Souvenirs – to buy or not to buy

Souvenirs are a token of your travels that you either get for yourself or your loved ones. For the most part, if you get them for yourself, they are a reminder to you of the fun and excitement of whatever destination you visited. If it’s something edible, the food can evoke memories of these far-away lands and literally give you a taste of what you had when you were away. Unfortunately, that “feeling” cannot really be transferred. When you buy some exotic Ecuadorian or Peruvian chocolate made from rare cacao fruit and bring it back for your friends, it will never mean as much to them because a) they didn’t go on your trip and b) they wouldn’t know the intricacies of why this item or food is so different or special. But it’s the “thought” that counts, right? Over the years, I haven’t bought as many souvenirs back for friends and family as I did when I first started traveling. I tend to move away from random objects like figurines because I cannot stand clutter, and if I buy them, I usually try to buy consumable items that are easy, like candy or chocolate. The exception to this is if I know a particular friend is really into something. When I went to Korea in 2016, I brought back specific Korean skincare for one friend and masks for another. When I visited France last November, I brought back French formulated sunscreen (that is not available in the U.S.) for my sunscreen-obsessed friend.

So when we visited Peru and Ecuador, I figured chocolate would be a good gift to bring back. I also picked up some Maras salt from the salt mines we visited in the Sacred Valley. But now that I am dividing these items up, I am not sure which friend would like what item more and why. So it ended up becoming a bit of a crap shoot or eenie-meenie-minie-moe game. It’s mostly different types of chocolate of the few items I bought, so how hard could this possibly be?

Even when I do enjoy the consumables I purchased while abroad and eat them at home, it’s never quite the same as the first time you get to enjoy them in the foreign land. But I still end up buying at least a couple things to bring home and eat because… why not?

Missing magnets are found to add to the magnet boards!

About halfway through last year, we had covered all three of the large magnet boards that Chris set up for us to display places we’ve visited around the world. Two are prominently displayed in our kitchen. The third is above the dresser in Pookster’s bedroom. We bought a set of two smaller magnet boards and were planning to hang at least one of them up this year. I gathered all the remaining magnets from the middle of last year through our Guangzhou trip this past January, hoping that Chris would put them on the fourth board and hang them up. Well, he didn’t do this, so I ended up taking all the magnets and tucking them away somewhere. When I went to go retrieve them after we came back from Guatemala in May, I realized I didn’t know where they were anymore.

So I combed through multiple closets and drawers, trying to see if I could remember where I’d placed them. It made no sense that I could lose them. It was a decent quality (and thus weight) of magnets. This apartment is only so big, so there were only so many places where I could have put them. And while organizing Kaia’s things and setting aside clothes she’d outgrown to give away, I realized they were in my camera box in her walk-in closet the whole time! I was victorious! I took them all out and laid them out, alongside our Ecuador and Peru magnets, and put them on the board for Chris to put up on the wall.

He put them up this late afternoon, and I went to admire all our new magnets of the last year. We have new magnets from Uruguay, Chile, and Argentina from last summer. We have a new one from Albany, New York, from last October. From our Thanksgiving trip, we have an Alsace magnet to represent Strasbourg. And from our side trip back from Australia, we have a Guangzhou magnet (we already had a couple Hong Kong magnets from 2015-2016’s end of year trip). It’s quite the collection of magnets since 2012 (and a couple before that, which I ABSOLUTELY NEEDED to display, such as my very beloved rotating Disney World 2010 magnet). And when I went through magnets from previous travels, I realized that I had a handful that were gifted to me of places I actually hadn’t been to — or at least at that time. I found a glass magnet a former colleague based in Santiago, Chile, had brought when he came to our New York office for training. I remember I had told him that I liked to collect magnets from travels, so he remembered this and gave this to me when he met me. The magnet has a outline of the long, skinny country, and the words “Chile Al Fin del Mundo” or “end of the world.” Granted, I hadn’t been to Chile at that point in time. But we did go last year, so I decided to place it on our fourth magnet board as an ode to him and his thoughtfulness.

Back from a 15-day vacation and home-cooked food is all I want

Our Northern hemisphere summer trip is always our longest trip away without any home base. This year, we were away for about 15 days, which according to Chris, felt like a longer trip than last year given that we had an overnight flight form New York to Santiago in June 2024. It felt like a good amount of time to be away to feel like we really got to reset and be offline. But at the end of this trip, while I am always a little sad the trip is ending, I’m actually happy to come back home, get back into my daily routine of exercise, work, and cooking. The part I tend to miss the most when I am away from home for a long while is cooking. A friend of mine thought I was crazy when I shared this, but I actually do mean it: cooking is one of my passions, so when I haven’t made anything in a while, my mind and hands tend to feel a little idle. Maybe at some point in the future, we could do an AirBnB where I could have access to a proper kitchen, cooking equipment, and be able to buy local ingredients to cook. But until then, this trip will always mean that we’ll be eating out the whole time, even if “eating out” can simply mean going downstairs to our hotel breakfast.

For dinner today, I made sure to soak lentils and rice the night before so that we’d have dal and rice as our base. I thawed some frozen chicken and frozen tomato onion masala. I trimmed the chicken and cut it into smaller pieces for a Malaysian style curry using the Sambal Lady’s Burlap & Barrel curry spice blend packet. The tomato onion masala got used in the dal I made in the Instant Pot. I cooked some jasmine rice in the rice cooker, and then I made two salads: Chinese-style cucumber salad, plus an arugula salad with beets, carrots, tomatoes, sun dried tomatoes, and toasted pepitas, tossed with a French-style vinaigrette. I also made a side of stir-fried bell peppers for the Pookster.

It always feels good to come back home from a trip and have home-cooked food that is less fatty, oil, salty, or sugary. I’m not saying all the food we eat out is salty, fatty, or oily, but well, you can’t really know what’s in your food unless you make it yourself. That’s what “home sweet home” is all about.

Caraguay Market, Ecuadorian chocolate, and lulo ice cream

Saturday was our last full day in Ecuador and in South America for this trip. It was a bit bittersweet to have the trip come to an end. On our last day, we visited a Caraguay Market, a very local market for fresh food, produce, and food stalls. There, we got a real taste of local blackberries that were a very interesting mix of sweet and tart. They definitely tasted like the un-sugared version of the mora (blackberry) ice cream we enjoyed at La Dulceria La Palma the other day! We also had a really deeply flavored sopa de mariscos from a prepared food vendor stall for just $2. It definitely felt like we could have been the only tourists at that market. The interesting thing about this market versus other markets we’ve visited in South America and around the world is that here, we saw endless vendors selling bags and bags of freshly picked beans. They ranged from fava to what looked like borlotti beans and white beans. I knew they were fresh because I actually saw some vendors freshly picking the beans out of pods! In addition to that, for the very first time I saw hibiscus flowers being sold fresh. Usually when I see them, they are already dried, but here, it was as thought they were freshly plucked! Hibiscus juice or “jamaica” is also very popular down here, though we never had any since we favored coffee or freshly blended juices like maracuya or tomate de arbol.

The last stop we had was at San Fernando Chocolateria in Guayaquil. It was quite touristy since it was right next door to the national chocolate museum, but here, we had a cookie brownie, a hot chocolate, and a scoop of lulo (fruit) ice cream — likely our last taste of lulo this trip. Kaia asked for chocolate, but well, we had to veto her and get lulo. She didn’t seem to mind and kept on wanting more and more bites of the lulo ice cream.

Every time we’ve had chocolate either here or in Peru, I’ve noticed that the chocolate just tastes fruitier. One of our guides told us that the chocolate here tends to be cacao plus sugar, and little else. Occasionally, they will add milk, but there are no other additives. While a lot of other chocolate manufacturers around the world will add “fat” to chocolate from things like various vegetable or palm oils, in Ecuador and Peru, the fat comes purely from the cacao butter, so the actual cacao bean itself.

After doing some further reading about Ecuadorian chocolate specifically, I learned that two different types of Ecuadorian cocoa plants are grown — National (arriba) and the CCN51 hybrid. The National/Arriba beans (“fine aroma”) beans are recognized for their fine floral flavor and fruity aromas. Ecuador produces about 63 percent of all fine Arriba chocolate in the world today. Unfortunately for us, though, Arriba beans only account for less than five percent of the entire world’s cocoa crop. So less people will be able to experience the complex flavors of Arriba cacao beans. CCN51 hybrid is a stronger plant in that it’s more resistant to disease and thus easier to grow. It also produces larger beans. Sadly, though, these beans are supposed to have a less nuanced taste. But they’re cheaper, so they make it easier for more people around the world to taste chocolate.

I should have known that there were a variety of different cacao plants in existence in the same way there are dozens and dozens of different mango, apple, and any other fruit out there. But having learned this and hearing more about chocolate from our guides, I realized that the higher level of fruitiness of the chocolate we were tasting was not just in my head. The flavor of chocolate actually is richer, deeper, and more layered here than I am used to. While I still enjoy milk chocolate I think my tastes are definitely preferring darker chocolates now in search of more flavors and nuance.

Six crabs for $18, iguanas, and my beloved alfajores in Guayaquil, Ecuador

Guayaquil is an interesting city. It’s the largest city in Ecuador, both by population and size, and is considered the country’s main port and economic capital. From a tourist’s standpoint, it’s also seen as the main access point to get to the Galapagos Islands. While I was pleasantly surprised when we arrived in Quito to see that the traffic was really predictable and orderly, I was shocked how different Quito traffic was to Guayaquil’s. In Guayaquil’s, it seemed as erratic and crazy as in Lima. Cars didn’t always stop at stop signs or red lights. They rarely give way for pedestrians here. It almost felt like we were once again in a different country!

Chris described Guayaquil as feeling “gritty.” He doesn’t mean it as though it’s dirty, but he says it has a different feel to it than Quito. It’s definitely far less manicured and picturesque here. In my own mind, Guayaquil is most definitely not as clean or orderly as Quito. On a lot of the streets, it smelled like an unpleasant mix of excessive bird poop and mildew. But I suppose that adds to the “character” of Guayaquil for those who choose to stop here for a few days.

The biggest highlights to our first full day in Guayaquil yesterday were 1) the cheap crabs (six for $18!) at Mercado del Rio, 2) the iguanas at a park in the middle of the city, and 3) Dulceria La Palma.

After the very expensive crab experience I’d had in Hong Kong earlier this year, I really wasn’t ready to pay much money at all for any crabs again. Plus, I dislike cracking crabs by myself and think it should really be a group activity. But when we saw cheap crabs on the menu at Mercado del Rio along the water, Chris insisted that I get them. So it was supposed to be five crabs for $18, and somehow, I got a sixth bonus one! These weren’t as fresh as the Dungeness crab I had in Hong Kong, but it’s okay since it didn’t feel like robbery like that meal was. I mostly focused on the claws and larger legs and left the rest. Chris and Kaia also had their seafood fix via some freshly grilled fish and seafood stew.

When we got to the Parque Seminario, known for iguanas just hanging out, I was wondering when we’d come across one… and then, suddenly, there were many! And once again, my child never fails to surprise me. Kaia shocked me when she exhibited no fear of the Andean condors outside of Quito just days ago. Then, while at a park in the middle of Guayaquil known for having lots of iguanas today, she was once again unfazed seeing these scaly looking reptiles. She tried to feed and even throw leaves on them and didn’t even look the least bit scared.

Another place we visited that we all loved was Dulceria La Palma. It’s a local institution for coffee, breakfast, snacks, and sweets that originally opened in 1908, but now has several locations. We went to the original location and had coffees, a tomate de arbol (local fruit) juice, two (yes, TWO!) mora (blackberry) ice creams, and sampled a few bite sized pastries. People were constantly streaming in and out for coffee, ice cream, ham and cheese sandwiches, and massive takeout boxes of pastries and cookies.

For me, the highlight here was finally, finally having alfajores on this South America trip. I originally ordered just two to try, but we ended up ordering two more (and our kind, friendly waiter threw in a third one on the house for us!). The alfajores were small, bite sized, and topped generously with a big sprinkling of powdered sugar. The biscuits shattered on contact as they should given their buttery quality. And the insides were so funny: the bakers who prepared them simply piped on a small dollop of caramel without spreading them. They were probably thinking, “yeah… we don’t have to spread them in this sandwich cookie for you; you get the idea, so go eat it!” These little bites of alfajores really topped off this trip for me.

“Can you calm down me?” and other toddler fun while in South America

In the last three-ish years since we’ve been traveling with Kaia, whenever we have a big trip, whether it’s been to India, Germany, Argentina, or Ecuador and Peru, one of the first questions I get asked from colleagues is, “Is your kid coming, too?” What my colleagues aren’t aware of is the fact that we don’t have grandparents on either side who live close by to just swoop in and take care of Kaia for a week or two. We can’t just drive an hour, drop her off, and then head to the airport. We also cannot easily have the grandparents fly from their homes in San Francisco or Australia to take care of her just because we want to fly off to some fun, exotic destination sans child. On Chris’s side, there’s the obvious issue of distance. On my side, it’s an issue of distance… plus the fact that I categorically do not trust my parents, mentally or physically, to care for my child.

Traveling with a baby, or now toddler, has its challenges. It makes even the slightest things, like going through airport security, more annoying and taxing. Packing is a lot more onerous because of all the other things we have to remember to bring for her (like her potty seat or overnight pull-ups, plus all emergency supplies). Our trip is also compromised because we cannot do everything we’d like to do. The biggest case in point is that we didn’t choose a Macchu Picchu outing on this trip because of her. We’re also not going to the Galapagos Islands… since how are we going to go snorkeling with a three-year-old? But I think all that is evened out by seeing her discover and explore new things, places, tastes, and also seeing her understanding of the world increase. Her love of trains, cars, airports, and planes is clear. She is usually open to trying new foods, thus increasing the diversity of her gut biome. And she always wants to know when she’s going on a train or plane next. She’s been able to see and interact with people from literally all over the world. When we arrived in Guayaquil yesterday, she yelled that we were going to Guayaquil, “not Ecuador!” and Chris had to explain to her that Guayaquil was in Ecuador, just as Quito was. Guayaquil is a part of Ecuador!

Last night, while putting her to bed, we finished reading and she looked up at me with a sleepy smile and said, “Can you calm down me?” I giggled a little when I heard this. While the grammar was definitely wrong, I just smiled so hard at the fact that she said this and knew what she was saying. I wondered if her teachers at school ever give her a back rub or something to “calm her down” before a nap (if she actually naps, that is). Chris and I never say to her that we’re going to calm her down before bed, so it must have been her school teachers who she picked this up from. As I rubbed her back and head while she closed her eyes, I wondered when the day would come when she’d get the grammar of this sentence correct. And I knew that when that day would, in fact, come, I’d likely be sad because once again, another teeny tiny part of her toddlerhood would slip away from her… and from me.

Museo Guayasamin and the “value” of art from the White person’s perspective

I learned about Oswaldo Guayasamin, the famous Ecuadorian artist of Quechua and Mestizo heritage, just a few months ago while researching interesting places to visit in Quito. He grew up poor but had a knack for painting and sculpture. He made his art debut quite young, just in his late 20s, which propelled him into an exciting life in the global art world. He used his fame and art to highlight painful truths of society, such as racism, social and cultural injustices (particularly to indigenous peoples given his own background), and inequality and oppression amongst people of lower social classes. His most famous paintings depict human suffering in multiple forms. It’s clear from looking at his work that he was heavily influenced by Pablo Picasso, as there are cubist elements to a lot of his stroke work that resemble Picasso’s art. In addition to recognition for his artwork, he was also given a prize for “an entire life of work for peace” by UNESCO. He’s also likened to the Michelangelo of Latin America by a number of art historians. In 2022, three years after his passing, La Capilla del Hombre (“the chapel of man”), housing his art, opened to the public, next to the house he spent the last twenty years of his life in. Both are located in the high hills overlooking Quito (which also meant it was a trek and a lot of sweat for us to get up there!). The chapel was made to document man’s cruelty to man and also the potential of greatness within humanity. La Capilla del Hombre and Guayasamin’s house were our last stops yesterday late afternoon before ending the day and packing up to head down to Guayaquil this morning.

While in La Capilla, I wandered around and looked at his depictions of human suffering and misery. The “Mural of Misery” painted in 1969 with shades of grey and white, was particularly sobering; you could almost feel the pain of the people he was painting given their facial expressions and contortions. I also noticed that he had a number of original paintings (acrylic) and sketches that were for sale. Just for fun, I took a peek at how much they cost, and I was completely shocked: the sketches went for $25-30 USD, while the original unframed paintings cost only around $2,500-2,700 USD. It made me realize that given Guayasamin is Ecuadorian, he is ultimately seen as Latin American, or brown, in an art world that mostly values White men and their work. An original Picasso, so a similar style of painting, would likely go for hundreds of thousands, if not hundreds of millions of dollars, today. Picasso original sketches themselves sell for $15-30K+. This whole thing just seemed ridiculous to me. Guayasamin doesn’t have the same name recognition as Picasso (obviously), but I’d say that a lot of their painting style is pretty much the same and is of similar quality. But at the end of the day, that’s the difference between how the white gaze values white men’s work versus brown men’s work.

When I visit art museums during our travels, I oftentimes think back to my sophomore year of high school when I studied Advanced Placement Art History. I always remember how overwhelmed I was by the size of the art history book. Despite the fact that over half the book covered Asian, Latin American, and African art, we had to skip over those sections because as my teacher told us, “those regions won’t be covered on the A.P. exam. But you can feel free to study them on your own time.” Early on, we were taught that people of color, their histories, their stories, their art, do not matter. And it was the beginning of my “what the fuck kind of world do we live in” perspective.

Despite all that and the state of our White-valuing world, I loved visiting Guayasamin’s house and museum, and I loved learning about his life and art and how he tried to depict people who were frankly being erased from society. I’m happy that I’ve been able to discover artists like him during our travels around the world. It reminded me of when we visited Bogota, Colombia, in May 2019, and how during that trip, we stumbled upon Fernando Botero’s museum, Museo Botero. I hadn’t known about him prior to our Colombia trip, but I was so happy we found out about him and perused his museum. His style, known as Boterismo, depicts people and figures in large, exaggerated form. Some pieces are kitschy or humorous. Others are political and instigating. But I think work like Botero’s could appeal to people who don’t even think they like or care about art.

While I enjoyed seeing Guayasamin’s home and art, Kaia was a bit less interested. Chris had to do some toddler finagling while I was walking through the house, attempting to listen to our guide, and also take a closer look at his artwork. Eventually, she had to “go to jail” in her stroller, which she was not the least bit happy about. All she wanted to do was run around try to touch everything (which… would not have been good for anyone). But I suppose art museums and historical homes were not necessarily made for toddlers to roam around in. Kaia’s a bit young to understand art, history, or art history, but I hope that when she’s older that she’ll be able to develop an appreciation for all the above.

Visiting the equator line at Intinan Museum in Quito, and a sumptious modern Ecuadorian meal at Somos

Today was our last full day in Quito before heading southwest to Guayaquil, the largest city in Ecuador, and our last stop on this trip before heading home. We got to have a bit of science education at the Museo de Sitio Intinan, which is actually situated almost exactly where the equator line is. Our admission included an interactive tour led in English by a guide. He discussed local indigenous cultures and old traditions (that are definitely not continuing on given how brutal they are…), explained the Coriolis Effect and how it influences everything that moves on the face of the earth, and also challenged us to a few activities, including balancing an egg (only a few people succeeded), keeping our feet straight on a single line with our eyes closed (here, we all failed. I tried to be as steady as I could, but alas, the earth’s rotation of course got to me, and I was even MORE off than I thought I’d be when I opened my eyes…), and tests of force on our arms. These all served as reminders to us that even when we think we are still, we are never, ever still: we live on a planet where we are constantly rotating.

We continued on after the visit to the equator line and enjoyed some local coffee, followed by a sumptuous lunch at the modern Ecuadorian restaurant Somos. It was so fancy that it even had a kids’ menu with very local touches, such as pasta with manaba cheese, a pizza option containing yucca sourdough, and a fruity, herby lemonade infused with local indigenous herbs. Kaia had the pasta deconstructed, and she ate all of the pasta, chicken, and sauce. She refused the cheese, though; she really does not seem interested in any cheese unless it’s stuck on a relatively plain pizza…

We started our meal with a complimentary tasting of canelazo, a panela (unrefined local cane sugar) drink that had multiple layers of flavor, including sweet, floral, and a bit of tart. I had the Amazonica beer, made with cassava, passion fruit, chonta fruit, and guayusa, while Chris had the Somos beer, a bitter style beer based on cacao husks. We had the lunch special options, which started with the corviche (green plantain and sal prietra patties filled with smoked Amazonian fish, served with slaw), and the ceviche tropical mestizo (local taxo fruit sauce with fish, cucumber, avocado, melon, served with green plantains. Our main courses were the raices del Amazonas, which was cassava puree, fried cassava, paiche fish battered in cassava flakes, chonta sango sauce, chili compote, and oregano oil; plus the chorizo ambateno — bean puree, pork belly, chistorra, avocado, tomato sauce, encurtido, potato, and egg. We ended with a banana cake served with a panela and coffee syrup, coffee butter, caramelized coffee, and banana and cacao nibs ice cream. They also gave us a last complimentary taste: three little freshly made brownie-style chocolates, which tasted particularly floraly like a lot of chocolate we’ve had in Peru and Ecuador thus far. Both starters were very fresh with lots of new flavors we were unfamiliar with. The paiche fish was definitely the highlight of the mains. And the banana cake was so unique — I doubt we’d ever have banana cake or bread served like that anywhere in the U.S. It tasted truly special and seemed very much a “modern Ecuadorian” fusion of flavors.

Somos itself was a beautiful restaurant with lots of natural light, plants, and murals inside, but what really tickled me were the bathroom signs. The women’s bathroom has a papaya hand painted on the door; the men’s bathroom door has a half-peeled banana. The papaya made me chuckle out loud.

The biodiversity of Ecuador is extremely high, and it was definitely on display here at Somos. This meal was definitely a highlight of our trip so far and how many other delicious plants (and animals!) we can eat in the world that we are not normally exposed to in the U.S. (or really, anywhere in the west).

Day trip to Quilotoa crater lagoon, one of my favorites

There are dozens of beautiful mountains, volcanoes, forests, farms, villages, and other natural wonders to explore in Ecuador. I knew we had to get out of the city and explore something, but I wasn’t sure where to start when researching. So I did a few searches for single day trips from Quito, and one of the first results was the Quilotoa crater lagoon/lake. Laguna Quilotoa is a collapsed volcano in the western Ecuadorian Andes, located about 178km southwest of Quito, in the Cotopaxi province; it sits at high altitude – 3,900 meters/12,800 feet above sea level. It takes about three hours by car to get there from Quito. The crater lagoon formed as a result of the Quilotoa Volcano erupting back in 1280 in what is supposed to be one of the most explosive eruptions of the past thousand years. This eruption caused the collapse of the volcanic dome to form the wide crater we can now see today. While Quilotoa Volcano has remained dormant since, occasionally, you can see volcanic activity via the electric blue-green waters bubbling at the edges of the lagoon. Even after all the gorgeous places in the world we’ve been privileged to visit, I must say that Quilotoa is likely one of the most spectacular places we’ve seen.

Volcanic minerals in the crater give the lake water its stunning emerald green, almost electric blue tint. The water color definitely changes depending on the time of the day, the weather, and the amount of sunlight hitting its surface. When we first arrived in the morning when it was drizzling and grey skied, the surface of the lake was more of a deep bluish green color. When we decided to go on horseback to get back to the top (partly because we were tired from the altitude, but mostly because Kaia really hated the hiking and whined endlessly), as we rode up, the light rain completely cleared. The sky was really dark and cloudy with light shining through, which then led to the water turning into this bright, vibrant, almost electric turquoise color with bright green at the water’s edges. I also loved seeing the beautiful purple lupine flowers along our hike down. They were really beautiful against the bright blue waters of the lake (they almost asked to have their photos taken…). And if my memory serves me well, these looked very similar to the beautiful purple flowers we saw when hiking in the South Island of New Zealand about 12 years ago, so that also brings back happy memories of brilliant purple flowers against electric blue waters.

Our driver/guide Cristian took us to the lake, and he hiked with us down and hiked up with our horses as we rode back up. He was a real trooper with us. Despite Kaia’s constant whining and protests, he managed to get us through the steep, sandy, and uneven hike down. And finally when we got towards the end, he even carried her down for quite a while since he said he was worried that if Chris tried to carry her given he was just wearing regular sneakers, they could both fall and get hurt. He humored her and carried her to the point up where the horses were, and we spent the best $20 ever for two horses to take the three of us back to the top (I’m just going to say — these were the cheapest horseback riding sessions we’ll likely ever have in our entire lives). Kaia was definitely Ms. Manipulator with poor Cristian. She would whine and whinge until he picked her up and carried her… just so she didn’t have to hike up herself. When she realized she wouldn’t have to go up all the way and would get taken on a horse, she got a little excited and kept on saying “Nay, nay, nay!” over and over again. After getting on the horse with me, Kaia was so calm and steady that somehow, she managed to even fall asleep on the horse with her head up!

Looking out at the lake, it was strange to think that a place this gorgeous and literally breathtaking (I mean, we were at high altitude, and I could even feel myself getting a slight headache on the horseback ride back up) had so few tourists. When we hiked down, we passed maybe just a small handful of tourists. As we reached the lake, there were just a couple more, but that was really it. As we got back to the top and headed out for lunch, we did see a few additional vans parked with people coming out to hike down, but this seemed so tiny in comparison with other famous scenic spots in the world. I really loved the peace and quiet. I reveled in the fact that there were no crowds or hoards of people. It feels really gratifying to see places in the world that “everyone else” isn’t constantly going to, the beauties that exist out there that are less seen and less traveled to.

Being honest with myself, though, places like Quilotoa will only grow in popularity. Who knows – Quilotoa may become one of the next Macchu Picchu type sites in terms of popularity (and over crowding). It’s already seeing an increase in tourists coming from internationally. Our guide told us that about twenty years ago, the entire area around the entrance to Quilotoa was all traditional mud and clay domed houses. Now, they have been replaced with more modern structures going up, with local families opening restaurants and hostels that cater to tourists (including the restaurant where we ate lunch, which had a number of hostel rooms in the back of the building for visitors to rent for short or long-term stays).

When we come back to the U.S. and people ask us what we saw, this will likely be on the top of my list. They will unlikely know what I am referring to, but I DGAF because I am totally obsessed with this place and think more people should visit (I just hope they don’t spoil the beauty of it).

Biodiversity of Ecuador

To be blunt, Ecuador is not considered one of the most popular travel destinations in the world. It’s unlikely in your top 20 or top 30. But after just a day and a half here, it kind of feels like by waiting this long to visit Ecuador that the joke is really on me. When most western tourists think of Ecuadorian tourism, they probably think of the Galapagos Islands. They’ll likely fly in and out of Guayaquil, the gateway to the Galapagos, do their swimming with the sea turtles, and then immediately leave. But outside of the Galapagos, Ecuador is renowned for its exceptional biodiversity, with a vast number of ecosystems, microclimates, and a ridiculously high number of endemic species. And it’s all due to its geographical location given that it’s right on the equator line, is on the ocean, and also includes parts of the Andean mountains and the Amazon rainforest. When I did a quick search for day trips outside of Quito ahead of this trip, I was astonished when I saw the number of results that came up for day trips, overnight, multi-day, and trips that would require a flight that spanned national parks, waterfalls, endless volcanos, cloud forests, the Amazon rainforest, and dry forest tours. I was completely mind-boggled and overwhelmed with the options, similar to day trips outside of Cusco. Except here, instead of thinking of which archaeological sites to visit, I was thinking about what natural wonder I wanted to prioritize visiting.

This morning, we headed up to take the teleferiqo cable car ride where surprisingly, it wasn’t just a a single viewing point we were taken to. We actually had multiple points where we could veer off and do our own hiking. I did not come prepared for that, as I wore nine-year-old flats that are near the end of their life. But the terrain was far more rugged than I imagined. Kaia yelped and whined many times when she felt it was too steep for her, and she had to coaxed endlessly to walk up and down rocky areas where she (ugh) slid a bit. The views were absolutely stunning: so many different shades of green surrounded us from so high up. We got to see endless mountains, a number of different volcanoes (for which we knew none of the names!), and lots of poofy marshmallow like clouds across the sky. Quito is technically at the equator line, but because we’re so high above sea level, the weather is quite mild here (mid 60s F). So we definitely had to wear more than our summer clothing in New York here.

When we came down, it was time for lunch. So we headed to the Mercado Central for a bowl of encebellado, or a mixed seafood soup, a bandesa plate of grilled fish, plantains, and rice, plus of course, fresh squeezed juice (maracuya). We made the acquaintance of a sweet fruit lady, who sold us a generous cup of husked goosberries, a cherimoya (maybe a third of the size of the ones in Lima!), and a yellow pitaya for just $3.50 USD. And as we walked towards the historic central district, we stumbled upon a tiny store front manned by one woman with a sign for “agua de cana” or “sugar cane juice.” she was running sugar canes through her machine multiple times to extract every last drop of juice. And she was also making other juices, such as jackfruit and orange. We got two cups — one cup of super ripe jackfruit juice blended with fresh cracked coconut juice, and one cup of sugar cane juice with a touch of fresh sour orange, for just $2.50. The sugar cane juice was very different here versus in the U.S., Australia, or Asia (where we primarily enjoy it). In Asia, it’s usually a deep green, almost golden color. Here, the sugar cane juice is much more on the brown side and almost seems caramelly in flavor. Both were a bargain and super refreshing. These tiny moments where we find little gems like this is always what makes our travel days so fun and interesting.