R. Doug Wicker's Blog, page 138

Ecuador — Cuenca; Cathedrals and Calderón Park

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Old Cuenca Cathedral

We arrived into Cuenca, Ecuador, late in the afternoon on Tuesday, 16 February, 2016. This evening we were on our own, or we could choose to meet up for dinner with several from our tour much later that evening. Ursula and I decided to hit the streets on our own. We began at Cuenca’s two cathedrals, which are on separate ends of the Calderón Park. Calderón Park is named for Abdón Calderón, who fought for Ecuadorian independence.

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Memorial to Abdón Calderón in Calderón Park...

Fun Photo Friday — Road to Cuenca, Ecuador Favorites

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Dos Chorreras

Monday we begin the next phase of our Ecuador tour with the city of Cuenca. Until then, here are today’s Fun Photo Friday favorites of the road trip from Guayaquil to Cuenca:

Filed under: Fun Photo Friday, Photography, R. Doug Wicker, travel, vacation Tagged: Cajas National Park, Cuenca, Ecuador, Fun Photo Friday, Hosteria Dos Chorreras, photography, R. Doug Wicker, travel, travel photography, vacation

Ecuador — Road to Cuenca; Fruits and Cajas National Park

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Cajas National Park

Leaving behind the cocoa plantation, our tour began to climb high into the Andes. Before reaching the highest point on this segment of our trip, however, our tour guide granted us a stop at a group of local fruit stands along the road.

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Fruit Stand

This stop was a crowd-pleasing one, as we were still a ways from our lunch destination. Besides the bananas you see above, also available were passion fruit, guava, soursop, and many others I have no idea what they’re named.

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Frui...

Ecuador — Road to Cuenca; Cocoa Farm

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Cocoa pod

On the morning of Tuesday, February 16, 2016 our tour group boarded the bus and headed out of Guayaquil southeast bound for the city of Cuenca. This is a 200-kilometer/125-mile journey that normally takes about three and a half hours. But we had several stops to make along the way, the first of which was a cocoa plantation.

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Plantation flowers — not cocoa

We learned much about cocoa farming that day. For instance, the cocoa bean comes from the cacao (cocoa) tree, or Theobroma cacao,...

Fun Photo Friday — Guayaquil, Ecuador 3

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Shutters

Next week we move on to our next destination, Cuenca, with a stop along the way to a cocoa plantation. Until then, here is this week’s Fun Photo Friday photo gallery/slide show of Guayaquil favorites:

Filed under: Fun Photo Friday, Photography, R. Doug Wicker, travel, vacation Tagged: Ecuador, Fun Photo Friday, Guayaquil, photography, R. Doug Wicker, travel, travel photography, vacation

Ecuador — Guayaquil: Lighthouse of Santa Ana Hill

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Guayaquil from Hop-on/Hop-off bus

On our first day in Guayaquil, Ursula and I didn’t just hoof it around. We also took a Hop-on/Hop-off. While on that bus we passed this lighthouse atop a very tall hill:

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Santa Ana Hill

Fortunately we were in for a pleasant surprise, as our tour guide led us up the long trek to that lighthouse. After a brief break at the gardens (Monday’s article), we headed over to the base of Santa Ana Hill and began our climb:

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Climbing Santa Ana Hill

Near the bottom was a r...

Ecuador — Guayaquil: The official tour backtrack

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Plaza de la Administración

As you can probably tell by now, once we joined up with our tour group Ursula and I wound up backtracking much of what we saw the day before. But there were things we had missed that first time around, so we weren’t disappointed. For instance, next to the City Hall is Independence Square:

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Guayaquil Independence Square

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Guayaquil Independence Square

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Guayaquil Independence Square

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Plaza de la Administración

And next to City Hall is something we had missed completely, th...

Fun Photo Friday — Guayaquil, Ecuador 2

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Street color

Here is today’s Fun Photo Friday gallery and slide show:

Filed under: Fun Photo Friday, Photography, R. Doug Wicker, travel, vacation Tagged: Ecuador, Fun Photo Friday, Guayaquil, photography, R. Doug Wicker, travel, travel photography, vacation

Ecuador — Guayaquil: More Iguana Park and turtles, too!

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The ultimate sandwich

We returned to Iguana Park the next day after we met up with our tour group and guide. What we missed the first time around were the turtles, but Daniel made sure we saw them on this visit.

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Turtle soup

I wouldn’t trust my finger to all the turtles here, as this one appears to be of the snapping variety:

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Snapper?

Watch out above, as well, because I hadn’t realized the day before that the iguanas here were also tree climbers:

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Tree ornaments

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Stepping down

of our repti...

Ecuador — Guayaquil: To the Metropolitan Cathedral and Iguana Park

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Parque Seminario (a.k.a., Iguana Park)

West of the Torre Morisca is yet another park, but this one contains a twist. It’s overrun with some very friendly iguanas. This is Parque Seminario, directly in front of the Metropolitan Cathedral of Guayaquil. It’s also aptly nicknamed ‘Iguana Park”, and for obvious reasons.

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Parque Seminario (a.k.a., Iguana Park)

These guys and gals are running around all over the place. While it’s illegal to feed them, or even approach them, they will come right up to...