A Trip To the Capital: Quito

IMG_1912, originally uploaded by A Family On A Mission.

One of the things that we had to do when we got to Ecuador was get registered with the government within the first 30 days of being in the country. When we got here on the first day we tried to do this before our final flight to Cuenca, only to arrive at the office 5 minutes after 2pm and the offices were not seeing any more people. Fortunately, there were quite a few other people who put up an argument and we actually got to see someone. That day they gave us a list of things that we needed in order to register, so it wasn’t a wasted trip. So with that list we made the trip to Quito once again on the 25th of July till the 27th in order to register. Hoping that we had everything they needed we got off the plane at 9am headed to the hotel to drop off our luggage and went straight to the offices, being prepared to wait a long time. Unfortunately we arrived to the offices and it was no longer there. They had moved within the two weeks that we had been in Cuenca. Luckily they had left a note to where they had relocated and the taxi driver new exactly where it was, about two blocks behind the hotel that we booked. Now headed to the right location we got out of the taxi, entered the building, waited about ½ hour which is good and were told that we had everything we needed and that they needed to keep our passports till the Wednesday morning. Luckily we had decided to stay that long, ‘Just in Case.’ So we ended back at our hotel by 10:30am with nothing else to do but return to the offices on the Wednesday morning to pick up our passports again.
With basically two days to wait for our passports, we decided to take the opportunity to visit the local attractions. We really thought that we would be in the country awhile before we got to see some of these things, so it was great to have the time to do so. So that first day we decided to go to one of the tallest mountain peaks in the city which had a lift to take you to the top. It was a very hot day outside so we had left our jackets at the hotel but once we got to the top we realized how high we were because it was so much colder. As well the whole taxi ride up to the lift just kept getting steeper and steeper and the harder it was to breath. (For those of you who don’t know, the mountains in Ecuador are extremely high and the air is very thin so sometimes it’s hard to breathe. We even struggled for the first while climbing up the stairs to our first floor temporary apartment.) At the top of the mountain they had a few areas to look through the telescopes to look at the city, it is huge and you can’t even see it all. As well we took a little hike around the top. Not all the way of course since we weren’t dressed properly and I struggled with breathing on the small part that we did, but the views are definitely worth it. We hope one day to be able to go back once the kids are a little older and we are better equipped and maybe make it to the very top.
Our second day in Quito we went to the Mitad Del Mundo, which means the middle of the world. This is where we can stand on the equator and either be in the Northern Hemisphere or the Southern Hemisphere. They have a great huge statue of the world and so many people take pictures like you are holding the world in your hands. And yes we did do this, you can see for yourself on our flickr pictures. Some of the things that you can see there is that yes the water does go down the drain one way in the North and the other way in the South. Inside the statue of the world, they now have a museum about the people of Ecuador. It was really interesting. Travis found it pretty neat to go back to a place he’d been years before and to see how much had changed during that time.
After we headed to the middle of the city of Quito where the downtown used to be, to a place called the Panicello. It is a huge statue of an angel on a small hill overlooking the downtown area. Inside the statue they had a museum showing how the statue was put together, each part was numbered on the inside, we even got to go right to the top and walk out on the outside just under the angel. And you could see the city stretched out forever. Travis couldn’t believe how much the city had grown and changed. Of course the day wouldn’t be complete without at trip to a restaurant that we haven’t been to in forever, yes, a TGI Fridays and yes it was yummy!
The Wednesday came and we headed back to the government offices to pick up our passports, we had a little longer of a wait but got our passports back without anything else being needed. So much easier and faster then when we did things with the government in Brazil. So still having time before our flight in the evening we headed to a little amusement park called the Volcano, so that the kids could play and have some fun. While we were there we met another Christian family living in a small town who worked at a Christian school. The husband was Ecuadorian but the wife was American and their two boys spoke English so all the kids had fun playing together and we were able to visit and talk about the work that brought us to Quito. It was a great trip and not as bad that we thought it could be with having to wait and get paperwork done. Hopefully every time we have paperwork with the government it goes as smoothly as it did this time.