Paseos

When it's nice on weekends, Alvaro and I have pretty much one go-to plan: go to a park. The parks here are lively, and I don't think I've ever seen public spaces so well utilized. There are vendors that sell food and drink, and people go to play soccer, run around, ride bikes, take a boat ride, or just watch other people. Most parks also have vendors selling artesanía- hand crafted items like jewelry, or maybe scarves and brightly striped hippie pants. Since Alvi and I conveniently live in a fairly central part of Quito, we can walk to most parks pretty easily, but still, we mostly go to the Parque La Carolina- the biggest park along the central strip of Quito.

View of the valley of Cumbayá from the Parque Metropolitano

Random sculptures

Lately though, we've been branching out to explore other parks. The Parque Metropolitano is up above the city in the more northern part, and it's filled with eucalyptus trees, trails, and bizarre monuments and statues in the middle of forest stretches. We've realized that this is something that's pretty typical in all quiteño parks.

Alvaro looking at tadpoles

About to walk home

Stopping to check out a swampy pool, Alvi realized that it was filled with tadpoles! That was pretty cool.

View of the Basílica church and the Centro Histórico from Parque Itchimbía

This park has some areas with pretty flowers and platns

The Parque Itchimbía has a really cool Palacio de Cristal- crystal palace, which apparently used to be used as a market space earlier in the 20th century. Now it sits atop the Parque Itchimbía, which looks out over the Centro Histórico.

Inside the Andean greenhouse

Walking home from Itchimbía, we saw this

We also saw this pretty street!

This park was cool too- there was a pet corner, where pets can run around and do agility things, and we came across an Andean greenhouse too which produces native plants and trees.

The Virgin with a cloudy background

Palms for Palm Sunday

Carrying a statue of Jesus

Aside from frequenting local parks, we did the Ciclopaseo on Palm Sunday with some other friends. We saw people carrying palm fronds, and several different recorridos or marches around with children dressed up and carrying statues of Jesus. 

At the Plaza Grande with Jasmine and Tiffany

Centro Histórico

I love biking around on Sundays during the Ciclopaseo because you get to see so many different things- dogs running, dogs in backpacks, dogs in baskets, dogs wearing sunglasses! Oh and also you get to see lots of Quito.

Landscape out to the San Rafael waterfall

Yesterday I took a trip out to see Ecuador's largest waterfall, which measures 160 meters- the first section is 40 meters and the second is 120 meters. It was quite a transport-filled adventure to get out there, especially because we were traveling on the Saturday during semana santa- holy week- and there were fewer buses than usual.

San Rafael in its 160 meter glory

I thought that it had a fantastical feel since you couldn't see the water hitting a pool at the bottom- there was just a lot of mist and vapor 

The waterfall, called la cascada San Rafael was along the road towards Lago Agrio which is a border town with Colombia, so we had to spend quite a few hours in buses. Still, they're working on a dam project which will eventually affect the waterfall, so we wanted to see it before it is affected. I think it was worth it!

Happy Passover and Happy Easter to everyone!