La Visita de Nuestros Amigos, Carlos and Sarah

A few weeks ago, Carlos and Sarah visited us and spent time exploring Ecuador. Carlos arrived a few days before Sarah and hit the ground running. Roman and Carlos first traveled to Cotopaxi National Park where they enjoyed the beautiful views of the volcano and did some horseback riding. On Friday, they rode the teleferico in Quito and hiked to the top of the Pichincha volcano (over 15,000 feet) with Lucy.

After Sarah arrived, we all traveled to Otavalo for a night and went to the textile market. When we returned to Quito on Monday evening, we got to see a soccer match between rival teams Barcelona (Guayaquil) and Deportivo Quito at the stadium right by our apartment.

After a day spent touring around Old Town, Roman, Sarah, and Carlos headed off to Mindo for a few nights. They saw a lot of interesting bird species, went zip-lining through the rainforest canopy, and hiked to a few waterfalls. The trip went by so fast and we miss them already! There are so many more things that we saw and did while they were here but I will let the pictures tell the rest of the story.

Parque Metropolitano Bike Ride

On the east side of Quito is Parque Metropolitano, the largest urban park in South America clocking in at nearly twice the size of Central Park in NYC.  It’s on a ridge so it overlooks the city to the west and then down the next valley to the east.  The park is full of trails, playing fields, picnic areas with grills and covered structures, as well as large pieces of art.  It’s also home to horses and alpacas.  The topography consists of rolling hills and cliffs covered with Eucalyptus trees, bushes, vines, and grasses.

There is an east entrance to the park a very short bike ride from our front door.  I was excited with what I found; great trails with endless loop choices that will get my heart rate going and feed my soul.  I also got my first glimse of Cotopaxi, the 19,347′ volcano to the East of the Parque.

Looking west from Parque MetropolitanoIMG_5193 IMG_5179IMG_5181IMG_5188IMG_5187IMG_5182IMG_5186Looking East from Parque MetropolitanoIMG_5195IMG_5194Looking East from Parque MetropolitanoLooking East from Parque MetropolitanoFirst View of Cotopaxi