After our short stay in Peru, we flew back to Ecuador to begin four weeks of travel on the mainland. Our first stop was Cuenca, a beautiful old city situated at the confluence of four rivers (cuenca means basin in Spanish). We stayed at a lovely B&B called Kookaburra Cafe & Accommodation located on Calle Larga, a main street that parallels the Rio Tomebamba.
The first thing we did in Cuenca was to leave town. It was a Sunday, and we wanted to see the market in full swing in the nearby city of Cañar. We opted for a full day guided tour that took us north of Cuenca to Cañar and then on to Ingapirca, a site of both Cañari and Inca ruins.
En route we learned a new way to cook pork. After scorching the pig, the cook scrapes off the black part and serves the crispy skin underneath with salt, aji (spicy sauce) and mote (corn kernels, also known as hominy).
The market at Cañar stretched for blocks with people selling clothes, rope, blenders, flour, fruits and veggies, fish, meat, and of course, cuy (guinea pig).
The archaeological site at Ingapirca is small in comparison to the places we saw in Peru but is the largest known Inca site in Ecuador. The Inca conquered the Cañari people in this area, and so the ruins are a combination of Cañari and Inca structures.
The next day Roger was on the trail for an authentic Panama hat. You may not know this but Panama hats are actually made in Ecuador and were misnamed because of the shipping route through Panama. We visited a converted hat factory that is now a museum and learned that the hats are woven with toquilla straw and saw the machinery used to block or shape the hats. Roger found his hat at the shop of Alberto Pulla, and we think it was his grandson who served us.
On our final day, we took a public bus to Cajas National Park west of Cuenca. Given the weather and the fact that we saw only one other hiker, we may not have picked the best time of year to visit Cajas. However, the landscape was stunning and yet another reminder of the diversity in Ecuadorian geography.
For more photos from Cuenca and the surrounding area, see: http://www.flickr.com/photos/sataylor/sets/72157626758130496/
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