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Sitting at the airport in Quito, Ecuador. AMA (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter Scoresman
- Start date
Dan Lambskin
Footballguy
What’s the temperature there?
msommer
Footballguy
Scoresman
Footballguy
- Ecuador has a sad stray dog problem. Stray dogs are literally everywhere wandering the sides of the roads.
- Smog in Quito is insane. It doesn’t hang over the city like it does in LA or Beijing because of the wind but driving around Quito is impossible with your window open, and if you pick your nose at the end of a day of walking around Quito, your boogers will be black from the smog.
- Corrupt police at checkpoints. We hired a driver to go to the cloud first one day and he had to pay $100 to let us through.
Scoresman
Footballguy
Scoresman
Footballguy
Scoresman
Footballguy
Quito is at an altitude of almost 10,000 feet so it is mild right now. Low 70s the entire time and no rain right now.
We spent some time at the coast where it was your typical hot/humid tropical weather.
Mad Cow
Welshers and Dawdlers Beware!
You can substitute almost every city in South America here for what you said and it be true. Especially the dogs. Crazy how they roam in packs free of human families.
Scoresman
Footballguy
Another not so cool thing is the janky ### national airline which we took from Quito to the coast. Old ### plane, torn up seats. And when we got there, like 10 people had their bags missing and they literally had to stop the plane from taking off again to check the baggage hold where they found them all. All with us on the tarmac. Very weird.
Scoresman
Footballguy
ShamrockPride
Footballguy
First off, how are you?
Sand
Footballguy
Used to live there many years ago. Don't remember the dogs, wasn't an issue back then. The city is in a valley (a gorgeous place), so I can see the smog issue. We definitely ran into bad cops. I recall my mother getting rear ended by a cop and having to pay the cop off to not be arrested for it.
On the other hand when we traveled afield there we found the people to be absolutely incredible. Loved, loved the people and the country as a whole.
Yeah - Air Ecuadoriana doesn't exactly have the best safety record, either. All I remember is we used to take Braniff airlines back and forth from there.
One thing I remember distinctly is that due to the altitude the pastries were the best I've ever had. Just awesome.
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Scoresman
Footballguy
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Scoresman
Footballguy
Yeah the people are really great here in general. One example is an outdoor market we went to in Otavalo. Was expecting incredibly aggressive vendors like we experienced in Mexico but instead they were these sweet locals who just wanted to get you what you needed. We took pictures and befriended a bunch of them. Couldn’t believe it.
Have to watch for pickpockets though.
wikkidpissah
Footballguy
If you flush a toilet right at the Equator does it explode?
Scoresman
Footballguy
It goes straight down. They have a monument and interactive thing right at 0 0 0 where they show you the water flow thing as well as some other weird things that happen on the equator.
Scoresman
Footballguy
@Dedfin Asked for some tips In another thread. Here’s what I can think of right now.
- We stayed with my wife’s family for the whole trip so take this with a grain of salt but I’d recommend not staying in Quito for the reasons of the horrible smog. I couldn’t imagine staying in the city the whole time. The city of Cumbaya as one alternative is very close to Quito and is much more pleasant with great restaurants too.
- Altitude sickness hit my in laws hard this trip. It’s a feeling of being extremely hungover for the first 2-3 days. If you can handle the side effects of having to pee a lot, ask your doctor for a prescription of Diamox.
- Bring bug spray, lots of it. There were mosquitos even at Quito’s altitude. My wife’s foot swelled up to look like a potato after a bite and she needed to see a doctor. The bites I got listed the entire 2 weeks.
- Do not fly any of the Central/South American Airlines if you can. Specifically Copa, Latam, Avianca, and especially Tame. Horrible cancellation rates. American, United, and Delta all fly out of here.
- Eat all of the following: Fritada, Carne Colorada, Seco de Chiva, Llapingachos, Churassco, Hornado, Humita, Quesadilla (not what you think), Pan de Yuca, and anything including fried plantain. The things they do with fried plantains are amazing. Just don’t eat from street vendors no matter how good it looks. Our family said this is a one way ticket to listeria land.
- If you go to the cloud forest (and you should), do it early in the trip. The road there is tiny and any accident will shut it down for hours. This happened to us but luckily we went back later in the trip.
- We had a driver for the duration of the trip. It was arranged by my wife’s uncle so I don’t know the company but he cost only $500 for two weeks pretty much full time everyday. So worth it. I would not want to drive here.
- Don’t pet the stray dogs. Lots of them have rabies.
- El Mitad del Mundo is just ok looking back on it. They hype it a lot as a tourist attraction. If you like watching the water go down the drain in different directions or balancing an egg on a nail then it’s cool. They built this big monument thing, then realized later it was in the wrong spot by about a half a mile. The actual interactive thing is in the accurate spot.
- Our primary reason for the trip was visiting family. I feel like the Quito area was not the greatest for tourism. El Mitad del Mundo I mentioned but even places like Otavalo were kind of lackluster. People here say Cuenca and Guayaquil are cool though. I’d go to Quito to see all the awesome volcanoes surrounding the city and as a base to see the cloud forest but that’s about it.
- Don’t take dumps in public bathrooms. Most of them require you to put the dirty toilet paper in an open garbage can next to the toilet instead of flushing it. So the first thing you see when you enter the stall is other people’s wipes then you have to do it yourself which is not as easy as you’d think.
- We stayed with my wife’s family for the whole trip so take this with a grain of salt but I’d recommend not staying in Quito for the reasons of the horrible smog. I couldn’t imagine staying in the city the whole time. The city of Cumbaya as one alternative is very close to Quito and is much more pleasant with great restaurants too.
- Altitude sickness hit my in laws hard this trip. It’s a feeling of being extremely hungover for the first 2-3 days. If you can handle the side effects of having to pee a lot, ask your doctor for a prescription of Diamox.
- Bring bug spray, lots of it. There were mosquitos even at Quito’s altitude. My wife’s foot swelled up to look like a potato after a bite and she needed to see a doctor. The bites I got listed the entire 2 weeks.
- Do not fly any of the Central/South American Airlines if you can. Specifically Copa, Latam, Avianca, and especially Tame. Horrible cancellation rates. American, United, and Delta all fly out of here.
- Eat all of the following: Fritada, Carne Colorada, Seco de Chiva, Llapingachos, Churassco, Hornado, Humita, Quesadilla (not what you think), Pan de Yuca, and anything including fried plantain. The things they do with fried plantains are amazing. Just don’t eat from street vendors no matter how good it looks. Our family said this is a one way ticket to listeria land.
- If you go to the cloud forest (and you should), do it early in the trip. The road there is tiny and any accident will shut it down for hours. This happened to us but luckily we went back later in the trip.
- We had a driver for the duration of the trip. It was arranged by my wife’s uncle so I don’t know the company but he cost only $500 for two weeks pretty much full time everyday. So worth it. I would not want to drive here.
- Don’t pet the stray dogs. Lots of them have rabies.
- El Mitad del Mundo is just ok looking back on it. They hype it a lot as a tourist attraction. If you like watching the water go down the drain in different directions or balancing an egg on a nail then it’s cool. They built this big monument thing, then realized later it was in the wrong spot by about a half a mile. The actual interactive thing is in the accurate spot.
- Our primary reason for the trip was visiting family. I feel like the Quito area was not the greatest for tourism. El Mitad del Mundo I mentioned but even places like Otavalo were kind of lackluster. People here say Cuenca and Guayaquil are cool though. I’d go to Quito to see all the awesome volcanoes surrounding the city and as a base to see the cloud forest but that’s about it.
- Don’t take dumps in public bathrooms. Most of them require you to put the dirty toilet paper in an open garbage can next to the toilet instead of flushing it. So the first thing you see when you enter the stall is other people’s wipes then you have to do it yourself which is not as easy as you’d think.
Scoresman
Footballguy
No idea on the first question as we weren’t this adventurous. I can’t imagine it’s unsafe but I’d probably want to be semi fluent in Spanish before going far out alone. And I’d want to bathe myself in bug spray before hand and make sure my vaccines were up to date.
Keep in mind there is a US travel advisory for far northern Ecuador near the Colombian border due to kidnappings and violence. I wouldn’t do it there.
We didn’t got to any ruins but my wife says she’s been to the ones near Quito before and they aren’t all that great. Nothing near the level of machu Pichu or chicheniza. Not really sure though.
Sand
Footballguy
Way back when my dad got hep A from a food vendor in Quito. Yeah, bad idea.
Cuenca was awesome from my memory (when I went it was still dirt roads to get there). I distinctly remember the hand made panama hat shops. Guayaquil has historically been a ####hole. I doubt it has improved much.
My recommendation? Go to Salinas and go deep sea fishing. You can catch marlin in sight of land.
msommer
Footballguy
Have you checked out Salinas before?
Anyone?
https://theculturetrip.com/south-america/ecuador/articles/8-reasons-why-you-should-visit-salinas-ecuador-at-least-once-in-your-lifetime/
Scoresman
Footballguy
We did not go there this time, but I heard it is wonderful. We went to the northern part of the coast, near Esmeraldas because my wife's uncle has a vacation home there , and it was pretty nice. Just don't expect any of the coastal regions to be Americanized at all like the Mexican resort towns.
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