Cuenca, Ecuador and Mancora, Peru

After our amazing trip to the Galapagos we went back to Quito for one day and stayed with our old host :-). It gave us just enough time to do our laundry, figure out bus schedules to go to Cuenca and get Scott's package with contacts lenses and a swiss army knife i gave him last year (yeah!). After a lot of thought we decided to take a night bus leaving at 10pm from Quito and arriving at 7h30 am in Cuenca, a town in the south of Ecuador. It might not have been the best idea because we did not get enough sleep. During the bus ride there were many stops all along the way and at every of them, we had to look out the window to make sure that no one was stealing our bags which were underneath the bus. We were told it happens so we became very protective of our bags. After our arrival, according to me (Anna), to the most beautiful city of Ecuador, we met our hosts, Veronica and Mauricio with whom we couch-surfed. Cuenca is the third biggest city of Ecuador after Quito the capital and Guayaquil, the port town. Cuenca feels very authentic because the old town has been preserved from colonial times. It reminded me SO MUCH of Europe. I loved it :-) We spent there 2 days where we visited all its recommended sites and on the last night we went out with our hosts and had a great time!

Traditional ecuadorian market

In the very cool panama hat factory

The ñady, my new purchase and me :-)

On Friday the 24th we left Cuenca and spent another 8hours on the bus heading south straight through the border of Ecuador and Peru heading to Mancora, northern Peru! Everything went smoothly so we got to Mancora, a surf and beach town in the afternoon. This town is completely different from what we have seen so far as we have not been to the coast yet. It is great! we took surf classes today and already VERY sore but happy to be able to surf :-). Tomorrow we are going to practice surfing a little bit more and then on Tuesday (28.06) we are going to keep going south. It is very nice because along the way we met a lot of very nice and interesting people. It is amazing to see how many people take breaks from their normal lives and start traveling for months...They just quit their jobs and go! :-)

Oh yeah!