I woke up today feeling like I had a cold, but after I started moving, things got much better. I left the hotel with sunny skies above once again and walked north on Avenida Amazonas for about 20 minutes until I reached Parque La Carolina. The guide book had many good things to say about this gigantic park, and I spent the whole morning walking around, exploring the art pieces, relaxing in the sun, and checking out the trees, the small man-made “river”, and the bike jumps.
A little after noon, I ate my picnic and finished reading They Came to Baghdad, written in the 1950s by Agatha Christie, which I found in the “library” of the hotel. Then I made my way into the recently built Jardin Botanico, which is located inside the park. I spent nearly 2 hours gawking at their collection of plants and crops native to Quito, Amazon jungle greenhouses, cactus, orchids, carnivorous plants, rose garden, and more! They also had a biogas production plant, which was powered by a bike and solar panels. The whole experience really felt like walking through a jungle in the middle of the city! In fact, as I left I walked through a small part of the park, crossed a 6-lane street and ended up at a different sort of garden-the El Jardin Mall!
I am definitely not much of a mall person, but I wanted to see what the Ecuador version looked like. Unfortunately it was almost exactly like one that might be found in Birmingham, or Santa Monica, or Tacoma, except they had a SUPERMAXI grocery store inside! And that was exactly where I headed to pick up some sunscreen (I’m getting burnt!) and I also found a small package of salted banana chips, which turned out to be way too greasy and not banana-like at all. After setting the store alarm off 3 times with my sunscreen, (which I had clearly paid for!) I was finally able to leave the mall, and I walked back along Amazonas toward the Mariscal. Before dinner I had to stop at the hotel to get more money, but this turned out to be unnecessary, as I found an Indian-ish restaurant that had a $3 dinner special! The vegetable curry, naan as big as the plate, pineapple juice and samosas filled me up! The only other excitement of the night was a fireworks show taking place a few blocks away that I could see from my hotel window at 8 pm.
how dare you complain about the banana chips. you're so lucky to be somewhere that not only grows their own bananas but grows way more varieties of them than we could ever imagine finding at a grocery store here. god save the ecuadorian bananas!
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