Back to City Life in Cuenca
The beautiful Cathedral in Cuenca
Our last stop in Ecuador and we were out of the wilderness and back to city life in Cuenca.
We slowed down our pace of travel and enjoyed four days of exploring the sites of the Old Town, making the most of the range of cafes, bars and restaurants in the city.
Our journey brought us flashbacks of buses in Colombia. Six hours through mountain roads made it the longest journey we had done in Ecuador by far.
The historic centre of Cuenca, where we spent most of our time in the city, is full of cobblestone streets, colonial architecture and pretty plazas. At the heart of it is the incredibly impressive Cathedral with its distinctive blue domes.
We learnt that the Cathedral is actually unfinished - and when you see the original plans for the towers, it’s hard to unsee that it's unfinished! Why was construction stopped? Because as they placed a statue of Santa Ana - the city’s patron saint - on the roof of the cathedral, a huge crack appeared down the middle. Further investigations showed the architect had made some pretty serious miscalculations, and the building could not take any more weight. So no bell towers, and no bells. Looking up at the central rose window, the crack is still quite clearly visible… We were glad we learnt this after climbing to the roof!
Just next door, we made our base in the Seminary of San Luis. Once a school for monks, it is now filled with restaurants, cafes, and bars around the pretty central courtyard. At night, it was our favourite place to sit and soak up the atmosphere with a view of the illuminated cathedral domes.
We did our sightseeing in Cuenca at a leisurely pace, taking in the main sights with plenty of cafe breaks in between. We loved the Mercardo de 10 Agosto - the main market, with rows of traditional fruit, veg and food stalls along with not-so-traditional, alternative medicine stalls, including lotions to attract your soul mate! We also had an interesting visit to the Museo del Sombrero de Paja Toquilla - the Panama Hat Museum. More of a shop than a museum, the site has some exhibits on how the Panama hat is made… and the fact that it actually originated in Cuenca, but was exported and gained popularity amongst workers on the Panama Canal. These are the kind of facts nerds like Graeme and I love.
For the first time in a couple of months, our time in Cuenca felt quite like normal life. We slept in, popped out for a coffee, cooked dinner in the hostel and had a few drinks after dinner. We really enjoyed the break from being in ‘travel mode,’ and all its associated logistics. Note to future us: plan a few more relaxed city locations!
Reflecting on our time in Ecuador, we both agree that we could have quite easily spent more time here. Colombia was our first stop and we were full of excitement, and we have both been mentally planning Peru itineraries for years. Between the two, Ecuador got a little lost. But this under-the-radar destination has blown us away. We’ve found the cities to be friendly and safe, the natural environment to be insanely beautiful and relatively easily accessible, we did our first multi-day hike, we realised long-held dreams of visiting the Amazon Rainforest, and we’ve met some amazing people whilst travelling here.
So… cheers Ecuador for an incredible three weeks, I really hope we have a chance to come back in future. Next stop: Peru!
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