to the Secret Garden.  Back in our room I took a picture of Alex, to show the remarkable change in his coiffeur.  Dig the pink walls!

Still bereft of WiFi I did some work on discographies on the computer whilst Alex checked out his e-mails.  By about 7.00pm the rain had stopped and we decided to venture out for something to eat.  This part of the old town was deemed as a dangerous area by the guide book after 9.00pm, but needs must when the stomach is rumbling.  Anyway it was re-assuring to have Alex's towering presence beside me, and I left all my credit cards in the room and only took $30 with me in case of mugging!  We came across a couple of transvestites in the road who started following us at one point, or maybe they were just going in the same direction as us - not to mention some hookers prowling around on a street corner.  Very little was open and we didn't have a lot of choice but to go into a fried chicken emporium and have fried banana, fried pieces of chicken legs/wings and some assorted veg.  Anyway it filled a hole and we safely got back to the hostel and adjourned for an early night.