I sat in a blood orange colored chair hidden from sight in the corner of the baggage claim at Aeropuerto Internacional de Quito, my head resting wearily in my hands. My plane was supposed to arrive at 6:00pm that day but it was now 2:00am and I was exhausted, sweaty, and wondering what to do.
I had never traveled out of the country before this moment and I had only been on a plane once when I was fifteen and once when I was four years old, both had been heading to Disney in Florida (only a two hour trip). Now, here I was on another continent, completely unprepared for what I was about to face.
Everything I read leading up to my trip to Ecuador had told me to avoid taxis in other countries because they can be dangerous. I had booked a hotel that wasn’t fully in the city because the airport is forty-five minutes away and one my boss had recommended. I was told there would be WiFi at the airport in order to message the hotel and ask for a ride. On arrival I realized there was no wifi at 2:00am and I had no cellular data. Hence I had no way to contact for a ride. Finally, after agonizing about the right decision I asked for a taxi from the airport booth, hoping it would be safe. It took a couple drivers reading the address until I found one that knew the place.
I was whisked into a bright yellow taxi that drove me out into the darkness of early morning. I refused to put my small hiking bags in the back as I clung to them tightly and stared out the window, hoping desperately I wasn’t about to be one of the horror stories I had read about being kidnapped or robbed. As we turned off the highway into a small neighborhood I began to get scared. I wasn’t used to the architecture that is common in South America with tall walls, barbed wire, and gates guarding homes. All I saw around me were dirt roads, dogs howling and barking at the intrusion of the lone taxi in the desolate area. As the taxi man pulled to a stop at a tall gate with no sign I couldn’t help but look around for an escape. He said, “Here, hotel” with limited English and pointed out the window. I got out and looked around for a door. Clearly realizing I was absolutely clueless he hopped out, walked over to a hidden slot, opened it, stuck his arm in and rang a bell. An older woman who was clearly in a nightdress came out and spoke to him for a few minutes quietly before waving me in.
At the time I didn’t realize just how kind the taxi driver had been to wait for me to enter and to help me figure out how to get in. He could have left me at any point but instead decided enough not to leave me stranded at 2:00am in this unknown country.
After being ushered in by the woman and questioned why I was so late I finally was put in my room. This would end up being one of the very few times I stayed in a hotel during most of my travels.
The room was made of concrete walls and floors. There was a small slot in the upper right corner that functioned as a window of sorts but was no bigger than my hand. The lamp in the room radiated a glowing orange light giving me enough to barely see the darkened corners. I decided to look around a bit only to find a fun roommate hiding in the darkest corner of my small bathroom. This furry looking, eight legged creature was staring at me with multiple unblinking eyes, reflecting the light of my flashlight. I convinced myself this was the least scariest thing I had faced in the last couple hours. With a highly unusual calmness after seeing a spider the size of my foot in my bathroom, I wedged the door all the way shut and stuffed my extra shirts in the bottom crack of the door in hopes to keep my roommate, who claimed the room before me, from saying hi during the night. After such an anxiety driven few hours I was ready to sleep. Though my mind was spinning, questioning if I should buy the first plane ticket home tomorrow and canceling my internship. As I put my head down on the pillow and curled into a small ball I was lulled to sleep knowing I would be heading home with the rising sun.
Obviously, leaving never happened, as I woke late the next morning. After taking a freezing cold shower and changing into some clean clothes I sat on the bed for a few minutes. I told myself I had to go out there and figure out how to get to the city. I was supposed to stay in a hostel close to the old town of Quito but now I had to get there. It took thirty-four minutes of agonizing over pulling it together and leaving the room for breakfast before I did. I kept telling myself “You’ve made it this far, you can do a few more hours, you can always leave if you need to.”
Finally I made it to the reception and the sight of other tourists helped relax me greatly. After greeting the woman from the night before I sat at a small table wondering how to get some food. I figured if I relaxed and just sat for a moment I would be okay. I observed as people entered and left and ate some toast that I finally managed to order. It was then that I saw a young woman, she looked much younger than anyone I had seen there, about my age. There was something that made me do it, I can’t explain why but I did.
I approached the girl with a slight shuffle of nervousness and said, “Excuse me, I’m really sorry if this is super random, but is there any chance you are here for the Runa Foundation internship?”
She looked surprised and replied, “I’m not here for the Runa Foundation internship but I think the program I am with is partnered and works together with that internship.”
Just with that stroke of luck I met a great friend who spent the entire two months we were there, traveling around the country with me. To Alexa, what a wonderful adventure we had as two first time travelers learning the ups and downs of backpacking life.
Looking back at my first days in Quito, I’m proud of my courage and ability to do something that is difficult for me to do, especially being relatively introverted, and getting out of the country for the first time alone. I can’t help but be incredibly thankful for the completely random chance of running into Alexa.
Together, Alexa and I split a ride to Quito and got to our separate hostels. Thanks to Alexa’s hostel, we were able to go for a free afternoon walking tour that would bring us all through historical Quito. We met on the street in front of her hostel as a handsome and tall man began introducing us to Quito and setting the expectations and rules for the tour.
Before we began he mentioned, “Oh, by the way, any ladies or gentlemen wearing any kind of shiny jewelry, I highly recommend removing it at this time and either securing it in your hostel or bags. There are many pickpockets around that are able to swipe even earrings from a girl’s ears.”
This probably set the precedent for my future trips where I have always taken great care that my phone, jewelry, and money are hidden on me to make it difficult to get to or at least spread throughout my stuff so in hopes one pickpocket or thief at least wouldn’t steal it all.
The tour was great and we learned how Ecuador ended up with a national currency of USD, which was quite complicated and something I didn’t quite realize until I arrived (just shows how prepared I was). One of the major highlights for me was walking into this old Spanish Catholic church. Just a few steps in and my breath caught a bit in my throat, and not just from the swirling incense clogging every pore of my body. But the entire interior was either painted or inlaid with gold. Every inch of the inside was sparkling from the yellow gold covering the arching ceiling, all carved with delicate swirls, to the altar that was decorated in pictures of disciples, prophets, and saints. I’ve never been to Italy where the renowned Sistine Chapel is, but I can imagine it stops you in your steps just as this place did as soon as I entered.
We also had an interesting interaction with one of the guys in our group. Most were normal backpackers and tourists, just there to walk around historical Quito, but this random guy named John kept talking to us. For some reason all I remember is him constantly calling us hippies and then randomly just disappearing from the tour to go to a coffee shop to work. It left Alexa and I quite curious and confused but was fun to laugh at later.
The tour ended up being extremely long and as the sky darkened, we decided it was time to head back to our respective hostels. As we were heading back, we had to walk on the side of this street that had an extremely tight cobblestone curve. That means you have to beware of any cars coming through as you’ll have to turn sideways and scooch along the wall. The tour guide had warned us of this when we walked along it but maybe it was the exhaustion and time change for both Alexa and I, and we weren’t paying close enough attention. Thankfully a man who was a few feet behind us, whistled loudly enough that we stopped in our tracks to look at him, just as a city bus passed inches by us. It would’ve crushed us on the curve if it weren’t for us stopping.
We told the man, originally in Spanish, “Thank you so much, I can’t believe we didn’t hear the bus coming!”
He replied with a wave and, “It’s no problem but you’ve got to watch yourself on these streets, they are terribly narrow and you could get crushed just like you almost did.”
With that we headed back and went to sleep for an early morning the next day.
The next morning was our first full day in Quito and we wanted to make the most of it. Once again Alexa was way further ahead of things than I was and booked an inexpensive tour to the Mitad del Mundo or the monument of the center of the world, which was located on the equator. Luckily there was still space when I got to her hostel, so I also signed up.
Since that small tour wasn’t until 2:00pm, we decided to go explore even more. We headed to visit the Basilica church that allows you to climb the towers for a high up view of Quito. There weren’t any clear signs of where to go so we walked around the inside first. This church was extremely different from the one from yesterday, it had very gothic architecture with no ornaments, just high cement arches, tiled floors, and stained glass windows lining the pews. We found a balcony that allowed us to get close to one of the stained glass windows. It had these brightly lit designs in a circle, reminding me of a mandala as the sun shone through the bright reds, blues, greens, and yellows.
Though the inside was nice, we really wanted to see the view so we wandered around some more before finding some stairs and ladders leading up. We continued up for around five minutes before we realized we were in one of the clock towers. Standing on some staging, we turned to see we were directly behind the clock face, we could see the numbers and hands right through it. It was so cool and I felt like I was in some disney movie being up in the clock tower. The excitement didn’t last too long as a man came up and saw us, then started yelling in Spanish so we figured we were not supposed to be there. He pointed us down a different way and we ended up in a gift shop where we ducked under some “Do Not Enter” and “Caution” tape.
To this day I have no idea how we actually ended up there but we truly thought we were going the right way to the lookout towers. After asking in the gift shop, we finally found the correct way up and climbed some very shaky iron ladders all the way up to the roof of the church. The view was amazing but my knees were shaking and my hands were gripping the rails so my knuckles turned white and the iron bars left imprints as my fear of heights won.
There was another section of lookout where we crossed this wooden plank bridge that went over the high arching gothic ceilings of the inside of the church. There were some railings but it felt strange being under the actual roof yet above the ceiling as we balanced along. It was fascinating to see how far along Quito went as the houses packed together formed a labyrinth of colors and heights through the valley.
We climbed down and enjoyed Ecuador’s independence parade as children walked through playing in bands and dancing with traditional and decorative Ecuadorian dresses. Our fun of exploring had to end somewhere so we headed back in time for our tour to the Equator.
The tour to the equator was fun as we learned a bit more about the history of Ecuador and met some other people. One was an older woman named Joanne. She was pretty funny as she explained to us, “My husband and I did quite a bit of traveling with the Airforce when we were younger but now that he is out he just wants to stay home all the time.” She continued on, “I decided no way was I staying home so I go on all kinds of these little trips without him.”
She was quite adventurous and as part of the tour they are willing to drop you off at the bottom of a mountain, where you can either walk or take a short car ride up to this cable car called the Teleferico. This cable car would take you to the top of the mountains surrounding the city. So Joanne, Alexa, and I got dropped off there instead of at the hostel and caught the cable car just in time for sunset. We shivered at the top as lights began flickering on along the longest city in the world. It felt like with the sun asleep, the city awakened as if the city itself was a constellation of shining stars set into the surface of the Earth.
We took a cab back to our hostels and Joanne’s hotel and once again said goodbye as we set off to catch some sleep.