Quito, Ecuador

Saturday, January 15

The day is finally here! Our family traveled to Ecuador today!

Ecuador has been on Andi and I’s travel bucket list for years. It’s a South American country known to be a very affordable and accommodating place for travelers + the amount of biodiversity here is unmatched. Where else can you visit the Andes Mountains, Galapagos Islands and the Amazon Rainforest all in one country?

Our travels actually began yesterday on Friday, January 14. We decided to drive to Minneapolis and stay the night in a hotel so we didn’t have to wake up quite so early to travel to the airport. Tory and Aden were super excited to stay in a hotel by Mall of America — you’d have sworn that was a special treat in itself! Saturday morning, we took the hotel shuttle to the Minneapolis airport and boarded a flight to Atlanta, then to Quito, Ecuador. Andi and I were a little nervous that we’d have all our ducks in a row for international travel. Ecuador requires visitors to be fully vaccinated and to provide a negative PCR Covid test within 72 hours of boarding the flight. The problem, however, is that most COVID testing sites aren’t able to turn around results that quickly right now. In the end, everything worked out OK for us and we had our documentation in time to go.

Our flights to both Atlanta and Quito, Ecuador went smoothly. We even breezed through Customs without a wait. All in all, we couldn’t have asked for a better travel day. Andi arranged for a shuttle driver from the Holiday Inn in Quito to pick us up at the airport. The hotel restaurant was still open for dinner by the time we settled into our hotel room at 9:00pm, so we decided to eat there. We ordered chicken for Andi and Aden, pasta for Tory and sea bass for me. The restaurant also gave us a free appetizer of fried plantain chips to snack on while we waited for our meals.

Sunday, January 16

Sunday morning, I woke up around 6:00am to workout in the hotel gym. This was seriously the fanciest and cleanest Holiday Inn I’d ever seen! Every inch of this hotel was spotless — including the gym — and I had the whole place to myself. After my workout, the four of us ate breakfast at the hotel restaurant. Delicious fruit and yogurt, pancakes, omelets and chicken stew — don’t ask! It was all very good and the restaurant wait service was excellent.

At 9:30am, Andi arranged for an English-speaking driver named Gustavo to pick us up and take us to a town called Mindo about 1 1/2 hours north of the capitol city Quito. Before we went, Gustavo agreed to take us to the shopping mall to get local SIM cards for my cell phone and Andi’s iPad. Doing simple, everyday tasks in a new country is always interesting. At this particular Ecuadorian shopping center, we all had to show our vaccination cards upon entering. We gathered right away that wearing masks is also a followed rule here in Ecuador. Gustavo said that as a tourist driver he is even required to wear a mask while driving in his vehicle by himself. Inside the mall, the stores were very similar to what we’d find in the USA offering a selection of clothing, kids toys, a variety of restaurants and a cell phone store. Aden was impressed to see they even sold Pokemon and Roblox merchandise — his two favorite video games. Andi purchased the SIM cards we needed with Gustavo’s assistance. He helped translate what we needed from English to Spanish and we were very thankful for his help.

After the mall, we continued onto Mindo. Andi and I talked with our driver about various things as we drove. We asked questions about Ecuador — his recommendations on places to see while we’re visiting, foods to eat and even about the economy and money (Ecuador uses the US dollar as their currency). In return, he asked us questions about vacation spots in the USA, about where we live, homeschooling and the places we’ve traveled. My biggest takeaway from our conversation with Gustavo today was that people are the same wherever you go — work, family, the pandemic; life brings us all similar hurdles and joy.

As we drove to Mindo, the scenery changed from big city to lush, green trees with rolling white clouds. Mindo is a small Ecuadorian town located in the Andes Mountains cloud forest. Our driver, Gustavo, said it’s sunny every morning in Mindo and rains every afternoon starting around 1:00pm. It had just starting to rain when we arrived.

Andi reserved us an airbnb just outside of town for the week. It’s a wooden house with three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a kitchen, living room and covered outdoor patio. Surrounding the house are incredible lush gardens filled with trees, flowers and birds. A woman named Mary greeted us at the door when we arrived. She is the caretaker of the property. Mary showed us around the house, testing our Spanish listening skills right off the bat as she doesn’t speak English.

Later, we learned this property is also a small dragon fruit plantation. Aden discovered the dragon fruit sitting on the counter right away and cut into one. He couldn’t help himself — he ate two of them in a matter of minutes! They were so tasty.

Once we settled into our airbnb, we asked Mary to call us a taxi so we could go into Mindo. It was a $2 cab ride and about a 5 minute drive. Mindo is an adorable small town. The main street is filled with restaurants, shops and tour operators offering adventures such as river tubing, zip lining, and bird watching tours.

We were all hungry and decided to eat at a restaurant Gustavo recommended called Caskaffesu. We were seated on an outdoor patio with a colorful open courtyard nearby. Aden entertained himself while we waited for our meals by playing with a friendly white bunny hopping around the restaurant. So much food and it was all delicious — Andi ordered chicken, steak and shrimp fajitas, Tory had a cheeseburger, Aden had chicken tenders and papa fritas (French fries) and I ordered the lunch special which included the soup of the day, choice of meat, vegetables, rice, beans and dessert all for $5.

After lunch, we walked around the streets of Mindo and then stopped at a local frozen yogurt shop for a treat. All four of us were having a hard time staying awake — we were so tired from traveling, we decided to grab dinner for later and go back to the airbnb to rest for the remainder of the evening.

Back at the house, Andi and I fell asleep for two hours while Tory and Aden laid down and watched shows on their iPhones. Andi heated up leftovers from lunch + the rotisserie chicken we’d purchased earlier in town & we sat outside on the outdoor patio for dinner.

Tomorrow, we’re excited to explore more in the town of Mindo.