Morning dawned brightly on our eleventh day here. The choirs had gotten up early and gone their various directions. After our big day yesterday we let them do their own thing and we slept in-- until 8:30.
Both the shower and toilet in our room are running very slowly. By the time we finish a shower we are standing in 3 inches of water! Our day will be filled pretty much with the details of preparing for our next adventure, the Galapagos. We need to move some of our belongings to the hotel where we will stay when we return from the Galapagos. We can only take one bag aboard the plane out to the islands, so we asked and the hotel will store the other bags which will be filled with things we don't need or that we have acquired.
We took to take taxi over to MamaCuchara's to pick up the music they'd copied for Leslie, then over to the new hotel to drop off our extra baggage and s
ouvenirs, then on to have lunch at what is reported to be the best place in Quito for Seco de Chivo (goat stew). A short taxi ride and we got our things safely deposited in the store room of the hotel. We Had a great seco de chivo at La Buen Sandwich under La Cathedral in the Plaza Grande. This place was highly rated by Lonely Planet and this time they got it right. Chunks of goat braised forever until they are so tender and have absorbed the essence of the sauce they braised in, served next to the ever=present mound of rice, some papas and slices of avocado. Muy Bueno!
We also bought one of those great helados from a vendor in the square like the one we enjoyed along our way yesterday, though this one wasn't nearly as rich.
The next stop, another must see when in Quito. We grabbed a taxi and asked to be taken to the Guayasamin museum, the great 20th century painter who lived here in Quito most of his life.
One would think that a taxi driver would know who this great man was and how to take tourists to his museum. And our taxi driver assured us he did. Not this guy. Oh, he said he knew how to get there, but by the time we had gone through a very long tunnel and through a toll booth, we had a pretty good idea he was hopelessly lost. We pulled over at Leslie's insistence and asked a guy who happened to be walking along the side of the road. He pointed up, way up, and back the way we came. Way back the way we came. Back through the toll booth, through the tunnel and up, up, way up. Leslie's map skills began to pay off as we zeroed in on the place and finally found it. Then the two of them started discussing what a fair fare would be. He insisting we should pay the full fare and Leslie insisting that it was too much since he obviously didn't know where he was going. Eventually, they settled amicably on a much reduced fare and we hopped out in front of the museum.
The museum is actually his home up in an upscale neighborhood. Beautiful home with a view out across the valley and across to neighborhoods on the op
posite hillside. We got a guided tour in Spanish and I was surprised at how much I understood. The gift shop was filled with prints of his works priced from around $400 up to a
round $2,000. Posters were also available much cheaper but we have no interest in those. The signed and numbered print I liked best was about two grand so it stayed on the wall. I'm relaxing out on the patio right now while Leslie looks through some of the other rooms.
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A bit about taxis here in Quito. We have had great luck with taxis so far. If you travel here be sure to insist on the cabbie turning on the meter before you go anywhere. The exception is on Sundays when they don't always turn them on them and often charge double the standard rate which is why they don't want to turn on their meters. You need to know what the normal rate (experience or talking to other folks who have been there for a few days will help you get your sea legs on this issue) is and then expect it to be double.
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We next headed for the Capilla del Hombre, a Guayasamin tribute to peace over war. It was supposed to be a 5 block walk which turned into a 5 block walk uphill. That might be doable at sealevel but I am not always doing well even when I'm not moving. Shortness of breath at higher altitudes has always been a problem for me, even as a kid. So I got real grumpy when I saw what we were getting into. Leslie saw a cab coming down the hill and asked him to take us the rest of the way. I felt kind of stupid when the cabbie turned around and drove about the equivalent of a block and dropped us off. Very kind of him when he could easily have refused and gone on to get a far more pricey fare. The Capilla del Hombre is a fortress-like construction. Inside the massive main room are huge paintings depicting war, injustice and their consequences. There is more on the floor below including a photo gallery of Guayasamin with various heads of state, Castro, Mitterand, etc., with any U.S. president conspicously absent. What with his socialist political leanings though, I guess a photo op with a U.S. president might not be forthcoming. Guayasamin died in 1999 so his estate has been turned into the Guayasamin Foundation which, besides controlling all things Guayasamin, also promotes peace and justice especially in parts of the world where that is in short supply. When we were ready to leave we asked at the entrance for a cab. An older man came up and offered to take us but we balked when we saw that he was unmarked. The attendant at the ticket window assured us he was okay so we decided to take a chance. But we settled on a price before we got in. $3 for all the way across town to our hotel. We knew that was fair so off we went.
Leslie hopped out near the hotel at the Supermaxi and I went on to the hotel to rest up before we headed out to dinner. Dinner was a three block walk away in a Brazilian place Leslie had spotted on one of her walks. It specialized in roasted meats that were brought to your table and sliced off the rotisserie. They brought us 8 different cuts of meat--pork, beef and chicken. An assortment of salads, rice, black beans (these caused me a problem when I bit into a small pebble and cracked a tooth), boiled potatoes and a local draft beer cost $20. We were stuffed!
A short walk through our neighborhood, even after dark, with no problems at all, and we arrived safely back to our room.
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