Life Eaters

We met up with Mark in Quito and spent two days exploring the city. We managed to pack in quite a few unexpected surprises and adventures into these two days

We stayed at Hostal Quito Cultural, which was a really cute hotel in the middle of old town. It has a beautiful central courtyard, lots of original artwork, and was run by a very sweet and friendly ecuadorian lady who did not speak any English. Most importantly, the showers were hot and the beds were warm.

After breakfast and amazing Italian lunch, we took a cab to the teleférico, which was a cable car that took us up to the top of. Nearby mountain, at 13,200 feet, where we got an amazing view of Quito. At around 2.5 million people, Quito is quite huge, and I believe it is the second highest city in the world for altitude.

In the evening we did some internet searching and found a place that looked pretty decent, named Octava de Corpus. We headed there and ended up with quite a surprise for our evening. When we arrived, the proprietress, Jaime, was waiting for us at the front door (we had called ahead). The entire place was decked out floor to ceiling with paintings and doublets and 19th century decor. We were the only guests in the entire place and we felt as though we were in his home. The place seemed like a cross between a southern mansion and king Henry VIII’s dining hall.

Jaime turned out to be an absolutely amazing, happy and energetic little ecuadorian host. Rather than choose wine from a menu, he took us to his basement to browse his 450 bottles and pick a couple out. We talked to him throught most of our dinner and We had a blast!

After dinner, we went out for one more drink on a rooftop of a place called Vista Hermosa, which was also amazing. The nighttime view was breathtaking and a three piece band was playing local ecuadorian music.