Guayaquil

From Cuenca I travelled to Guayaquil. It was a bit a strange feeling to walk around in the place I was born and not recognising anything. I had not learned much about Guayaquil from my fellow travellers, except that it had a reputation of being unsafe! So I booked myself into a nice hotel in the center of town, close to the Guaya river and started cautiously to explore....the riverfront, El Malecon 2000, has been redeveloped as a recreational area with parks, play grounds and even a shopping center.

Just north to the Malecon is La Peñas: a small area which has been restored and renovated and which is a delightful place to walk around and discover. The houses, all very colour full, the art galleries and the views over the city and the river from the light house at the top (444 steps to get to the light house, all of them numbered). The area is very safe, there are so many security guards around that you always have one in sight - that felt very good!

One morning I went to see the area and the house were I lived the first three years of my life: the house is in a richer area of the city and all houses have lovely gardens and trees - but all well hidden behind high walls and lots of security guards around. I even had to explain to one of them why I was taking pictures of this one particular house...



Otherwise I went to shopping malls and to the artisans market....it was time to think about all the Christmas presents to be organised!