Ecuador 1994 – Part Four

7th August – Monday

Prior to returning the car to Budget at the airport we had the worst breakfast of all at El Cafecito. It took 35 minutes to deliver, and consisted of rubbery pancakes with maple syrup, fruit juice and foul, cold coffee. Budget gave us a lift back into town. As the odometer wasn’t working, the administrator, Sandra, (under)estimated our kilometerage as 400 for the round trip and gave us an effective $6 refund. So the cost of the whole trip was $211 + petrol.

We spent the morning down at the park of Amazonas. The art exhibition was pretty lousy apart from the work of one artist, Pedro Gomez, who had put together some beautiful 3-D look pictures using airbrush and chalk. He promised to send one, gratis, for Liz. We won’t hold our breath! I bought a small rucksack for Joy which I think she’ll love. We had pork and salad with ají off a stall for lunch. It was served by a woman who would have outweighed the pig she was serving.

The Playground

An Artist in the Park

In the afternoon we headed for the park to the north of the city, towards the airport. There were all sorts of activities there. Stalls, hawkers, boating, fishing with small nets, horse-riding, football, volleyball, basketball. Everyone, of all ages and abilities, was having a good time. We decided to go to Reina Victoria for a Newcastle Brown before proceeding on to La Chosa for supper. Both were closed. We ended up at the Texan Grill where we had a good steak, but there were no postres. We dissolved our disappointment in a Marguerita at the Taco Factory where we met a Texan oil man who enthused about a sex show that he wanted to take us to. We left him to it.

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