We had time off the week before Carnival and I headed to Cuenca. It is in the Southern Andes about 50 minutes by airplane. It is full of 16th and 17th century architecture and red tiled roofs.
It is also known for the rivers that run through it.
let's pretend my finger isn't in this picture
I stayed in a lovely hotel in the old city center called Hotel Los Balcones. It was quaint with a clean room, good services and a nice daily breakfast on the terrace.
The food in Cuenca was really good. A Pedir de boca was a nice restaurant with asian inspired dishes. I had my first really spicy meal since I moved to Ecuador. I had a noodle dish it was pretty tasty. Next time I'd get rice noodles though.
spicy noodles
Sofy GLocal was a lovely restaurant inside the inner courtyard of an old building. The walls had art by local artists and lots of plants. The food was really good. I went back twice.
smoked trout, capers, and cream cheese open faced sandwhich
olive and anchovy tapenade on toast served on a hot stone
seabass encocado
By far my favorite meal was at El Mercado. It was a really upscale dining experience at really good prices.
grilled octopus
slow cooked pork shoulder on cauliflower puree
Los Tiestos was a family style restaurant that had dishes served in clay dishes (cazuelas). Dinner started with about 10 different tapenades and bread. It was a really lovely dinner.
I arrived on Sunday and after a short nap and lunch I went on a bus tour of the city. For only $8 it was a nice way to learn about the city and see how the city was laid out. According to the tour there are enough churches to go to a different one every Sunday in a year.
It was really warm and the sun was strong.
The next day I took a tour to Gualaceo and the jewelry town of Chordeleg. It was a small tour (just 3 of us). We stopped first at a Guitar makers shop outside of San Bartolome above the Valle de Santa Barbara. His guitars were beautiful. I wish I played.
He showed us how they make the inlay.
This cuatro is made out of an armadillo. Supposedly they find dead animals to make the instruments.
Then on to Chordeleg where at one time artisans made jewelry out of silver and gold mined in Ecuador. It is not just a plaza filled with jewelry stores. I enjoyed the window shopping and the church in the town square.
Then we headed to Gualaceo and enjoyed a meal of roasted pig. It was so good.
We decided to stop at Ecuagenera to see their orchids and learn about how they hybridize and propagate orchids.
Jesse James is a local who runs a private taxi service called Members Only Maxi Taxi . Jesse has an outstanding reputation and is known by everyone in the expat community here in Trinidad. He is the one who picks us up from the Airport when we arrive for the first time. He also runs many tours. A group of us from school went on his Taste Trini Tour. All 9 of us met at the school at 7:30 am on a Saturday and the adventure began. We started in Port of Spain and made our way east to Mayaro. Here is a rough map of our trip. We stopped multiple times. Most times Jesse jumped out, bought the food, returned to the van and passed out portions. I sat in the co-pilots seat. It became my job to document what we were eating both by name and by picture. I also helped out cutting portions and passing the plate. By lunch we were so full. It was tough to contemplate eating the Roti. The sites were amazing. It was so interesting to listen to Jesse tell us about Trinidad and the places we were pa...
Finally we stopped at Ikat Gualaceo to visit artisans who dye and weave beautiful shawls by hand. The dyes are all natural.
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